Looking for a new job presents a complex set of challenges by itself. If you are out of a job and looking for a new one, the challenges take on a different form: How much time will it take to find a new job? What do you tell prospective employers about your employment situation? What if they want to talk to your (now former) manager?
The best advice for someone who is employed and looking for a job is also the best advice for someone who is out of work and job hunting.
Start Right Away
When you're out of a job, people will tell you a lot of things to make you feel better. One of the most common pieces of advice you'll hear is, "Being laid off is probably the best thing that could happen to you. You have your severance pay-why don't you just take some time off?" Losing your job is a traumatic experience that may make you feel you'd just like to take some time off and relax before starting your job search.
The problem is, a day or two can stretch to a week, which can become a month, and before you know it, you've been on two interviews and your severance pay runs out next week. You need to start right away because you have to get "back up on the horse," because you need to work your network while it's still fresh, but mostly because finding a job takes time.
How Long Will This Take?
Judging how long your job search will take is an inexact science.
Everyone will tell you horror stories of their brother-in-law who was still looking two years later. For the record, during an average year in the 1980s, about 40 percent of unemployed people found a new job within 5 weeks of losing a job. An additional 30 percent found jobs during a period of 5 to 14 weeks after they lost their previous jobs. This means that, in an average year, about 70 percent of unemployed people find jobs within 15 weeks of being fired or laid off
Statistics can, however, lull you into a false sense of security.
When you factor in the millions of minimum-wage workers who can find another position almost immediately, you can see that the statistics can be skewed. Drake Beam McOrin, a New York outplacement firm, estimates that it can take experienced professionals five to six months to find new positions. Generally, the higher your income or more specialized your interests, the longer it will take you to find a new job.
Other factors, such as the health of the economy, the demand for your skills in the job market, your willingness to relocate, and your education and experience can have an impact on the length of your search.
Regardless of your situation, then, you should begin your search immediately. Almost everyone can tell you of someone they know who was looking for a year or more before finding another position. With some judicious financial juggling you should easily be able to tough it out for at least nine months to a year. The sooner you start your job search, though, the more likely you will be to find a new job within a significantly shorter time frame.
What Will It Cost?
You will have a number of expenses as you proceed with your job search. Because you need to conserve financial resources right now, you need to be judicious about what you spend on your job search. A number of potential costs include:
- Resume preparation. Resume services can help you prepare a resume, but they can charge several hundred dollars for their service. A cheaper alternative is to write your own, using some of the guidelines in this article and the advice of other experts on the subject. A good book on resume preparation can save you many times its cost in resume preparation fees. You can still expect to pay for stationery, envelopes, and printing costs, depending on how you have your resume printed. In general, a neat typing job is all that is necessary; typesetting or laser printing adds to your costs without adding any appreciable value.
- Recruiters. You should never pay a recruiter a fee for finding you a job. In general, recruiters are paid by the company that has the job opening.
You should definitely keep track of everything you spend on your job search because your expenses may be tax-deductible. According to Robert McCarthy, president of a financial advisory firm in Massachussetts, "The more you spend on your job search, the more likely it is that some of your expenses will be deductible." In fact, if you itemize your taxes, and if your job-search expenses exceed 2 percent of your adjusted gross income, you can take a deduction for those expenses.
Most of the expenses you incur when looking for a job fall into this tax-deductible category. You should keep track of everything, including:
- mileage to and from meetings with prospective employers or people in your job-search network, as well as tolls and parking expenses
- any other travel expenses, especially if you are looking for a job out of town
- meal expenses that are involved
- office supplies, stationery, and postage
- job-search services, resume services, and job-search books
