Improving Your Job Prospects

When it comes to improving your job prospects, there are usually a few reasons that happen. You might be in a job that you really don’t love. You are perhaps unemployed right now and want to increase your chances of getting into the workforce. Or you simply feel like you are ready to advance your career because you aren’t reaching your full potential. 

There are a few options to improve your job prospects, here are just a few. 

Learn

Most of the time, one of the best options to push your career forward is to learn more. As you work your way up the career ladder in any company, the more qualified (on paper) people tend to reside in those offices. They specialize in specific areas or have further learning like an MA or a PhD. And, if you want to totally change your career path, then going back to school is going to be your best option most of the time.

Skills

It can be hard to know what skills we need to improve on. One way to work it out is to spend some time researching online for what skill sets people have when applying for the role that you want. How many do you meet, and what is left over? You can plug the skill gaps by seeking out opportunities to learn more in any of those areas. 

Or, you can spend some time at home working on the skills. Taking on interesting challenges will be one way that you can flex the skills you have and actively learn those at you don’t. And, these skills don’t always happen from extra learning, sometimes you need to watch other people work. 

Organize

It isn’t very easy to improve your job prospects when other areas of your life are a little bit chaotic. If you have a messy home, or you have some debts – those things linger in your mind and have an impact in all areas of your life. It is better to feel like you are in control, or at least tackling everything that you can. 

Time management is one area that people tend to think that have under control, but if you look at how many productive hours you can account for vs. the hours that seemed to disappear, there is usually a gap. Your mindset and commitment are going to play a big part in how you manage to move forward. 

Finally, it is all about focus. The odd fleeting thought about how much you want to improve what you do, or land a specific job is okay. But in order to meet your goals, you need to make sure that you set them and make them your focus. When you find yourself with free time, are you using it to improve your skills, research courses, or networking with those in the industry? Or are you using it to catch up on the latest Netflix original? Speak to career advisors, spend time researching online and chart out a plan of getting from where you are now to where you want to be. 

You might also like to read:

• How to improve yourself AND your career prospects
• Feeling blue about your job prospects? Don’t forget this market
• Improve Your Resume to Boost Your Job Prospects
• 4 Things to do Before You Move Abroad
• How to position yourself in a competitive market: make your customers brand ambassadors