6 Tips to Help You Target Your Job Search

The transcript is about targeting a job search. The speaker gives six tips on how to do a targeted job search, including identifying career goals, researching industries and companies, networking, applying strategically, tailoring resumes, and preparing for interviews. The speaker emphasizes the importance of aligning career goals and values with job opportunities and suggests networking as a way to gain insights and build relationships with potential employers. They also share personal experiences to illustrate the importance of starting at entry-level positions and working towards desired roles. The targeted job search, what exactly does that mean and why do I need to target my job search? On today's episode, I am giving you six tips on how to target your job search so that way you can actually get called in for the interview instead of just submitting your resume, submitting your application, and never getting the interview. So stay tuned. This is going to be a good one today. Six tips on how to target your job search. Hey there, you professional, ambitious, working mama. Welcome to the Christian Career Coach Podcast. Do you want to achieve remarkable success and experience unwavering faith in your professional journey? Do you find yourself up late at night searching for answers on how to make more money, maintain a positive work-life balance, and achieve exponential career growth? Do you wake up with big, ambitious goals only to feel overwhelmed and uncertain when faced with setbacks, frustrations, and unexpected challenges? Well, you're in the right place. I'm Susan Edwards, and on this podcast, we tackle those exact concerns head-on. We dive deep into strategies to propel your income, accelerate your career growth, and help you align your work with your faith. So if you're tired of feeling stuck and you're ready to embrace extraordinary success, unwavering faith, and a purposeful life, then join me on the Christian Career Coach Podcast. Together, we'll navigate the obstacles, find clarity amidst chaos, and unlock your true potential. Get ready for inspiration, actionable advice, and powerful insights that will empower you to conquer your fears and create the fulfilling career you've always dreamed of. Let's walk this transformative journey together. Welcome to the Christian Career Coach Podcast, where ambition meets faith and your dreams find their wings. Hello, hello, friends. Welcome back. Welcome back to the Christian Career Coach Podcast. I'm Susan, and today we are going to talk about something that I just consistently keep seeing and hearing every time I talk with a client, every time I see a new post or a new thread, and that is simply that I'm applying, but I'm not getting jobs. Why am I not getting called for a job interview? And so today's episode is really dedicated to the job search, and I want to give you six major tips on how to do a targeted job search. How exactly do you do or how exactly do you target your job search? And the reason we're doing this is because this can actually be tacked on to a couple of episodes that I've done in the past all about writing the perfect resume. So if you've got a perfect resume out there, there's no reason why you shouldn't be getting called for a job interview unless you're blanket interviewing or blanket applying. And what that means is you're just taking one resume and you are submitting one resume to multiple jobs that you see. So you're submitting the same resume in multiple different job applications. So go back and listen to episodes 37 and 38 if you want to hear more details about the resume, but today we're talking more about the job search. So without further ado, my first piece of advice out of six, so six words of advice for you for the targeted job search is to identify your career goals. So before you even start to submit anything online, sit down with a piece of paper and give this some thought, but determine what you want to achieve in your career and the types of roles that you're interested in pursuing. And put some real thought into this. I mean, this is your career. This is what's going to, you know, make you money and pay your bills. And ultimately, when you lay your head down on the bed at night, it's going to dictate your happiness. And the last thing you want to do is go to bed every night frustrated and miserable and constantly thinking about work. So the first piece of advice is to identify your career goals. Really know what type of position that you want before you start to submit any resumes. Okay, my second piece of advice is for you to research different industries and companies. If you're able to explore different industries and companies, you can understand the culture, the values, and different types of job opportunities that are available. Once you are able to see and find positions that line up with your career goals, what we just talked about, you know, you see, oh, well, you know, this role, I would enjoy this. This other role, I would enjoy this. You know, there's two or three or four different positions for all these different companies. You know, it could be the same job title or very similar job titles, just at different companies. But those could very much align with your career goals and your values. This is important, especially if you want to be, if you want to stick to a faith-based role or be happy, especially for Christians, this is important. Because you want to make sure that the values of the company align with your Christian values and with your faith. Okay, so that was the second piece of advice that I have for you in your targeted job search. The third piece of advice is to network. Okay, and this might be one of the most key aspects of a targeted job search. Connect with professionals that are in your desired field by attending actual in-person networking events or attend electronic events online. Connect with professionals in your desired field through LinkedIn. And then reach out to those that maybe you don't