Whether you’re starting your career or in the midst of it, if you’ve found yourself unemployed, it can be upsetting and confusing, not to mention hard to know what to do about it. Once you get past the overwhelming stress of losing your job, it’s time to start thinking about the skills and experiences you need to build to get your career back on track. Luckily, we’ve got some ideas to help you get over the hump.
- Start a Blog About Your Target Industry
Blogging has become a great way to get yourself out there, make connections, and show future employers what you know. It doesn’t matter if your career has anything to do with content management; blogging helps keep your industry knowledge fresh. This will help you with interviews, but if you do social media correctly, you may also be able to build connections through fellow bloggers and other social media connections. - Take a Temp Job
Taking a temp job is a great way to earn money and build connections. It’s also an honest way to get a job. If you start sporadically applying for jobs that you don’t really want in the long-term, you may end up lying to a future employer unnecessarily just to get a job. Temp jobs come with the understanding that the work is temporary on both the employer’s and the employee’s side of the equation. - Take a Class
Continuing your education is a great way to build skills and further your knowledge about the industry with which you’re hoping to work. They can also be great ways to connect with peers and professors of the courses you’re taking. - Volunteer
Employers like to see passion and work ethic in potential employees. Volunteering while you’re unemployed helps prove your character to future employers. It also helps keep you busy so that you don’t succumb to boredom while you’re unemployed. Helping others simply makes you feel good, too. - Work on Your Connections
It’s true what they say: the more people you know, the more opportunities you’ll have. If you want to build connections, there are a number of ways to do so. Connect with alumni from your school through LinkedIn, attend networking events, and reconnect with former co-workers and peers with whom you’ve lost contact. You never know when someone you know has a job opportunity that could be perfect for you. - Give Yourself a Daily Schedule
Being unemployed is challenging for many reasons, not the least of which is the boredom that can ensue without a strict working schedule. If you make yourself a schedule and stick to it, you can create needed structure in your life to stay productive, work through the job search process, and have some time to focus on yourself.
