Six Ways Your Job Search Is Like Dating

Getting apprehensive as you get dressed up, rehearsing the stories you want to tell, following up afterward hoping for a second chance, and getting hopeful for what the future might bring…searching for a job is a lot like dating, isn’t it?

It might seem like a strange comparison, but when you stop to think about it, dating and job hunting have a lot in common. From the initial search to putting your best self forward, both activities involve a lot of effort and a lot of searching for the right fit. But if all goes right, you might just find a bright future.

Numerous experts have made the same observations, and thinking of the similarities between the dating world and job-seeking can provide an interesting change in perspective. Embrace these dating-esque strategies and you just might find a new career to fall in love with.

Know what you want

Many people don’t like to admit it, but most people have a type when it comes to dating. Whether consciously or subconsciously, people are looking for a partner or partners that check certain boxes. Just as understanding your tastes matters in dating, knowing what you want in an employer partner is vital before you even start your search.

FlexJobs’ Kat Boogaard compares looking for a flexible work environment, room for growth, and a good salary to looking for a sense of humor or a shared passion with a prospective romantic partner. Identifying what traits are important to you before starting the search will make the journey much more fulfilling.

It’s also important to decide what level of commitment you want before searching. Maybe you want a casual fling with a new industry. Maybe you’re looking to settle down for the long term. You’ll want to decide before you swipe.

Know what you’re getting into

Speaking of swiping, the internet is a double-edged sword for both dating and job hunting. The ease of dating apps and online job boards means more potential for connection, but it also means you have a lot of competition. You’ll face much more rejection, and ghosting is common. You may have thought things went well with that cute marketing company, but you never hear from them again. It’s part of the search.

Just as you may have better luck if a friend fixes you up with a date, having a business connection will make the search important. Networking is the best wingman out there.

“Your coffee date doesn’t show up, an exciting person ghosts you, everyone is flaky, and you feel like a piece of meat. You must be job hunting.” –Arianne Cohen, Bloomberg

Make your best first impression

Once you’ve landed the date/interview, you want to put your best foot forward and make the best first impression possible. Dress your best, show up on time, don’t look at your phone, and be a good listener.

Beyond the basics, prior research is key. Via a 2021 Statista survey, 40% of people look up their date online, and 44% will search for their social media. This gives you a better idea of who you’re meeting and provides talking points. The same philosophy applies to job searching. Always research the organization beforehand. Not only with the information answer some of your early questions, but you’ll get a feel for the overall culture and see if you’re a good fit. You’ll have much more to talk about and be able to impress your date.

Forbes’ Caroline Castrillon stresses the importance of body language. Nonverbal queues play a major role in your interpersonal interactions. You can practice power poses to build confidence and really wow your interviewer.

“Whether it’s facial expressions, gestures or eye contact, non-verbal cues can make the difference between getting a job offer or being shown out the door.” – Caroline Castrillon

Be authentic, and don’t be desperate

Caroline also stresses the importance of being your authentic self. “If you can’t be yourself, then what’s the point?” Knowing what you want and doing prior research make it easy to recognize whether this is a good fit or not. You want a partner that shares your values, and you don’t want to settle for less than you deserve.

Don’t just take the first thing that comes along. Looking desperate is a turn-off in both the dating and professional worlds. Just as looks aren’t everything in dating, money isn’t the only trait that matters in job seeking. A bad fit may mean starting your search anew, but it’s better to come to that conclusion early on instead of having a messy breakup.

“Don’t talk about a job too early in the process of networking, that is like talking about what you want to name your children on the first date.” –Hannah Morgan

Don’t talk about your ex

Just as talking about your ex on the first date is a major red flag, bashing your previous employer is a major faux pas in an interview. Don’t do it.

Trust your gut

At the end of the search, you’ll have a lot of information at your disposal, but only you can decide whether you’ve found the right partner for you. It’s okay to be picky; if something doesn’t feel right despite looking good on paper, don’t be afraid to move on. You’re making a life-altering decision, and it’s okay to wait for the best fit.