know so well, or maybe those that you do, and do something called an informational interview. This is really just an opportunity for you to pick the brain of a person that is in the role that you could potentially be applying for, to see what a typical day is like, to see what the frustrations are, to see what kind of salary expectations. You know, you could see what's posted online, but is that reality? And so that's what an informational interview is. And it's really key for you to put yourself out there to let people know that maybe they're in your network, maybe they're in your extended network. But this is a great way for you to learn more about the potential role that you may be applying for. This can also help you learn about job openings. Obviously, it's going to help you gain insights, not just about the position, but also about the companies, the multiple companies within that industry. And you can really uncover what that culture is like and whether or not it's going to align with your Christian values. Networking also allows you the opportunity to build relationships with potential employers. So even though they may not be on your radar right now, and you may not be on their radar right now, an introduction is the beginning piece of building that relationship. And getting to know somebody, especially if they remain in this field and you go into this field, this is a great opportunity for you to nurture that relationship, to be able to nurture the relationship which could grow into something in the future. So keep that in mind as you network. It doesn't have to be an uncomfortable situation where you're going to a cocktail party and standing in the corner because you don't know anybody. Go to find an event that sounds fun to you. Maybe they're, you know, doing an activity. Maybe it's at a location that you're interested in seeing. But pick one that is really relevant to you and then go to that one so you can introduce yourself to a few people, get to know a few people, but also learn something about that venue or take the opportunity to do a fun activity, whatever that thing may be that is intriguing to you. Use that to your advantage. Maybe it's just the free events that you want to go to. That works also. Maybe it's all budget-based right now, and that is perfectly fine. You can still meet and network with industry professionals at free networking events. So do a quick Google search and start to find those opportunities where you live and put yourself out there. Okay, so my fifth piece of advice for your targeted job search is for you to apply strategically. You want to focus your job applications on positions that closely match your qualifications and your career goals. Even though you might want that manager position, you may not be qualified for it yet. You may have to start at an entry-level position first and work your way into that managerial position. I can speak from experience here. I had a business degree, and my degree is a business degree with an emphasis in human resources, and I really wanted to get into the field of human resources. And it was so hard for me to find my first HR job. And when I found it, it was through networking, and it found me through the network of people that my now husband, he was my boyfriend at the time, ended up, you know, just through our network of people, passing my resume around. It fell in the hands of an HR person at a hotel. They called. I came in for the interview. I got the job. I trained for a week in the new job. During this time, I stepped back. This was an entry-level coordinator, HR coordinator position, and my pay was so small compared to what I was making. But that didn't matter to me because I wanted to be in HR. I wanted to actually put my degree to use and be in an office that was constantly talking about human resources and dealing with real, live human resources problems and issues. And so I was in this position for a week, and the girl that was training me, the HR manager that was training me, went on vacation. And she was gone for the whole next week. And when she came back, she gave a two-week notice but only worked a week of that notice. So when she left, I was afforded the opportunity to move into her position. Now, it didn't happen immediately, so she was gone a month into my new position. So a couple more months went by, and the HR director at the time gave me a lot of the manager's old responsibilities, which I did with ease. It was great. I actually had previous manager experience, and my business degree really came in handy for this role. And so I was able to get promoted into that manager role and get back above, actually, where my previous salary was three months into this position. And I only held the manager role for two years, and then the HR director at that time left the company. And, again, that afforded me the opportunity to submit my interest in that director role, which I, again, had to do the duties for a few months to prove that I was capable of doing the job, and I did. And then I was promoted into that HR director role after two years of being the manager. So I tell you this story to let you know that just because you have to take a step back at first, doesn't mean that you cannot climb your way back up very quickly. It's just a temporary adjustment, but it gets you into that field that aligns better with your career goals. Okay, my final piece of advice for your targeted job search is to prepare for interviews. Research the company and the role thoroughly before your interviews, and practice answering common interview questions. If you don't have somebody to practice with, just look in the mirror and talk to yourself. Go into a quiet room, ask the questions to yourself, and then look at yourself and how you talk, how your demeanor is when you're answering those questions. Make sure in your answers that you can highlight your relevant experiences and skills that make you a strong candidate for the position. If you can target your job search in each of these ways, you