The temptation to put off beginning a job search great. Maybe you've dreamed about an extended vacation. And once you find a job, you can't expect ordinary vacation time for at least a year. Besides, you have severance pay.
Resist the temptation. Promise yourself time off once you've landed a job, before beginning work. If you delay a start, you'll soon realize that you've wasted a lot of valuable time as well as financial resources.
When athletes get out of shape, they must work hard and long to get back into it-and performance suffers in the interim. Right now you're in good trim-geared to working under pressure and meeting deadlines. So keep momentum going by swinging immediately into your job search. Don't fall into the "I deserve a vacation" trap.
Perhaps you have six months before you must leave your company. Your boss has said that you might conduct your job search on company time, although you'll have certain continuing responsibilities. This can work to your advantage-if you use the time effectively. Six months is a whole half year. Surely you'll find a good job in that time, and what's more you'll be doing useful work. Don't fool yourself. That six months will go by rapidly, and your first priority is to get another job. Do what you need to do for the company, but use as close to 100 percent of your time on your job search as you can manage. Don't cut back on your efforts until the company complains.
You may think you can do some consulting work temporarily, instead of looking right away for a new position. This holds numerous hazards.
To be sure, you earn income and you stay in shape. Consulting might lead to a permanent job. But time passes and job-hunting inertia sets in and that's hard to overcome. Earning income, while important, isn't your number one goal. If you do consult, seize every opportunity to look for a job. Don't put much stock in the idea that consulting itself will become your permanent occupation. The odds against consulting leading to a good job are high.
There are two job markets. One is visible, the other hidden. Don't fall into the trap of concentrating wholly on the first.
The Sunday New York Times and The Wall Street Journal carry pages of advertisements for executive jobs. The classified directories of any metropolitan area contain lists of employment agencies and executive recruiters. Ads and lists relate to the visible job market-known jobs that companies want to fill.
Employment agencies and recruiters stay in business by locating employees for key jobs-the kind you're seeking. To focus on them as well as on ads would be normal. Yet if you concentrate wholly on the visible, you entrap yourself. The hidden market contains fully three quarters of all jobs available. This is the market in which job hunters must find and make contact with executives who are not actively seeking candidates, but are in a position to hire.
Newspaper ads, employment agencies, and recruiters cast a wide net, which pulls in a host of candidates. Competition for known jobs is fierce. The visible market is overrun with "elite" candidates-the younger, well-trained, and desirable who stand out in a crowd. This pool diminishes with age. But for a person in mid-career, it's a tough group to buck. As an older, experienced executive, your chances are much better in the hidden market, where positions are more plentiful and competition is less.
You'll use every resource available to land the job you want. You'll answer ads and you'll work with agencies and executive recruiters. But ignore the hidden market at your peril-more about this later.
You may have sought expert aid on a number of employment occasions to help you solve various problems on professionals the job. You may have hired a consultant to help with a complicated problem. In your personal life, you probably have called on specialists-a doctor, a lawyer, a banker, or a tax expert. All have plenty of competent professionals. Expert job counseling is limited, but if you can find it, it may well make a substantial difference in the number and type of opportunities you'll be offered. So try to find it. If you can, it can be well worth it. And often you can find good counseling for a reasonable fee. I have seen dozens of job hunters who with the help of good in-depth counseling have changed faltering job searches into successful ones. Others have entrapped themselves by ignoring counseling opportunities.
Don't expect job counseling from executive recruiters and employment agencies. These people seek candidates for specialized jobs. Since their success depends on satisfying rigid employer specifications and because they work under great pressure, they have little time to counsel you unless you have a high potential for filling the kinds of jobs they handle. Their skill lies in evaluating candidates for employers, not in counseling candidates on how to be more effective in the job-hunting process (the kind of help you may need).
This doesn't mean you shouldn't see all the recruiters you can. You should-provided it does not distract you from approaching the hidden market. Listen carefully to the recruiter's advice, but be realistic about it. Counselors represent only a small fraction of all employment professionals.
The availability of effective professional counseling help is further limited by the fact that many of the best, even for the high fees that they often charge, are not available to most job seekers. Generally the most skillful are the outplacement specialists, a category that developed recently after employers accepted responsibility for placing those people they let go in other jobs. Outplacement specialists work for the employer laying off personnel. The fact that outplacement specialists will sometimes spend 50 to 100 hours working with a job seeker gives some idea of the in-depth counseling they can provide.
If your former company does not provide out-placement service, you might obtain it on your own. Use The Directory of Outplacement Firms, 1980 (Consultant News, Templeton Road, Fitzwilliam, N.H. 03447), to locate one in your area. If the firm insists on company sponsorship, try to get your former company to sponsor you and pay the fee. If the company won't pay the fee, it will probably at least sponsor you-that way you can become a client provided you pay the fee. You can also be sponsored by a friend who is a former client or someone who works for a company that has used the service. Ask for references from the outplacement firm(s) you're interested in and seek references on your own. Executive recruiters, personnel managers, and workshop counselors should be sources for such references.
Try to work with a counseling service on an hourly fee, if possible. You may be able to negotiate a fee to cover only the services you need. Many people have received excellent counseling for less than $1,000. If the directory doesn't provide you with the name of a service to meet your needs, ask employment professionals and counselors if they know of a good one.
I urge you also not to overlook volunteer counseling services for established professionals. Though they are few in number, some of them are very good. Other possible sources of help include management consultants, CPAs for financial jobs, and job, career, and vocational counselors.