Wrap up

Dating and finding a career have a surprising amount in common. The search can be harrowing, but if you know what you want, do your homework, make a good first impression, and be yourself, you can find a situation you’re comfortable with.

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Coexisting With A Coworker You Dislike

Sometimes, having the right coworkers can make a job you dislike more tolerable. But the opposite is also true; a coworker you dislike can make your job unpleasant.

While many workers are able to work remotely, limiting direct face-to-face interactions with these workplace nemeses, those in the office don’t have that luxury. Even remotely, you’ll still have some interactions with these disdained coworkers. Regardless, you need to learn to work with others you may not enjoy.

We’ve previously covered how to successfully navigate workplace conflict and why a positive team culture is so important. We’ll build on that foundation, with assistance from the experts, with strategies on how to coexist with your least favorite coworkers. You likely won’t become best friends, but you’ll find common ground and be able to work together in spite of your differences.

Could it be you?

The first step in finding common ground is asking yourself why this individual irks you. With some soul-searching, you may realize that both of you are at fault.

Forbes’ Nicole Lipkin discusses affirmation bias, the tendency to blame your own shortcomings on external factors while blaming the shortcomings of others on their personal character.

“[L]et’s say you’re late to work. The attribution bias would have you exonerate your own lateness by claiming there was heavy traffic. But if someone else is late to work though, they’re obviously lazy.” –Nicole Lipkin

You may be projecting this bias on your workplace antagonist solely because you dislike them. By always thinking the worst of this person, you build them up as a bigger villain in your mind. You may also be projecting attributes you dislike about yourself onto this person, writes Lolly Daskal. Analyzing your mindset and figuring out why you dislike this person is the first step towards understanding.

Try to get to know them

Easier said than done, right? But finding common ground with someone is the key to resolving conflict. Iris Dorbian spoke to various actors, who must project chemistry with one another to the audience even when they dislike each other, and found multiple strategies you can use to co-exist with your foe.

Start by asking your coworker simple questions to get to know them. It doesn’t have to be deep; small talk about hobbies, interests, and daily routine is enough.

“I’m trying to give this person the impression that I actually give a damn about their day-to-day existence. The funny thing is, you’ll usually find that eventually, you do form chemistry because the person on the receiving end is amazed that anyone asked them questions about their life, work, or hobbies.” -actor Gino Dilorio

“Fake it til you make it” is a popular strategy in many of life’s facets, and it applies here, as well. Be enthusiastic about what your coworker tells you, even if you don’t feel it on the inside. Keeping a positive attitude will not only be good for your relationship with this person but it can be wondrous for your mental health.

Understand their point of view

Once you know this person a little better, it will be easier to understand their perspective and get to the root of why you don’t get along. Take your emotions out of the equation and try to view the person objectively.

Are some of their unpleasant traits a result of outside factors? There may be things doing on in their personal life you aren’t privy to. Are they trying to get along with you but struggling to do so? Or do you just have incompatible values or personalities? These questions are much easier to answer after you’ve made an attempt to get to know the person.

Set boundaries

Maybe you’ve put in the time to get to know your antagonist but still can’t find common ground. It happens. Not all people will get along. But to better coexist, you need to set boundaries with this person.

If the person keeps exhibiting disrespectful behaviors in your direction, sit down with the person and explain these behaviors are unacceptable. Ivy Exec reminds us not to let anger build up and color the interaction. Calmly tell them their behavior is unacceptable and they need to work with you in a professional manner.

Meanwhile, set boundaries on your own behavior. Don’t behave antagonistically towards them, and don’t engage in gossip regarding the other person. Stay professional.

Acknowledge your dislike and minimize contact

If all else fails, up upfront with the person. Lipkin says to have a simple conversation with your coworker: “We’re not getting along that great, what can we do? Let’s try to brainstorm what’s getting in our way.”

If you can find a way to work together, great. If not, you did your part. Continue to work within the boundaries you set, and reduce contact as much as possible. Don’t do anything to fan the flames, and do your best to remain professional. You don’t have to like your colleague, but you do need to work together.