really can increase your chances of finding opportunities that are a good fit for your skills and your career aspirations. I just want to say that I find a lot of times almost, you know, 99% of the conversations that I have with clients when they tell me, well, I've been looking for, you know, three months or four months or six months or even a year, and I've submitted, you know, 25 applications, 50 applications, 80 applications, and I've only gotten two interviews. And this is important to note because there is an easy fix for this, and that is narrow down your job search and narrow down your resume, and make that resume as though that was the only position that you were applying for and that's the only company that you want to work for. So when you submit online or through your network or via email, however you send your information in to apply for that position, that company feels like, wow, they are really interested in working for us, but they really don't have the experience or they don't have any industry experience, but they've highlighted things that make sense for this role. And so what this does is it breaks that seven-second cycle. I'm sure you've heard of the seven-second resume scan. I actually timed myself one time doing this, and if you're not familiar with this term, what this means is experienced recruiters can scan a resume in seven seconds and determine if they want to call that candidate or not and invite them in for an interview. And I timed myself at one point, and I could do this as quickly as four seconds. Now, obviously, if the resume was more in-depth or this was a managerial position with two pages or more, it does take a little bit longer to read those resumes. However, imagine for a moment that you're not looking for a job, that you're the recruiter, you're the hiring manager, you're the person that has to screen all of these resumes that come in for this position. And so when you see the same resume over and over and over, then you know a few things. A few things really stand out when you see the same verbiage, see the same format, see the same font. And so when you are looking at a resume, as someone that is experienced looking at resumes over and over and over, which resume is going to stand out to you? How do you pick the one that you want to call? This is how a targeted resume and a targeted job search will get you called for interviews. It is very easy to go through hundreds of resumes each day, even just, you know, maybe seven or eight resumes each week, but hiring managers know what they're looking for. And if they see that same Canva template or, you know, that same generic Microsoft Word, or if there's, you know, nothing that really stands out, if there's, you know, I could jump into a whole plethora of things about the resume, but the point is you want your resume to stand out and you want it to stand out because you put the appropriate things in there, because you have targeted your job search, and because you are applying for positions that align with your career goals and you can prove you have those transferable skills from your previous positions and you desire the position and the company enough to prove how hungry you are for that job. So I hope this was beneficial for you. I hope that it was easy to understand as we kind of go through each of these different pieces of advice. I hope you're able to actually pull yourself back for a minute if you are job searching and take a deep breath and start from scratch. You know, go through each of these, starting with the first, identifying your career goals, and then just moving through them one at a time, researching your industries and your companies, making sure you're networking, customizing your resume and then your cover letter, applying strategically, and then really preparing for those interviews. I think that you will get those interviews. I think that you're going to have a much better shot of landing the interview if you're able to target your job search. So before we go today, I wanted to mention something that I have coming up soon, and it is an opportunity for you as a job seeker to get your resume read by a professional, me. And so I'll be adding to my website the opportunity for you to do that, more information to come, but it will be super affordable, just, you know, a way for you to send me your resume and I'll be able to critique it for you and give you tips and advice on things that look great, but also things that I see that are opportunities for you that will help you get your foot in the door for that interview. So the cost of this is only going to be $27, and so I'll be adding it up to my website really soon, so be looking for that. If you haven't been on my website, it's just forwardscareerservices.com, or if you have questions, feel free to e-mail me. It's just forwardscareerservices at gmail.com. So I hope you enjoyed today's episode, and I will see you in the next one. Hey there, Ambitious Mama. I hope you enjoyed today's episode of the Christian Career Coach Podcast. If it resonated with you and provided valuable insights, I'd love for you to take just 30 seconds and share this episode with a fellow Christian professional who may benefit from the career advice and inspiration. Together, we can uplift and empower more women on their professional journeys. And don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode. Oh, and one more thing that would mean the world to me. Could you leave a review? Your feedback and support light me up and let me know that this podcast is making a positive impact in your life. As we continue this journey together, remember that you're not alone. I understand the joys and challenges of being an ambitious mama, and I'm here to cheer you on every step of the way. So march your calendar, because I'll meet you back here next Tuesday for another episode filled with valuable insights and practical tips. Until then, keep chasing your dreams, balancing your roles with grace, and shining brightly in your career and family life.