Congratulations! You’ve completed matric. And good luck… because now you need to find a job! Here are 10 important tips that you should be thinking about to help you with your journey towards employment.

 Be confident!

Confident people stand out from the crowd. Here’s a little trick to help you even when you’re feeling nervous: stand up straight with your feet apart, your shoulders back and your fists on your hips.

This is called the power pose. While you’re standing like this, remind yourself of every fantastic thing about you. Believe in yourself and your unique gifts. Now go and take the world by storm!

Network, network, network

This is one of the most important things you can do when looking for work. Ask EVERYONE you know if they know about any jobs you could apply for, and ask them to introduce you to other people who might know about jobs. Stay confident!

Your job is to find yourself a job
Looking for work is a full time job until you find it! So you need to work on this every single day as hard as you can. Read job ads online or in the newspaper and apply for the ones that look right for you.

Keep talking to everyone you meet about your job search. Do voluntary work and keep your CV updated. Knock on business doors and hand out your CV. A wise employer will be impressed by your attitude and your confidence.

Get your CV and references in order

• You need a written CV. If your English is not very good, have someone check your spelling and grammar! Your CV can be short and should include:
• Personal details (date of birth, contact details)
• Education
• Any actual work experience you have, including holiday jobs and volunteer work
• Any notable achievements: awards, pass marks, sporting achievements
• Any experience that shows your character such as taking care of others, roles within church, your family or your community
• Even if you’ve never worked, you can get references from teachers, church leaders, employers of your parents who know you, etc.

Look where the jobs are

80% of entry-level jobs are in the service and sales industries like retail, restaurants and hotels. Also look out for small businesses that hire young, enthusiastic people who are willing to learn and grow with the business.

Be prepared to start as a junior at entry-level. We all have to go through this valuable time to gain experience and prove ourselves.

Volunteer

Volunteering is a great way to gain experience. Offer to help out at your church, community centre or sports club. Any kind of job counts as experience and can be added to your CV.

You could also offer to work for free at businesses in your area but be very clear about your reasons for doing this: you want to gain experience or you hope the business will hire you. Only do this while you’re learning – not forever

Make sure you’re always contactable

Use only one cell phone number when you’re looking for a job. Keep your phone on and fully charged and answer calls politely. If your number does change, make sure you change it on your CV. You also need an email address to send your CV out. If you don’t have one, it’s easy to set up a free @gmail account.

Go English!

Generally, English is the language of choice for businesses in much of the world and South Africa is no different. The better your English, the better your job opportunities! Watch English TV, listen to English radio stations, read magazines and newspapers and speak to friends and family in English! Practice every day.

Beware of social media

Potential employers will look you up on social media before they interview or employ you. Remember this when you’re posting. The rule of social media is that if you don’t want people (especially employers) to know something about you, then don’t put it on social media.

We’ve saved the best tip for last – register with Harambee

For help with job hunting, register on www.harambee.mobi by completing the online application form. Harambee is a 100% free network that helps young first-time work seekers find work. They give work-seekers the tools you need to find work, assess your skills and strengths and if you match an opportunity that they currently have available they could also place you in employment.

Source: www.sagoodnews.co.za

https://www.sagoodnews.co.za/passed-matric-looking-for-a-job-know-where-to-start-heard-of-harambee/

So, you now have your matric diploma, or other qualification, and you feel like the world is at your feet.  You hit the road running with all the enthusiasm and joy of someone on the start of their adult journey.

You put your CV on the internet and visit some recruitment agencies – and then you wait for all the offers to come in. And you wait and you wait!  What happens then?

When you keep doing the same thing over and over again, can you really expect a different result?  If you’ve sent out your CV and are now just sitting and waiting – and carry on waiting – for job offers to come in, you will probably end up being very disappointed!
So, what should you be doing if you are not getting the results that you want?

