Developing and Managing Your Calendar as Part of Your Job Search
One of the items which my clients and webinar attendees who are in job search during the process of finding their next employment opportunity, is the necessity of setting their own calendar throughout the search process. This may seem surprising to those who either have not been in job search for a long while, or perhaps have been fortunate never to have been part of a long job search to locate their next work opportunity. However, while we indeed “may keep calendars” within our lives, often while working those calendars “are set for us” by others.
For example, some of the appointments or meetings on the calendar are set by your place of employment, your bosses, you clients through meeting them, etc. Other appointments “may be scheduled,” by your spouse or your children, where they have activities that “require” your attendance or participation. However, the job search process can be very different. The person in search often finds initially that they have large gaps of “open time.” They may learn of different activities they should be doing as part of the search process. The job searcher will hear such things as they should network with others, attend job search support groups, be a part of webinars which will enhance their job search skills and of course spend time investigating or applying for jobs. However, when left to their own devices, and when proceeding without much structure, the job searcher can quickly find that days and weeks go by very quickly, and a feeling of “hopelessness,” begins to emerge in terms of making progress in their job search.
While certainly the goal of a job search is to find your next employment opportunity, the setting up of a “calendar schedule,” and monitoring one’s progress against that calendar is a major part of the process toward success. One such technique that I look to guide my clients toward using, and which is one that I learned in my coaching studies, works as follows. It has been one that I have also transferred into using as I manage my coaching business.
The advice to my clients is to start by determining how many hours each week they can allocate to their job search. We all get 168 hours in a week. If one is not working, ideally, they can allocate 35 to 40 hours, (the hours they would have normally been working), to the search on a regular basis. However, that may not be possible for all. For some, they may now find they have family obligations around the home. Others may need to care for an elderly relative. Therefore, they may only have 15 to 20 hours to spend on the search each week. There is nothing wrong with that fact, but one needs to realize the less time spent on the search, the longer the search may take, (again depending on the type of role one is seeking, the levels of people one may need to speak to during the interview process, etc.).
Once identifying the number of hours available each week, on Friday or Saturday of that week, sit with the calendar for the coming week. Of your available hours, how will you use them? Statistics have shown, the more likely how successful one’s search is, is in direct proportion to the search methods they use. Connecting with individuals through networking conversations or direct contact, have statistically proven to be far more successful than just blindly applying to job applications or using recruiting services, (as much as 8 to 10 times more successful). Therefore, with the time one has, whom may they look to have a networking conversation in the coming week. What companies will they look to contact, (either by phone, mail or in person). Additionally, what new contacts may they make through seminars/webinars/association meetings, or places where others are in job search mode and may be able to point them to opportunities. Certainly, some time may need to be provided toward job search application completion, but it should be in proportion again to the success of such efforts, (perhaps only 10% to 25% of your available job search time).
As the week ends one should look back on the week in the following way. What was on the original schedule? How much of that got completed? What were the positive results of those efforts? What little “rewards” could one give themselves for the progress they made? What might have to be rethought of when the schedule is made for the upcoming week? Is a certain activity likely to take more time than anticipated? What roadblocks might one come up against?
Taking the time to conduct one’s search with such discipline helps to keep the job search in control of the job searcher, as opposed to the search becoming a fruitless exercise of no progress. Finding that you are the one who needs to manage all the details of your calendar in search, (as opposed to having it dictated to you by your life’s normal work and family activities), is an eye opener for many a job searcher. The quicker one can manage that fact, the more successful their efforts are likely to be and at the same time they will more quickly minimize or eliminate activities that keep them from making any progress at all in their search.
