6 Things You MUST Stop Telling Yourself While You Look for a Job
Let’s state the obvious: job hunting is kinda hard. No matter how accomplished you are, you’re inevitably going to get a whole portfolio of rejections. This is the first time you’ve received this many rejections in a row since joining Tinder. You might have started to doubt yourself. You might be experiencing lower self-esteem. But what if we told you that rejections are a normal part of the job search? It’s important that you find a way to stay positive and not let those rejections get to you. As Rocky Balboa once said “Life isn’t about how hard you can hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.”
Now, we can’t give you a motivational speech as good as Rocky’s, but we can tell you how important it is to stop putting yourself down during your hunt. Just like you can “fake it til you make it”, the reverse is also true — the more you keep spewing negative thoughts about your abilities or success, the more you’ll subconsciously start to believe it. When these thoughts take over they’ll follow you into every interview, messing with your confidence and your presence. Rejections are just a bump in the road, so don’t let your inner critic let you become a self fulfilling prophecy!
Stop fretting. You will get a job. It may take a whole lot of rejections, but (never the less) you will persist. If you catch yourself saying any of the things on this list, take a deep breath, and remember how awesome you are.
1. “I’m not good enough.”
Let us tell you something you might not know: companies sometimes prefer to hire people who are slightly under-qualified for a position over someone who is overqualified. The reasoning? The over-qualified individual will get bored faster and leave the company earlier than the under-qualified candidate. The under-qualified candidate is also more likely to work harder to prove their worth to the company. In the long-run, they actually add more value to the company than their counterparts. So if your resume is a little lacking, or if your skills aren’t at 100%, still apply! You might be pleasantly surprised!
2. “They’d never hire me.”
If we’ve learned anything at all about startups these past few years, it’s that they always need a wide array of talents and personalities. Yes, startups need techies, designers, and data engineers, but they also need growth hackers, content creators, and marketers. There will always be room for great sales people or smart organizational minds. No matter the startup, there is always some way you can add value to their team (even if it is your amazing attitude). Don’t forget, the only way you definitely won’t get hired is if you don’t apply!
3. “I’ll do it later.”
Everybody and their mother knows that you won’t do it later. Cut the BS and just do it now. The longer you wait, the higher the chance that the position will no longer be available. It’s not rare for startups to fill open positions within 24 hours! Your dream job could realistically be snatched up by someone else because you were too busy saying “I’ll do it later”… If you have to bookmark it for later, schedule a time to actually sit down and crank it out. You’re more likely to get it done when it’s in your schedule, and you’ll be less likely to lose job hunt momentum.
4. “I don’t have anything to offer.”
We’ve already established that you don’t need to have technical skills to work at a startup. Let us also tell you that you don’t need to have studied English or Business. For all anyone cares, you could have majored in Underwater Basket Weaving and still be able to bring value to a startup. At the end of the day, what’s most important is that you’re able to work in a fast-paced environment, learn quickly, and be excited about what you do. For example, we at Planted love having a diverse team, and we have folks coming from everything from consulting and finance to advertising, media and education! Our team has majors from Sports Medicine to Urban Studies to Econ and Chemical Engineering. . What matters the most for us when making hiring decisions is attitude, aptitude, potential, and personality(more than just past experiences or area of expertise). These kinds of hires happen on the daily for all kinds of startups, so even if you didn’t study something related to the position, you can still bring a ton to the company
#JobHunting #Motivation #Positivity #jobsearch #Career #JobSeeking