Here are 10 Tips for first-time job seekers

1. Check your CV!
   Have you had your CV checked by someone in the corporate world? It’s not unusual for people to miss their own typing errors (you know the ones that spellcheck doesn’t pick up, like ‘there’ instead of ‘their’) so it’s essential to have a ‘proof reader’. Make sure your contact details are correct!

2. Target your applications
   Don’t just send your CV out to thousands of people and hope that one of them will get back to you. Target your applications. Do internet research to find out the best place for you to be sending your information to. Find out where other people in your group or circle have had success and try those resources.

3. Use your contacts!
   This is always quite difficult when you start out, but often it’s not what you know, but who you know in business.

4. Network
   Use your parents’ or relatives’ network.

5. References
   Ask your teacher/professor for personal character references.

6. Face-to-Face
   Try and meet the people who are going to be looking for jobs for you. It is much easier for a recruitment agent to remember someone they have met, and who has made an impression on them – rather than some nameless person on a CV. Remember that recruitment or personnel agencies get thousands of job applications a week, so you need to be the one who makes the effort – and the impression.

7. Follow up
   Don’t wait for people to get back to you: they are doing you a service; you must do the follow up.

8. Be prepared to start at the bottom of the ladder
   No matter what your qualification is: Remember to be working in a company, in ANY position, is better than not to be working at all. It’s about getting a foot in the door to gain experience.

9. Good work ethic
   A prospective employer will always look at what you’ve been doing since you qualified, so they would rather hire a person who qualified as an accountant last year, but has worked as a receptionist this year over someone who qualified last year and has not worked since.

10. Don’t give up!
    No matter what the negative people are saying, there is work out there.  You have to keep trying until you succeed. They say in sales that you have to knock on 20 doors before you make a sale.  These days it may be more like 30 doors before you make that sale – in this case, yourself.  So if you’re not successful at first, remind yourself that it’s ‘one down, 29 to go’. . .

Good luck with your job hunting!
 

About the author:
Bev Morrison is a development coach based in Johannesburg. She opened her coaching practice in 2008 after an 18-year corporate career.

‘Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.’ – Zig Ziglar

Pic:  Tim Gouw

Where to start?

The key to searching for jobs is knowing what you are looking for. You need to decide where you want to work, what you want to do, and how much you’re willing to get paid for the job.

It often helps to start with an exercise, which I like to call “Brainstorm Myself”. Be honest and list what you’re good at, as well as any achievements you’ve accomplished (at school, church or volunteering). 

Write down the following:

1. Your ideal first job (Top 5 but, BE REALISTIC!) – the kind of job you are looking for
2. Where you would like to work (the company/individual)
3. What skills and characteristics do you have, so you can get a better picture of what you have to offer
4. Why you want to do that job
5. Your short and long-term goals

What’s next?

Job-hunting used to be about getting the newspaper and trawling through the jobs section or classifieds. Whilst newspapers are still a good place to look for opportunities, particularly your community paper, the internet is another great place to look – at home, school, your local library or internet café.

Online job-hunting takes practice, however. And be prepared, some internet cafés may charge by the minute.

What do I search for?

If you do a Google search (www.google.co.za) for “job opportunities in South Africa”, approximately 441,000,000 results come up…EEK! That’s not a good place to start!

Use the answers from your brainstorm exercise above and start by typing these keywords into the search field. Use these keywords to search for jobs with specific skill requirements rather than searching for jobs in general.

Find out which job portals are most popular for the type of work you are looking for. You can ask your teacher/lecturers, friends, past employers, relatives or mentor.

Many career sites advertise opportunities for “first jobs”, “graduates”, “Matriculants”, “Part-time” or “No experience needed”. Add these keywords in your searches. You may need to use the advanced search option.

There are a number of websites listed at the end of this article to help get you started.

You should also read about the companies you would like to work for and learn about what they do; understand their vision and see if you truly want to work for them. Do they have positions available at your level? Do they have jobs for school-leavers, graduates or offer internships or apprenticeships?