“If volcanoes erupt every time you meet, then it might be best to, instead, keep things professional at a distance.” –Andy Charters

Wrap up

You won’t get along with everyone you meet, but if you’re working with someone you dislike, it’s important to at least make an effort to coexist. Try to find common ground and settle your differences in a professional matter. If all else fails, consider coexistence and acceptance a victory, and do your best to at least work together when needed.

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Addressing Employment Gaps In 2022

In past years, having resume gaps was taboo in the eyes of hiring managers. But the professional world is rapidly changing, and those changes were further accelerated by the pandemic. Whether it’s due to health reasons, caring for children or loved ones, pursuing a passion, embracing freelance work, or simply changing careers, gaps and breaks in work history are increasingly common.

Forbes’ Caroline Castrillon believes the traditional career ladder is being replaced with “career waves” and that resume breaks could actually become a strength in becoming a more versatile and well-rounded individual.

If you’ve been worried about your own resume gaps, know that the stigma is over. We’ll analyze the data surrounding resume gaps before covering how to use those gaps to accentuate your value as a job seeker.

Career gaps are increasingly common

What was once a red flag has become a sign of a well-rounded worker. What changed? Millennials becoming a major demographic in the workplace and the cultural changes resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic have caused a major shift in how companies hire.

A 2019 Manpower study found that 84% of millennials expected career breaks throughout their journey, and this was before the pandemic forced many workers into an involuntary gap. The pandemic also led to the Great Resignation, which led to pickier job seekers and employees having more power. Employers must work with the candidates they have and embrace new ways of thought to maintain and bring in top-tier talent.

“Because it was such a high volume of people who chose to stay home for a variety of reasons and the labor market is so tight, those things factored in together made it that employers are much more flexible now about their ‘red flags’ toward longer career gaps.” –Jeramy Kaiman, head of LHH Recruitment Solutions

LinkedIn has embraced this new meta and introduced titles such as “stay-at-home parent” and the option to add career breaks (with reasons including bereavement, career transitioning, layoffs, volunteering, and more) to normalize gaps. Their 2021 research found that employers were much more open to workers with unemployment gaps.

“79% of hiring managers today say they would hire a candidate with a career gap on their resume, according to LinkedIn.

59% of hiring managers are interested in learning about any transferable skills you have learned, and 58% are interested in lessons that can be applied to a particular job.” –LinkedIn

Addressing the gap

No matter why you needed a career break, it will come up in your interviews. Thankfully, with a little preparation, you can expertly counter these questions and turn them into selling points.

Have a plan

If you’re re-entering the workforce, especially after a long gap or while entering an entirely new industry, you want to have a clear vision for your job search.

Corporate Escape Artist suggests taking time to find positions that align with your vision and to take control of your personal brand. Re-entering the workforce is much easier with a strategy in mind, and it will make you more excited about getting back out there. You get to control the story of your employment gaps and taking time to reflect on your previous career journey and your time away can provide clarity into your future goals.

Focus on skills

One reason employment gaps used to be a red flag is that employers worried important job-related skills would atrophy from time away. But in today’s world, the Great Resignation led to many employees switching industries to find positions that better aligned with their passions and values. Many skills, especially soft skills, are highly-transferable and desirable. Make sure to highlight them.

If you gained any new skills or certifications during your gap, make sure to detail them on your resume and cover letter.

Mariana Toledo says to think of these skills as your personal toolbox. The job may be different, but these tools are always useful. In fact, you may have developed new skills or insights in your time away that other candidates lack.

Focus on accomplishments, not absences

It’s always to focus on the positives over the negatives as a job seeker. Just because an important contribution happened months ago doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. While your cover letter may be a way to explain your gaps, don’t make them the focus. Instead, let your experiences sell you as a candidate.

Find value in your absence

If you had valuable experiences that didn’t align with a traditional 9-5, don’t hesitate to add them to your documents. Just because they didn’t occur in a traditional workplace doesn’t mean your experiences weren’t valuable.

