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Five Biggest Job Hunting Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
Looking for a job can be a challenging experience. Between the resume writing and the interviews you can find yourself exhausted and ready to throw in the towel prematurely. Stay the course until you find the job you want. While you are on your job-hunting journey, here are five big mistakes to avoid when job hunting. Steering clear of these mistakes could make finding a job much easier.
One of the biggest mistakes that people make when they are job hunting is not looking in enough places for jobs. There is a certain level of diligence you need to maintain when you are searching for a job. Look in newspapers, online and ask around.
Of course, there are boundaries you should follow when looking for a job. First of all only apply and interview for jobs that you think you would take if you were offered the position. Do not apply for jobs that you are not qualified at all for or jobs that you do not have a clear understanding of.
When applying for jobs, it is important to have a resume that is update and professional looking. If you are not a good resume writer, look at examples online or find a professional to do your resume for you. Employers will take one look at a messy or unprofessional resume and rule you out without ever meeting you.
It is also important to be sure that you resume can be found online. There are plenty of job sites that allow users to post resumes. Some sites even allow multiple resumes to be posted. This is a great place for employers to locate your resume and contact you without you actually applying for the job.
Lying on your resume can eliminate you from being a job candidate immediately. If you stretch the truth about your experience or the type of jobs you have had in the past, employers will think that you are a liar. If employers think you are a lair they will not feel confident about hiring you because you have already compromised your integrity.
Tell the truth about your work and educational history. No matter what people may tell you, an honest inexperienced candidate is better than a lying experienced candidate. Have faith that you will be able to prove your worthiness for the position you are applying for without making up half-truths.
Be sure that your contact information is correct and that you respond when you are contacted. No matter how busy you are, you need to check your e-mail and phone messages on a regular basis. If you do not respond to a call about a job this is a sign that you do not need employment that badly. Employers will move on to the next candidate if you are slow getting back to them.
Candidates that are not prepared for their interviews are typically eliminated from the search before the interview is over. If you are late for an interview you have a big huge mark against you as soon as you walk in the door. Not being dressed in professional attire also will leave the interview with a very bad impression of you before you even speak. If you show up without a pen or copies of your resume you look like you are unfamiliar with the interview process. This, in turn, makes it quite possible that you are unfamiliar with other work place procedures.
A good job hunt can land you the job of your dreams. When you are settled into your new job you will be thankful that you took the time to search for a job the right way.
Why Time Management Makes for a Better Employee Time management is a major issue in the workplace. When time is not utilized efficiently, it leads to sloppy work, missed deadlines, and way too much stress. Employers are constantly seeking ways to teach their employees to manage their time better for a simple reason – a team that manages its time well is a team that is productive and successful. Everyone has done it. You’ve know that there is a big deadline approaching for weeks on end, and you kept telling yourself that have plenty of time. Then, suddenly, it is the day before the project is due, and you haven’t even begun it. You know you will have to pull an all-nighter, and even then you will be lucky to get everything done in time. Your heart is racing, your head is pounding, and you’re cursing your procrastination yet again, thinking about how much time you wasted surfing the next when you could have been doing a little work on the project every day, so it wouldn’t be so overwhelming. The end result of a project like this is predictable. You may get it in on time, or at least close to the deadline, but your work is likely to be sloppy. The rush job you did will be evident to everyone, and if your project involved making a pitch to a potential customer, your time management failure may end up costing your company big money (and costing you a job). As if you were not stressed enough already! If you contrast that performance with one in which you had effectively managed your time, the difference is clear. If you have worked on the project over the entire time span you had to finish it, a little bit at a time, then you would have had time to make sure your work was up to par. You wouldn’t have been scrambling for last minute information to include, and you could have made sure your work was free from little errors like typos or pages that printed incorrectly. Most importantly, you wouldn’t feel like you needed a week long vacation when the project was over, because your stress level never would have hit the roof. So, how do you become a happier and more effective employee by managing your time better? The first thing you can do to become an effective time manage is simple – write yourself a to-do list everyday. Not only does a to-do list help you think through exactly what you need to accomplish so you don’t forget anything in the rush, but it also helps you feel accountable for everything that needs to get done. If you write “spend 30 minutes on the big project” on your to-do list, it is a lot harder to come up with excuses why you can put it off for another day. Your conscience will make you want to get through everything on that list. If it seems like you never have enough time in the day, keep a journal of all of your activities. If you spend 20 minutes chatting by the coffee pot, write it down. After a week, look back over your activities. You may be surprised how much time you actually spend doing nothing. Now that you know, you can reinvest that time more wisely. The last thing is the hardest thing – getting over procrastination. This one is sheer willpower. When those voices in your head start arguing over whether to work on something now or put it off until later, listen to the work now voice. Give yourself manageable goals, like working on something for 15 minutes or 30 minutes, to get started. Once you experience the freedom from stress that time management brings, that procrastination voice will be a thing of the past. Copyright Infringement Statistics Copyright infringement statistics, by most standards are inflated. Most recent copyright infringement statistics cite that almost 30 percent of software is pirated in the United States of America. This means that they think 30 percent of the software on your computer is illegal… they think we’re all thieves, to an extent. However, copyright holders have good reason to worry that we’re violating their rules: the number of suspects referred to the United States attorneys with an Intellectual Property lead charge increased twenty six percent in the period between 2002 and 2004 – and there have been studies that show that this is rising. Copyright infringement statistics are difficult to come by, but it’s plain to see it’s affecting every aspect of intellectual copy. Copyright infringement statistics show that in addition to software privacy, there are a lot of violations in the music world. Copyright infringement statistics show that many unsuspecting people, from college students to thirty-something a professional, download music on a consistent basis, and often it’s not downloaded legally. Often times, someone will download a song off a MySpace or YouTube page, without giving thought to who really owns the copyright and if it’s legal for them to have it. Copyright infringement statistics, brought to us by the music recording industry, would have us believe that online infringement is seriously hurting the recording industry. A sensible person, however, would realize that with the abundance of MP3 sales sites that this will turn quickly and recording giants will see the huge profits available online. It’s already begun, you see, we have yet to see the impact of online music sales, and how it will increase revenue. I’m sure, with the huge talent pool at their disposal, the media giants will find a way to monetize the internet to their fullest advantage. Copyright infringement statistics also show that many people are downloading games off the internet. With the litany of games available to us – from complete alternate worlds such as World of Warcraft to the more mainstream “The Sims” series, people are clamoring for PC games – and for good reason. They’re fun, intelligent games that play on a system everyone has – a computer. Because of this, people are always looking for new games to play and download, and they may download a game without knowing that it’s not ‘freeware’ (as many internet games are). In addition to computer games, copyright infringement statistics also show that movies are downloaded in abundance on the internet. Many peer to peer file distribution sites and programs (such as bit torrent or Kazaa) allow for the transfer of very large files, and they’re easy to find online. Using a tool provided by one of many suppliers, users can search for any item they like – and, of course, the system is abused and people download copyrighted movies and entire DVDs instead of publicly available works. Copyright infringement also branches into written works, such as articles, books, poems, etc. Many times, a student will copy a paragraph or two without realizing the implications of such copying. While they may think of it as ‘borrowing’, if it’s used on a grander scale, the person could be opening themselves up to a large court fight, especially if it’s used commercially. As you can see, copyright infringement statistics show us that many people are using copyrighted works illegally. Do your best diligence when using another’s work – and ask for permission every time you want to use something that you haven’t created. Chances are, if you just ask the question up front you’ll save yourself from becoming another copyright infringement statistic and save yourself from a major lawsuit. |