Making the Time to Find a New Job

Good time management is vital when you’re jobhunting. Find out how to make the time-consuming process of jobhunting quicker and easier.

If you’re jobhunting, you’ll be aware it’s a time consuming process. Analysing your skills and interests, reading through job adverts and writing persuasive, job-specific and perfectly proofed CVs and covering letters all take many hours, and for those already in full-time work or training these hours are difficult to find. So how can jobhunters best manage their time, and what resources are available to help?

Jobhunting is a process that often takes much longer than candidates originally anticipate. That’s why it’s important to schedule time into your day to review and apply for suitable opportunities. Setting aside time and making the effort to find a job that’s right for you can be the difference between finding a job you like and a job you love.

Its vital jobhunters spend sufficient time creating a strong CV and researching both job vacancies and prospective companies to ensure they’re a good match for your personality.

The next stage is researching actual vacancies that you like. Before applying to any, research the company and the job description and tailor your application to the job and company you’re applying for.

So it’s vital jobhunters take the time to jobhunt properly, but how exactly can they fit this time-consuming process into their busy lives – particularly if they’re already employed? There are two parts to good time management when jobhunting. The first is making a choice to prioritise certain things over others. When people are stuck in a job they don’t like, they’ll often say they don’t have the time to change things. Jobhunting is time consuming. There’s no doubt about it. But people who want a new job have a choice. They can either make time for complaining – which a lot of people most certainly do – or they can make time to take action and find a new job. It really comes down to having respect for yourself and thinking, ‘I deserve better’. This means if you’re jobhunting, you should tell yourself that you really deserve a new job that makes your life more fulfilling. And you should make a time commitment to finding it.

The second part to better jobhunting time management is to track your time and keep records. A lot of people aren’t aware of how they spend their time, which means they aren’t making best use of it. So the first advise fortime-pressed jobhunters to do is start keeping track of how they spend their free time. When you track things, you’ll notice all sorts of windows of time you’re not putting to best use. As soon as you identify activities that you realise aren’t helping you get the best out of life, you can replace some of them with jobhunting activities. For example, a spare thirty minutes while waiting for dinner to cook can be spent searching lingua-jobs.com for jobs or filling out applications.

Keeping good records of your jobhunting activities is also important. You don’t want to waste time by doing the same activity twice, so keep records of how you’re applying for work.

Once jobhunters are more aware of their time, they can take advantage of online time-saving resources that make jobhunting much quicker and easier. These include internet jobsites, online CV creators, getting in touch with friends on facebook to ask about jobs and job email/SMS alerts.

The internet allows you to search for, look at and apply for jobs and post your CV from the comfort of your own home, a friend’s place, the local library or internet café. Many job sites also make your life easier by sending alerts to your email address when the kind of job that you’re looking for becomes available. Lingua-jobs.com, for example, sends email jobs alerts to registered users, meaning instead of searching for jobs now all jobhunters have to do is check their inbox to find job vacancies tailor-made to their requirements.

The internet is always available and it can provide quick access to a huge amount of information, not only on the jobs and organisations you’re interested in, but also on the process of jobseeking itself.