1. No vacation - yet.
The temptation to put off beginning a job search is great. Maybe you've dreamed about an extended vacation. And once you find a job, you can't expect ordinary vacation time for at least a year. Besides, you have severance pay.
Resist the temptation. Promise yourself time off once you've landed a job with better perks, before beginning work. If you delay a start, you'll soon realize that you've wasted a lot of valuable time as well as financial resources.
When athletes get out of shape, they must work hard and long to get back into it - and performance suffers in the interim. Right now you're in good trim-geared to working under pressure and meeting deadlines. So keep the momentums going by swinging immediately into your job search. Don't fall into the "I deserve a vacation" trap.
Perhaps you have six months before you must leave your company. Your boss has said that you might conduct your job search on company time, although you'll have certain continuing responsibilities. This can work to your advantage - if you use the time effectively.
Six months is a whole half year. Surely you'll find a good job in that time, and what's more you'll be doing useful work. Don't fool yourself.
Those six months will go by rapidly, and your first priority is to get another job. Do what you need to do for the company, but use as close to 100 percent of your time on your job search as you can manage. Don't cut back on your efforts until the company complains.
2. If possible, defer the payment of major bills (i.e., mortgage, utilities, etc.). Be candid with your creditors before a crisis comes up. You can also re finance your home or borrow on your life insurance. Try to avoid more drastic steps like selling your home or taking a child out of college - the upset can adversely affect your campaign.
3. Apply for unemployment compensation.
4. Don't short-change your campaign expenses. A revised printing of your resume or an extensive mailing is really fairly cheap in view of the stakes involved.
5. Keep track of your job-hunting expenses - some are tax-deductible.
On the whole, your reduction in income is probably less than you might think, providing you have severance pay and unemployment compensation (which is not taxed), and your federal and state income taxes are lower.
We have seen many of the traps and problems that can arise in a job campaign and how to avoid them. Now let's look at the general principles of a good campaign.
There are 10 principles of job hunting applicable to all and at any time. They are:
- Often a job hunter goes looking for a job and can't find one - until he or she finds a way to uncover the original source of all jobs - identifying an employer's need that the job hunter can fill.
- Perhaps a job hunter's greatest assets are knowing what he or she is willing to do and having the motivation to find a way to do it.
- Many employers believe and stick to the fact that they will hire to fill (even though they're not actively hiring) if the right candidate comes along.
- A successful job hunter must get the serious attention of someone in a position to hire - someone who often has set up defenses to guard against the superficial approaches of most job hunters.
- Effective job hunters are made and not born. They find good jobs in any economic climate, while ineffective ones often have great difficulty in even the best of times.
- Everyone has liabilities, but the skillful job hunter knows how to sell his or her assets so that any liabilities are minimized in perspective.
- An effective job hunter understands an employer's likely needs, what assets have the greatest appeal to prospective employers, and how to present them effectively.
- There are numerous ways to present your credentials - and you may have to experiment with a number of them to see what works best for you.
- Being turned down may present you with a unique opportunity, if used skillfully, to show that you are an outstanding candidate.
- Everything you do in your campaign is judged as your best. Now let's see how you choose your preferred objective - which can be one of the keys to a successful campaign.
