With Covid-19 came lockdown; with lockdown came enormous strain on our economy and with that strain on our economy came job losses. In the third quarter of 2021, South Africa’s unemployment rate rose to 34.9%. To put this into perspective, in the 3 months between July and September, six hundred and sixty thousand (660,000) people lost their jobs. Reading these kinds of stats can be very disheartening and can leave one feeling rather despondent. But it doesn’t all have to be doom & gloom. We can either see the glass as half empty or half full; and I’m a half full kind of guy.
It was Albert Einstein who said, “in the midst of every crisis, lies great opportunity” and that goes for this job crisis too. But with hundreds of thousands of job seekers on the market currently, how can one take advantage of our current situation? Well, here are a few quick ideas to get your foot in the employer’s door:
Network to an interview
The days of sending out your CV for job postings then waiting and hoping for that phone call or e-mail are long gone. Stats globally show that 80% of new jobs are acquired through referrals and/ or networking. 80% is a huge statistic and one that you can’t afford to not be a part of. Yet so many candidates are unaware of the strategies to networking, and in particular, cold networking. They feel it a daunting exercise and tend to rather not do it. But it needn’t be; by putting steps in place to help you in the process, you can make it not just less daunting, but an incredibly valuable tool in your job search tool bag. So below, I will show you one of my favourite techniques, one that I have found to be rather successful, to network your way to a job interview and potentially a new job, using LinkedIn.
- Make a list of companies that you are interested to work for
- Map the people who can get you to your next role
- Send them a message
This can go very wrong if not worded correctly. We teach the steps and the language to use to get this just right in our Job Seeker Coaching course.
Volunteering
This might not be for everyone, but if you can afford to, offer to volunteer for 3 months to 6 months. (I generally wouldn’t advise volunteering for longer than that.) Companies need the people, they just can’t afford them right now, so a lot of firms will be more than happy to take on a few volunteers. With the right aptitude and attitude, when that 6-months has run its course, the company’s options are to bring someone else in and start teaching them form scratch or employ someone who has been in their organisation for 6 months and already has a grasp on their systems, processes and culture. The answer is an easy one. But as mentioned, this isn’t for everyone and should only be done if you can afford to.
Have a great (not just a good) CV
Ultimately, whether you are networking your way to an interview or offering to volunteer, HR or the hiring manager will eventually need to see your CV. You don’t want to get thos far and then falter at the final hurdle. You need to be able to present a great CV that speaks to what the company needs. Our Job Seeker Coaching Coarse teaches just how to do that through the use of numbers, keywords, matching language, a skills matrix and the likes. Present them with a CV that makes them go “this is someone we MUST interview.”
With a couple of hundred thousand people sending out 10, 20, 50, 100 mediocre CVs a day, be that one candidate who is swimming upstream. Use this time to your advantage and stand out from the crowd.