Check out their websites for employment or other opportunities they may promoting, including internship or graduate programmes, under the Vacancies, Careers or Jobs section.

Be specific, be creative

Be creative. For example, when looking for jobs in Sales or Retail, type in retail assistant, sales consultant, customer service agent, shop assistant, etc. By doing this, you are searching for the same kind of job in many different ways.

So, when typing in search terms or filling in entry fields on job websites, the trick is to include as much detail as possible to narrow your hunt and get closer to the job that’s right for you.

Include the industry you want to work in, job type and title
Location: City or area you’d like to work in. Most career sites today give you the option so use it!

Level (junior/mid/management): keep it real! Look for jobs within your experience level to maximise your chances of getting an interview

Full-time/ Part-time/ Contract/ Permanent: in these hard times, explore what’s out there. You never know if a part-time position will turn into something more permanent.

It’ll also count as experience to add to your CV, which most employers look for.

Good luck!

by Liat Beinart

Liat Beinart  is a Graduate Development Consultant at S-Connect
(http://s-connect.blogspot.com/)

‘It may not always be profitable at first for businesses to be online, but it is certainly going to be unprofitable not to be online.’ – Esther Dyson

“Staying motivated is a challenge – and when you get demotivated, you’re more prone to anxiety, depression, and stress. The important thing to remember is that while unemployment rates may be high and the job market is tough, it’s not impossible,” says Johannesburg-based counselling psychologist, mentor and career counsellor Thabile Adams, who recommends these 10 tips to keep positive.

(1) Evaluate and adapt the way you’re looking for a job

Accept that the process takes time, planning, research, persistence, skills and using the right tools. Start by asking yourself these questions to work out if you’re really hunting or simply just applying for jobs?

• Am I putting my best foot forward? Take a long, hard look at your CV and Cover Letter and ask yourself if it is interesting, relevant, clear and error free?

• Am I emotionally invested (how badly do I want this) in finding employment? How many hours per week have I dedicated to my job search? How many applications have I completed each week? (Career consultants suggest that you need to apply to at least 20 jobs in a week, not one or two per month, to create more opportunities for yourself to land that interview.)

• Am I following up on applications? And how am I keeping track of my progress?

(2) It’s easy to get de-motivated!

• If you lose sight of your goals. Keep focus by putting a plan into place with daily or weekly milestones to help you get there.

And ask yourself:

• Where do I see my career in the short and long term?
• How do I plan on achieving these goals?
• Have I mapped out a different route should things not go according to plan?
• Am I aware of the financial costs (faxing, emailing and postage of applications) involved in achieving a set goal, so I can save for them if needs be?
• Will I have to make any sacrifices to get there – and am I prepared to make these sacrifices?  For example:  Am I prepared to take a downgraded job to get where I want to be in the long term?

(3) Don’t dwell on the job opportunities you didn’t get

• This will only drain you emotionally. Set yourself some time to be disappointed – but then let go and move on!

(4) Focus on empowering yourself

• With further skills and experience you can make yourself more employable. Volunteer, take more courses – just don’t sit home and feel sorry for yourself.

(5) Do things differently!

• This means putting yourself out there by contacting companies directly and telling them about yourself and what you can do for them. Participate in events in your community, network with people in the industry you’re interested in or start your own business.

(6) Employers select the ‘best candidate’ for the position

• If you weren’t selected, it could simply mean that the job wasn’t right for you – not that you weren’t right for the job.

(7) Remember

• You’re not being rejected when you don’t get a job. The truth is that you were just not selected, not rejected – two very different things.

(8) Learn from your experiences

• Build bridges for the future. When you receive another ‘regret–not-rejection’ letter, kindly thank them for considering you and ask for feedback on where you fell short so you can work on these areas for your next interview or application. Each interview can offer career-enhancing tips for your long-term growth – use them!

