Traditional ways to get a new job are all well and good, but many roles are never advertised, creating a hidden jobs market you need to tap into. Here are the insider secrets you need to know to take advantage of job opportunities you might not otherwise have seen.
Talk to trusted contacts
There could be the perfect opportunity waiting for you right now, but if people don’t know that you’re open to considering new roles, they might not tell you about it.
Catch up with some of your trusted network, grab a coffee and explain what you’re looking for. Think more broadly than your professional network. You never know whether the person you chat to in the pub, on the touchline while your kids play sport, or on the bike next to you at the gym could know about the perfect job vacancy.
Talking to as broad a selection of people as possible could create a ripple effect, with those people talking to others who might be the one with the perfect role for you.
It’s not what you know
Plenty of organisations are on the look-out for good talent, but haven’t got around to placing an advert, or are trying other ways to recruit good people.
If companies have a policy of recruiting for values rather than skills then using the existing team to try to find potential candidates is a great way of being more certain of that values alignment. Some companies even have referral schemes for employees who introduce someone who is offered a role in recognition of the saved recruitment fee.
This makes it even more important to chat to your network about what you’re looking for, but also to be clear about what that is.
Know what you’re looking for
The more specific you are about what you’re looking for, the easier people will find to identify it. So before chatting to people have a think about the kind of role you’re after and what’s important to you.
That could be about the location and commute for any new role, the sector or kind of company, or the job itself. It’s much easier for people to listen out for opportunities if you can be clear about exactly what you’re looking for.
Make like a Scout and be prepared
Once you start talking to people about you being on the look-out for a new job you never know quite when the opportunity will come your way, so you need to be prepared. Potential employers will almost certainly check you out online (see the LinkedIn tips below), but there are other things you can do to be prepared, including keeping a record of your achievements as a shortcut to interview preparation. For more tips, read my blog here.
Stay active on LinkedIn
Recruiters use LinkedIn to search for candidates, but so do in-house HR people. Make sure your current experience is up to date and try to post relevant content that people in your industry will find interesting, as well as commenting on other people’s activity and helping others by signposting or giving a bit of your expertise.
You don’t need to worry about using LinkedIn being a red flag for job-hunting if you use it well all the time. Check out my tips here for more on that.
If you need help thinking about what your perfect next job looks like, accessing the hidden jobs market, or brushing up your CV in preparation for applying for it, give me a call on 07765 894040 to book a free introductory chat.
