Been searching for a job for three months? Six months?
Maybe even a year?
It can be quite daunting and overwhelming for your mental health when the bills are piling in, credit cards are maxed out and payments are overdue, and you lose all motivation and strength to keep pushing on when you are constantly receiving job rejection emails.
Job searching, especially if you are looking for a remote job, is a lengthy and protracted process that is aggravated by ghosting from recruiters and employers, discrimination, and unethical hiring and recruitment practices.
However, there are some factors that thankfully lie within your control as a job seeker, that enable you to cut short the search process and secure a job (including remote jobs) much more quickly than others.
How To Find A New Job Quickly
Career experts at Indeed recommend some simple steps to take that will help you find a job much sooner than you ever imagined:
1. Explain Your Gap In Employment
If you've been out of the workforce for a long while, especially if it has been more than a year, it would be wise to provide a suitable explanation in your resume and cover letter for why you have been unemployed. It might sound obvious and unnecessary to include—after all, it's not your fault that you're out of a job for so long—but failing to do this will lead to red flags with employers and recruiters and set you back in your search.
2. Keep Professionally Active
Next, Indeed's experts recommend that you develop new skills through courses, volunteering, or self-study. Keeping professionally active while you're out of work, especially if it is for a longer time than you expected, is essential to ensure you are always relevant to your industry, and have fresh skills that are attractive to employers. It helps you to have new and unique experiences and conversations to which you are adding value on platforms such as LinkedIn, and increases your visibility and job market value.
3. Use Job Boards And Professional Organizations
You should also think outside the box when it comes to job boards. In many cases, it might be best to apply for the job on the company's own website, rather than a job board. However, if you do decide to use a job board, Indeed says that you should explore multiple boards, and include professional organizations and membership bodies as part of your search.
They will usually have an industry-relevant job portal that will have opportunities posted by corporate or affiliate members.
4. Network Extensively
And in your desire to land a job quickly, never underestimate the value of networking. Go through your contacts of family, friends, acquaintances, old friends from university or school, alumni, etc., for job leads. They may have a job or know of a decision-maker who does—and even put in a good word for you through their employee referral system.
While networking, Indeed experts say that you should go as far as to request informational interviews to learn more about companies and make connections. You can do this at in-person and online networking events, and through LinkedIn.
5. Broaden Your Search
One other way to speed up the process of landing a job, including getting a remote job, is to broaden your search to include jobs requiring similar skill sets. Think about all the job titles that may not sound identical to your last role or job that you're looking for, but are very similar in terms of skill set required.
For example, a contract manager, project manager, and operations manager have much in common. However, if you were solely looking for a job as an operations manager and entered that search term in job boards and search engines, you would be severely disappointed. So take time to brainstorm other roles that share the same or similar responsibilities, and you might just find it sooner.
These five steps will speed up the job search process and enable you to land your dream role with confidence, increasing your options, and improving your competitiveness in the market.
