Always Be Prepared
At Collaborative Talent, we recommend taking a few key steps to ensure you’re always prepared for difficult business climates, similar to what we find ourselves in today. Whether you’re searching for a new position a or trying to ace an internal interview for your next promotion, these small but powerful tips should be practiced routinely to keep yourself in the best possible position throughout your career journey.
Keep your LinkedIn profile updated. Your LinkedIn profile is not your resume, but should be a concise summary of who you are and your professional career. It should be a primer that entices a recruiter or hiring manager to learn more about you.
Keep your resume and list of achievements updated. There is nothing worse than trying to remember the details of a critical project you successfully executed ten years ago.
Always Be Networking. Meeting people within your company is an awesome and necessary step to further your career within the company. You should also be actively networking with professionals outside of your company. You never know who you know, that might know someone else, that could get you an introduction into your dream job. Building a strong network takes work, and there is no better time than the present to start. All too often people are caught off-guard with a layoff or another event stimulating a job search. Don’t be caught flatfooted because you don’t know anyone outside of your company.
Always be open to a conversation about a new position. This doesn’t mean that you should take every recruiter or HR call, but it does mean you should look through your emails and LinkedIn messages to see if any of them appeal to you. If there is even the slightest chance the role might appeal to you, you should take the conversation. It could be the dream role!
Be polite. A recruiter might reach out to you about a role that might not be a perfect fit, or might not be a fit at all, but being a polite professional and telling them what type of role you are possibly open to will get you a lot farther than being rude to that Recruiter for being wrong and taking a shot.
Carve out some time each month to document your accomplishments, dust off your resume, and polish your LinkedIn profile. Staying prepared saves time in the long run and will help you rest easy knowing you’re ready for whatever happens next in your career journey!