Between the Trapezes - On Job Search! | March 2021
Between the Trapezes

Help for when you’re between two career certainties

March 2021

And the latest about job search during the pandemic:

What is the latest on job search now, especially as vaccinations for COVID are here and on the rise? Experts are saying we won’t see much change for a while: that the hiring process is still via Zoom or similar. And when new hires come on board, it will still be in a working remotely capacity. For how long?

We don’t know. We wish we did but all I’m seeing is what’ll be an uneven "coming back to a new normal", with each industry coming back at its own pace. And some forever changed. So keep up with your field, keep networking, keep reading sources like this and others.

Want to know some of the latest? Read on.

Joanne
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Joanne Meehl
Resume expert who hopes you never need to actually use your resume. "The Resume Queen"®
LinkedIn profile creator if you want yours to be an employer magnet.
Networking guru who coaches you in elegant (not needy, gimme gimme) networking, finding hidden leads.
Interview prep that puts you at ease matching what they need and describing why they need you.

BA, MS, IJCDC
Photos in this Between the Trapezes courtesy of Shutterstock.com
unless it's flowers or memes, which are by Joanne

Your Career Is The Treasury of Your Life ©
Are you a new or recent college grad, in job search, know what you want, but it’s not happening? 
Contact Joanne (email is at the bottom of this page). She wants to hear from you first (parents, we will talk later!), so that YOU and she can talk about what is working and not working in your job search. It will actually be a fun conversation!
"How long should my job search take?"
It’s hard to separate “How long should my job search take” from “How long WILL my job search take?” They aren’t quite the same. But they get at the same thing: time. And what’s “normal”, which each candidate wants to be.

If I can answer either question for my job search clients, who are mostly seasoned professionals, it reassures them. And job seekers usually want – as soon as they decide to start a job search – that new job right away.

By the way, the old adage of “It takes a month of search for every $10,000 you want to make”, I never found to be true, either “back in the day” or now.

Before the Great Recession of 2008-2011, one could say your search would take “a few months”. Confidence in “landing” that desired new job was high. The candidate was pretty much in charge. There were no great numbers of job hunters, just a regular flow of people deciding to make career changes, or new coming into the job market. 

Then it all changed: parts of the country, like Minnesota, underwent massive layoffs for the first time. Job search became a discipline. LinkedIn was now a very big thing. Technology was starting to make an impact. 

Since the recovery from that recession, the job search seems to have settled into a typical 4-6 months for first-tier managers through VP-level, and I’ve seen that “average” length hold even during the pandemic – if you do the right things.

Yes, that time totally depends on the candidate. And I’ll guarantee it’ll take even longer if you do these things:
  • You do a resume-based search, instead of a networking-based one
  • You base your search activity on how you FEEL, not what needs to get done each day (it’s a campaign you have to work at)
  • You’re doing an on-and-off job search, letting yourself get pulled off course by house projects and the like
  • You keep changing career goals, titles, direction
  • You have a poor presentation and aren’t fixing it
  • You’re using old job search methods that haven’t worked in years
    
And that’s how I answer the question to each person who asks, “How long will my job search take?” 

It’s up to you.

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This month’s Tip from Joanne:

How many pages
should my resume be?

Answer: If you’re a new grad, or someone entering the workforce later in life, you can usually stick to one page without having to resort to a too-small font size.

But most professionals with more than 2-3 years of career-related experience will need to go to two pages -- because you won’t have space to fit everything without going to a microscopic (and impossible to read) font size. Longer than 2 pages? I don’t recommend it except very rarely.

So stick to 2 pages max, and you’ll hold their interest. 



Thought for the Month

Spring is nature's way of saying, "Let's party!"

— Robin Williams



Joanne Meehl Career Services LLC | 612.440.6765 (new) | Joanne@TheJobSearchQueen.com