4 Steps for Regaining Momentum When Your Job Search Stalls

You made what appeared to be some progress in your job search, but then it stalled. You networked. You posted your newly updated resume on leading job boards. You were even contacted by several recruiters and quickly submitted additional information about your qualifications. You felt that you where getting somewhere.  Then, nothing.  No e-mail messages.  No calls.  You’re in the dead zone.  You ask yourself questions: What’s wrong?  What’s not working?  Why?

Often the cause of a stuck campaign can be traced to a “ready, fire, aim” approach. Thoughtful analysis may suggest that you were out of the the gate too quickly and hadn’t focused on key elements that can positively impact a job search in a tough market.  Here are the steps you need to take to regain momentum:

1. Create a target list of prospective employers.  Be sure to not only add competitors of your former company, but also their vendors and suppliers, businesses with upstream and downstream relationships to that employer. All of these are serious prospects.
2. Measure your job search activities and their effectiveness.  As the saying goes, “If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.”  In a recent post, I suggested the use of a couple of templates that will allow you to conveniently track resume submissions, networking contacts, interviews, and career websites.
3. If you did a hasty re-write of your resume, revise it and re-post it to the leading job boards.  Your revision should be clearly targeted at your market and be rich in keywords .  Keywords are extracted in processing and are used as search criteria by recruiters.  If you do a good job of using keywords and keyword phrases, you’ll be found on a continuing basis.
4. Keep your personal website, LinkedIn, Spoke, blog and Twitter social networking sites up to date.  If you haven’t yet established a digital presence in social networking sites, do so.

Take these steps, and you will regain momentum and move your job search forward to eventual success.  Importantly, these steps will help you eliminate the future stalls and maintain your stride.