It doesn’t matter if you volunteered, freelanced, took up independent projects, acted as a consultant…don’t hesitate to include that in your resume. Something is better than nothing. –Hiration

Wrap up

A person’s career journey looks much different than it did in the past. Employment gaps used to be an issue, but they’ve become normalized as the culture changes. Employers are much more open-minded and view your unique career journey as a plus. Your time away may make you a more well-rounded candidate than someone with a more straightforward career path, and you may have skills your competition lack, but it’s up to you to make that clear.

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Stand Out Digitally With These LinkedIn Summary Tips

In any sort of persuasive speech, your attention-getter sets the tone of the entire performance. An engaging introduction reels your audience in, while a boring one sends them looking elsewhere. Imagine walking into a hotel lobby and finding it unpleasant. No matter how good your room may be, that initial entrance soured the experience.

Your LinkedIn profile is the same way. Using LinkedIn is vital for the modern job search, and your summary is your introduction to recruiters. The website itself declares the summary as one of the most important pieces of information you can describe.

“Your summary or About section is the one place you define yourself in your own words, free of start dates and titles. Whether you use it to put career choices in context, highlight your biggest achievements, or show off your personality, the summary is your chance to put your best self out there. It strengthens your first impression in a way no other Profile section can.” –LinkedIn

If you’re doing some spring cleaning with your profile, we’ll go teach you how to craft an exceptional summary that shows the real you.

Prioritize the first few sentences

If your summary is the introduction to your profile, the first few words are the introduction to your introduction. Laura Smith-Proulx reveals that your full summary isn’t immediately displayed until someone clicks on “see more” (on both mobile and desktop versions).

That means your summary needs to “pop” immediately to catch the eyes of the looker. You want to hook your audience immediately by getting directly into your brand and making your objective clear right away.

Use keywords

The modern job search is all about appeasing the search engine. Realizing this is the key to making sure you’ll show up in a recruiter’s search at all. To do that, LinkedIn experts recommend using keywords throughout your profile.

Executive resume writer Jessica Hernandez simply defines these keywords as “Keywords are a list of words and phrases that are related to your work—they are the words that a prospective employer would search for when trying to find someone like you.”

Find words relevant to your industry and use them often. This will make sure you show up in searches AND make it easier for a prospective employer to get an idea of what you’re all about. While you should use keywords, make sure to avoid making your profile a jumbled mess of jargon.

Showcase your personality

A recruiter isn’t just getting an automaton worker when they look at your profile; they are looking at a complex human being. At the end of the day, not only does a recruiter want a qualified worker, but they want someone that is a good cultural fit for the organization.

Because of the nature of LinkedIn, you still want to be professional, but don’t be afraid to let a little flair or humor out. If you followed the above advice, your audience will get a view of you as a worker and you as a person. Having this insight allows the reader to have a more detailed picture of how you will fit in with the company.

Find a format that works for you

In keeping with the above advice, you can craft the style of your summary in a manner that best describes you. There isn’t a single cookie-cutter approach to take. SocialTalent reminds us that the summary is your chance to tell your story as you see it. Just like in an elevator pitch, you’re using that short space to say who you are and what you bring to the table.

The Muse’s Aja Frost analyzes different strategies for telling that story, including the mission-based strategy, the personal strategy, the short-and-sweet summary, the blended summary, and the accomplishment summary. These five example methods allow you to decide what’s important for you and the best way to summarize yourself. All five are great starting points, and you can click the above link for more details.

Meanwhile, LinkedIn itself goes over 14 well-designed and radically different summary styles and provides reasons why they work. All 14 off an excellent place to start and can serve as a template for your own story. It’s all about finding the best way to represent you!

Avoid third-person

Your LinkedIn summary is a summary of you as a worker, told by you. This is a chance for you to be yourself, and ideally, you don’t talk in third person in real life. Avoid this common pitfall!

Example

Aja Frost provides us with a great example of a short, detailed summary that follows all of the above advice.

“I’m a sales rep dedicated to helping local Oklahoma City services businesses grow their customer base and decrease customer churn. I have 6 years of experience in local sales and I’ve consistently met and exceeded my quota throughout my career. Within the last year, I’ve topped our leaderboard six out of 10 months. On average, I close business 10% faster than my peers.”

