Been There...Done That

I've given a number of workshops over the years to job seekers. Topics have typically covered things like resume/interview techniques, networking your way to new opportunities and adding sales strategies to standard job seeking activities. Most of the content has been pretty straight forward. Finding a job isn't rocket science. It's mostly an exercise in creativity, consistency and organization.

It wasn't uncommon to have at least one participant with a furrowed brow and scrunched up face. As ideas were shared you could tell the person wasn't buying it. Some would simply sigh or tap their pen on the table. Others were more vocal. "I've done that before and it doesn't work."

One such participant was Theresa. I could tell at first glance she was carrying around a negative and defeatist attitude. She wore her frustrations with her job search on her sleeve and heaven help anyone who dared to breathe a positive sentence in her direction. Theresa had been out of work for 3 months and had few to no bites on her resume. She'd tried it all. Nothing was working. She was all to happy to point out how flawed my ideas and strategies were at several points in a presentation.

Now, I'm a humble person. If someone thinks I am wrong or an idea I have is bad, I'm okay with them saying so as long as they don't mind backing up their point of view with some information. When I asked Theresa to tell the group about her experiences using these ideas a common theme developed. Theresa had indeed tried just about everything...once. If she tried something and it didn't give her good results she dubbed it a dud and moved on. That strategy is almost always a bad one. When you think of all of the important things we've had to learn to do in our life, few of us experienced success with our maiden effort. If humanity made a habit of scrapping things after one try, we'd still be in caves drawing cute stick figures on walls.

Theresa wasn't lazy. She wasn't mean or hard-headed. She was simply one of many who had found herself adrift in unfamiliar seas. Her fear and uncertainty over her situation made it easy for her to cling to the negative and run away from things that scared her. The biggest fear job seekers often have is of rejection. Something not working on the first try equates to "I tried it and I got rejected and I'm not going to do it again." Part of me understands. Really and truly, I do. I realize, however, the importance of picking yourself up and doing things over and over until it is perfected. The more you do something, the better the statistical probability of a positive outcome.

Job seekers need to make a conscious effort not to fall into the same mental trap Theresa fell into. The biggest obstacles in her job search were her negativity and her willingness to throw in the towel quickly. Not only did they take a lot of steam out of her job search, they carried through to her demeanor and sent a less than glowing message to networking contacts and potential employers.