Articles - Page 13 of 260 - The Voice of Job Seekers

Do You Think of Yourself As Underemployed?

Underemployment is worse than unemployment for some depending on their other life choices and whether they feel trapped. Others will use it as an advantage because it gives them the space to hone their craft or sharpen their career tools.

There are are a few who will position themselves as a big fish in a small pond. I didn’t consider that in recent years and having written about it before, it’s important because it’s choice. All of the above are choices.

Many people choose underemployment to prepare for the future and take a job that is not stressful or demanding and for which they’re overqualified. It could be a competitive advantage if they buy time while going to school, get training, or need more time to prepare for a new career or venture.

Other people may have their confidence shot and take an underemployment to prepare for the future and take a job that is not stressful or demanding and for which they’re overqualified. It could be a competitive advantage if they buy some time while going to school, get some training, or need more time to prepare for a job that is not their chosen career for a short period. Sometimes, people get stuck in those careers because they are still trying to gain their confidence, and their mojo, salary, benefits, and coworkers cannot help them move forward. Mostly, it hurts their salary because they are not earning what they can, and it could be a little degrading because they’re underachieving.

Here are a few signs of underemployment. The following can keep you in employment captivity and ultimately affect your finances and the long term:

1. You’re caught in complacency

You become very complacent about where and how long you’ve worked, and you take more pride than that instead of learning what’s new in the marketplace and how that will translate to your future advancement and earnings. The cost of career development could be stifling, but the return on investment can be well worth it, especially if it’s far above where you are underemployed.

2. You covet and grow jealous of the career moves your peers made.

Seeing your peers move up and move forward with their careers ahead of you is a thing. You become envious of their new salary, promotion, and status. Meanwhile, you become disgusted with yourself and see it more as missed opportunities without knowing what opportunities are available for you and your future.

3. You’re easily distracted by personal obstacles

If you listen to yourself, you’re full of excuses and apathy. You think more about how arduous Your journey has been so far rather than the prize at the end, which is to create more impact on the work you love or used to love. Meanwhile, your obstacles may cost you thousands of dollars daily or weekly.

4. You’re scared of rejection.

You’re afraid of what others may think of you if you don’t get to where you want to go the first time. Today’s job search is full of trials and errors: what you did right, what you did wrong, and what to leave and what to leave out. If you are rejected, I cloud your vision and judgment about your life.

5. Uncertainty becomes a showstopper

We’re in the days where anyone can Google or YouTube what they need to know or at least where they can find more answers. Sure, confidence has much to do with it, and you may feel a lack of confidence now. Negotiating your worth is hard if you’re unsure of your market value and worth.

Some stigmatize underemployed as being lazy, unambitious, and problematic. Very few fit this description, and an argument to be made is many chose it as a way to transition to something bigger. People chose bridge jobs all of the time with plans to prepare for something bigger at the right time.

by Mark Anthony Dyson

Mastering the Art of Interview: How to Take Control and Impress the Interviewer

When candidates prepare for a single job interview, they must have intel about how the job and industry work and what makes the hiring manager and team tick.

Control of the interview is to create a conversation to make the interviewer feel you’re easy to work with daily and exchange ideas. You’re not controlling because you’re asking the questions. You guide the conversations with the answers and responses you give, making the interviewer want to know more.

1) How does your experience resonate with what the team does regularly? Through rapport, you look for times to trade stories with the interviewer(s) about departments, conferences, and training.

2) You can control the tempo of the conversation by getting the interviewer to engage in your stories. Storytelling is the best way to accentuate your strengths and how you implemented solutions. Engagement gets them involved in sharing some of their stories and challenges.

3) Show you can gather, analyze, and manage data to customize to the company’s needs based on what’s discussed in the interview. They want to preview your work behaviors and crisis reactions. Most interviewers consider their work challenges unique and want to know how the candidate faces adversity.

What about candidates who are nervous or shy during the interview? How can they take control without coming across as too aggressive?

A good candidate connects with the interviewer through storytelling, but if you want to positively persuade them to like you, control the pace of sharing your experiences.

Great stories convey peaks and valleys, intrigue and suspense, the protagonist (that’s you), and an antagonist (the problem). Ultimately, you share the solution, but it doesn’t mean you must tell it all in one shot.

You can pause and ask the interviewer if they faced similar experiences or challenges.

You can interject how you feared or failed in judging the outcome.

You can also draw some parallels between the company problems and the ones you’re about to share and how you solved the issues you faced.

I have interviewed and hired many call center reps in my management career. The best interviews were ones where the candidate was a great listener. Throughout our conversation, they were able to repeat the needs of our call center through specific examples of how they handled similar experiences.

Even short stories can have all of the elements told in a way that generates interest and conveys value. When people see themselves in a scenario, they’re intrigued.

You can always stop a story to see if people identify with the storyteller, the audience, or both. If the experiences are shared, the interviewer may share their knowledge. The exchange and conversation where everyone involved is learning and conveying interest is the best gauge of how your interview went despite the hiring outcome results.

by Mark Anthony Dyson

Baby Boomers Must Display These Attributes To Get Employed Now

I want to expand on an article on Yahoo Finance written last September, “I’m a Career Expert: 6 Things Baby Boomers Need To Understand About the Job Market Today.”

I like everything about the article, but other connections are just as essential to appealing to today’s employers.

The article lists:

The Benefits of Job Hopping

The Power of Personal Branding

Understand the Applicant Tracking Systems

The Decline of 9-5 Schedules

Flattening Hierarchies

The Rising of Diversity and Inclusion

While these are important, they are a ways off from being the norm in understanding today’s job market. Boomers don’t have the longitudinal landing strip for jobs than other generations.

They should be ready to adapt to these emerging trends, but I think of several things more immediate:

1) Boomers need to pay more attention to marketing themselves to connect with the needs of the employer or recruiter. They must anticipate some of the employer’s current problems, both immediate and future.

Forecasting is a sweet spot for Boomers because of their experience in the workplace, but they must demonstrate the use of contemporary tools to solve them.

2) Boomers must present themselves as mastering relevant skills. It’s essential to hone your skills as a craft constantly and show progression. Career advancement does not have an expiration date. Today’s professionals are works in progress.

3) Boomers’ confidence is a superpower because of their lived experiences and resilience. They must show how they’ve navigated many adverse fiscal and market crises. They have stories and anecdotes to fit into the new world of work.

4) Boomers must find synergy with their younger counterparts. Many Gen Z workers are more open to learning from them, especially if there is a value exchange of shared learning experiences.

Boomers can help younger workers bow to tone a message, while younger workers can help Boomers with simple tech tasks such as converting a document to PDF.

5) Boomers must lean into the power of tact and respect, which is vital to connecting with younger hiring managers and recruiters. They need to read the room to find common ground rather than differences.

The response to sitting at the feet of others to learn and adapt comes as quickly as the need for a mentor.

Boomers looking to work desire meaning through their work or purposeful work. They adapted to varying leadership styles, fluid job markets, and complex transitions for decades. LinkedIn is a great place to update your profile and engage in conversations by sharing anecdotes and solutions to employers’ problems.

The biggest challenge for Boomers to conquer is getting in front of employers and connecting their attributes to business solutions they currently need.