Wrap up

If you aren’t using LinkedIn as part of your job search strategy, you need to do so immediately! And a successful LinkedIn summary is the welcome mat to the rest of your profile. Make sure it’s clear, direct, and a good summary of you, the writer. There isn’t one successful must-use template, so do some research and some tweaking and find what works for you!

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Three Keys To A Rewarding Informational Interview

The key to a successful interview is preparation. Your skills and experience level don’t mean much if you go into an interview without doing your homework. Researching the company, the industry, and conducting a mock interview are all beneficial, but if you really want to do a deep dive, consider conducting an informational interview.

An informational interview isn’t the same as a job interview. Rather, it is an informal meeting or conversation with someone in your target industry/company to get a deep dive into that line of work. Indeed found a host of potential benefits of this type of interview, including:

  • Learning how to research or screen careers, positions or employers
  • Preparing for future job interviews
  • Learning how to ask direct and follow-up questions
  • Increasing network contacts
  • Learning steps to pursue a potential career
  • Recognizing your strengths and weaknesses for a potential role

An informational interview gets you something you can’t find from an online resource: a real person’s experiences and advice. If you think your job search could benefit from an informational interview or you’re looking to move into a new industry, we’ve done a little information gathering ourselves to help. Learn how to prepare for and conduct the most efficient fact-finding mission with these tenets.

Find the right contact

You’ve recognized that an informational interview will be advantageous, but where to start? Whether you’re a network novice or seasoned web-builder, chances are you can start with your own inner circle. If you already know someone in the industry or at your target company, excellent! Send them a message. If no one you know fits the bill, look to your friends, family, and professional contacts to see if they know a good fit. They may know the right person to assist and can introduce you.

If your network comes up empty, a good old-fashioned cold call (but actually email or direct message) can help! Look for someone in that company on LinkedIn or try searching in an alumni or professional group. LiveCarrer suggests being sincere and considerate when asking for a conversation. Remember, you’re asking this person for a favor. Be upfront and direct with your request. Make it clear you’re asking for help, but don’t ask for a job. You’re looking for information, and you’re hoping to learn from this person’s experience.

Pre-research research

While the purpose of your interview is to gain knowledge, you can’t go into an informational interview completely clueless. Compile enough background information to sound credible. You want this informational interview to support the information you’re able to find on your own, and merely asking someone the basics you could easily find online is a waste of both parties’ time. Mac Prichard suggests coming up with one clear objective you’d like to gain from the conversation and tailoring your preparation to it.

“What’s the #1 thing I can learn from this connection to help me on my career path?” -Mac Prichard

As Jennifer Winter of The Muse reminds, your contact is taking time out of their day to talk with you free of charge. Respect their time by doing your homework beforehand. Research their history and find common ground with them. Not only will you look prepared and professional, but they’ll feel honored you’re familiar with their work. A bit of flattery is always nice.

Ask useful questions

An informational interview shouldn’t be long—maybe about 15-30 minutes at most. You want to get as much useful info as possible, so it’s important to maximize your time by asking great questions. Have a specific list of questions prepared beforehand and keep them organized.

Harvard Business Review cited author Dorie Clark, who suggested approaching the interview like a journalist. “Gently probe through curiosity, then listen.” You don’t want to feel like a cross-examiner or be pushy. You’re asking the questions, but let your contact determine how they answer. You’re there for their expertise, so whatever they choose to answer with is probably what they view as important information.

The Balance Careers’ Alison Doyle has a magnificent list of questions you can ask your contact, divided into occupational and functional questions. A blend of both will give you a superb look at both the big picture aspects of the role and what the day-to-day looks like.

Wrap up

An informational interview can be an invaluable tool to assist in your job search, especially if you’re breaking into a new industry. These conversations are a great way to use the network you’ve created to get insider information you wouldn’t find in traditional research. Remember to find the right contact, do your homework beforehand, and make the most of your limited time by asking useful questions. There are so many resources out there for networking and learning about your chosen industry. Don’t be afraid to use them!

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