Have you thought about how you’ll remain engaged in the job search even if you love your current gig? Few jobs offer security much less can promise stability.

How can you be “gainfully” employed in 2017?

You only have one job? One job?

My opinion, you’ll win a vacation spot spinning the wheel on “Wheel of Fortune.” It’s more plausible than getting an interview through job boards. Although lots of people do succeed applying through job boards, most people don’t. The debate continues.

What will rock your job search in five years?

The search looks like this in five years:

1) The job search will require constant vigilance

All careers will shift and change as the economy does. Companies worldwide will modify the way they do business more quickly and frequently. To disengage from trends is surrendering your options to your replacement.

2) The job search requires proof and content

You must show social proof of your abilities, and anticipate how others can do the same. Interviewers will want to discuss how you solve problems. Yes, original thoughts rather than sharing provides more street cred in all professional spaces. You gain a competitive edge by having your personal website. Linkedin makes creating content easy and clean. Many more of us need blogs of our offering breadth and value.

3) The job search requires offline visibility 

You disrupt all job application through referrals or being discovered. Add to the conversation at large while producing value at work. Join conference panels or get interviewed at a college or radio station (or television). You won’t be a celebrity, but you will need to be known and found. Participate in conferences, lectures, and meetings at professional affiliates and organizations to heighten your industry profile. No longer be the person standing in the back of the room.

4) Volunteer counts in the job search

The right volunteer project can keep your skills and network fresh and relevant. You can control more of the lifestyle desires. Exploring new ideas, skills, or network can help you pivot to a new career if you are looking to change.

5) The documented job search

Finding hacks to your work? Why not share it using Facebook Live? Or Instagram Stories (or wherever recruiters and employers look)? Initiating dialogue around your ideas are as valuable as they are right or wrong? By the way, there is nothing wrong with presenting an idea not embraced by most.

6) Mobility before, during, and after your job search

Expand your options globally. Contracting is where most experts predict how professionals will work. Be ready to keep your business office, transactions, and coworkers to your phone. Your laptop will be your primary workplace and workspace.

Does this sound like entrepreneurship or a job search? There are few differences, and you can expect those worlds to collide even more. In five years, you must own your career. You’ll need to own every phase of your job search. It seems overwhelming at first, but it is everyone’s reality.

Grit and grind will always matter in the job search as much as having adequate hard and soft skills. But hard work in years to come will look much different as a does today. Partly due to how job seekers will market present themselves to the world long before a single employer is interested.

 

Many surveys including Remote.co predicts half of the population will be remotely employed by 2020. This will require a significant change in the way we navigate our careers. Everyone should imagine what 2020 will look like for their career. I have, and this is what I saw as takeaways.

Read 12 Ways to Mute Your Personal Brand and Not Get Heard or Hired

Your life lessons matter in your job search

Although hardships are not a direct career accomplishment, it is part of the fiber of your career trajectory and success building blocks. Resilience is what employers will need to see more of as opportunities are more global and the work/life balance lines burr. Navigating your career becomes the “Scylla and Charybdis” because a mobile job search is not a haven everyone thinks it will be. The cost needs an assessment whether it’s lifestyle changes or career choices. It won’t be easy. Just be ready.

 

Compensation negotiation is constant

As you consider salary as a priority, you’ll also need to look at how much everything else means to you in your negotiation package. Healthcare packages become more costly and on the fringes of unaffordable for the long term. Packages will change during the duration of one employment stint, not just from employment to employment. Pensions and social security will have changed.

Read Is Your Career Search Comfortable Yet? No? Good

A clear career trajectory ten years ahead will be rare if not impossible

Technology shifts are impossible to predict five or ten years down the line. Everything is about automation through robotics or virtualization. Time and productivity for everything are measured, so unless you can prove you can do things quicker, better, and faster, it will be harder to compete for technology careers. You will need to show it before you can consider being competitive in the market.

 

Your network is your job search navigation

Those who are vigilant and connected to their networks discover jobs more seamlessly than ever. Social proof is the norm rather than the exception. There is a clear difference between an active network and a weak one based on the relevance of your connections, and their connections. Not only your direct connections matter but also 2nd-degree connections matter more.

Listen to Preparing Young People to be Job Ready

Your team will matter more than your boss

We’ve seen the rise in teams interviewing job candidates. In 2020, a candidate enthusiasm for working at a company based on his or her projected team. Remote work as a norm will promote team branding and the entrepreneurial spirit.

 

Be Mobile, agile, visible, and adaptable in your job search

One of your options may not include physically moving, but understand roles with movable parts are interchangeable. Technology will create opportunities as much as opportunities will fade as the need for companies to alter business plans and objectives. Although the quality of your work is stellar, doesn’t guarantee its relevance from one year to the next, or between companies.

 

Career title focus signals a failure to brand

Having one job is complacency–so we understand. The problem will stem from pursuing one job. If you want to brand yourself beyond 2020, several roles are needed. The preparation to use different skills within different roles is critical. Although most will say you can’t be an expert in everything, you must offer several specialties because it’s likely you’ll have three or more part-time jobs while you’re young for years to come.

 

Failure to take control of your job search now will become more involved in 2020. By then, the cliches such as “fill out many applications as you can” and “send your resume everywhere” are heard in movies as a punchline, not as viable advice. If you want some indications of how your brand appears now, look at your LinkedIn headline and does it speak value, or does the title of your position stand out. If it’s the latter, it’s not too late to relaunch your brand for 2017.

This article was originally published on Jobs2Careers.com!