Avoid These Common Mistakes During Your Job Search

Looking for a job is hard and with so much conflicting job search advice online it’s difficult to know what you should and shouldn’t do during your search for a new job.

I’ve been a recruiter for almost two decades and here are the common mistakes I see a lot of people make.

Not Knowing Why

Why are you looking for a new job? This is the first thing you need to know before you start even writing your CV and applying for jobs.

Your entire job search should come back to you ‘why’.

Your CV or Resume

Poorly formatted, trying to cram too much irrelevant information into two pages, not listing achievements, the list goes on.

The entire purpose of your CV is to get you an interview, it should be written with that goal in mind.

You can download my Free CV template if you need help.

Your LinkedIn Profile

Most recruiters use LinkedIn to search for candidates and the advertise jobs.

You need to make sure your LinkedIn is fully optimised so that you appear in recruiter’s search results and appear high in them. But also, when a job is advertised on LinkedIn, it is automatically emailed and marketed to users whose profile matches the skills in that advert.

You need to optimise your profile to make sure the jobs come to you but also to make sure that when a recruiter lands on your profile that they feel compelled to contact you.

Job Search

You restrict your job search to simply applying for job adverts rather than networking with the right people online and marketing yourself to potential hiring managers.

There are a huge number of people hired everyday for jobs that were never even advertised.

Job Interviews

Not preparing for job interviews in the right way. Knowing how big the company is, when it was established and other pub quiz type trivia will not help you in your job interview.

In job interviews you’re not tailoring your answers because you’ve not prepared properly, you’re not telling stories and you haven’t prepared questions you can ask to understand if this job aligns with your ‘why’.

Job Offers

You struggle to negotiate job offers, whether that’s salary or benefits. Does the offer align with your ‘why’, have you been offered lower than you where looking for and do you know how to negotiate a higher salary?

A lot of people don’t know how.

Looking for a new job needs a strategy, you need to be proactive and prepared.

Find out how with my Ultimate Guide to Job Searching which will help you avoid all of these mistakes and be fully prepared and proactive in your job search.

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