(9) Stay confident & optimistic

• Even if you have to force yourself to pretend to be confident and optimistic in the beginning. When you become demotivated, you begin to stop trusting in your abilities and may even begin to question your achievements. Don’t fall into this trap. Focus on your strengths and determination to achieve your goals.

(10) Celebrate any call-backs!

• Even if you didn’t get the job it means your CV is saying the right things, and you beat out tens if not hundreds of other applications to be considered for the post.

“Finally, remember that you’re not alone,” concludes Adams. “The trick is to turn the job search process into an opportunity to teach yourself new skills, network – and to get creative in the face of obstacles you might face.”

Thabile Adams is based in Alberton, Johannesburg.

‘What we pay attention to – expands.  What we pay attention to – we become.’ – Anon

Job hunting can be stressful, but there are things we can do to make it a bit easier.

The worst part of job applications is being rejected. So, how can you minimize the possibility of being disappointed?

Here is just ONE way:

• When you read a job advertisement – read it slowly and CAREFULLY!
• Pay attention! – Underline or highlight the specific credentials (skills/qualifications/etc) they are looking for.
• Make sure you have ALL of them!
• Try to avoid applying for a job when you do not have what they are looking for.   You are wasting yours and the company’s time.

Time is money!  A company specifically lists what they want from an applicant to save time and money.  They have very important reasons why they want those skills for the job.  By listing the requirements they are trying to narrow down the applicants to the ones which are the most suited.

Lots of people will apply for the job.  You’re not the only one.

The quickest way for the company to sort through all the applicants is to list the minimum requirements.  If you apply for a job and you don’t have the required skills, it’s very sad, but your CV will be thrown, immediately, into the bin!

They will ONLY consider those applicants who meet their requirements.

So read the advert CAREFULLY!

Here are 5 examples:

1. Computer literate?

If a company requires you to be computer literate – they really want you to be skilled in MS Word, Excel, Outlook etc.  This does not mean phone apps or that you’re good at Facebook-ing!  If you don’t have these computer skills, then applying for this job would be a waste of time. (This might also be the push you need to go and get computer skills. Then you will be able to apply for a similar job. Some NGO’s offer free or subsidized computer training. Ask around to see if there is a training venue near you.)

2. Own transport?”

If a company requires you to have your own transport  – they really want you to have your OWN car.  If you don’t, this would not be a good job to apply for.  The company will not consider public transport as ‘having your own transport’.

3. Experience?

If a company requires you to have at least 2 years of relevant experience  – they really want you to have it.  ‘Relevant’ means you’ve worked in the same or similar position before as the job advertised.  They’re not prepared to hire someone who hasn’t.  There will be someone applying for the same job that has!  So again, you will be wasting your time.

4. Qualification?

If a company requires you to be Trade-tested, then, make sure you are.  If you’re not, your application may not even be read!

5. Language?

If the company requires you to be fluent in English – then only apply for this job if you can speak, read and write English well.  English is obviously very important for the job, so if you can’t, you won’t be a perfect applicant, someone else will.

Warning!

Lying on your application because you’re desperate for a job, is not advisable – EVER!

Falsifying documents or certificates is fraudulent and you will be found out.  You may even look silly or stupid in front of other people if you can’t do the job you said you could do!

In some cases, you may be instantly fired!

A Quick Recap: 

Read the job advertisement CAREFULLY. 

If you match 100% with the job requirements – then go ahead and apply.  This approach is not a guarantee you‘ll get the job, but you’ll minimise the chance of being rejected and disappointed.

FACT:

• YOU = 100% Job Requirements = Big chance of getting an interview!
• YOU = 99% Job Requirements = NO INTERVIEW!!! It’s that simple!

Here is my list of things to do if you want to apply to apply for a job, but don’t really want to be considered. These are based on real applications that I’ve received.

It’s a long list and you don’t have to do everything on it to be rejected.  Often, it just takes one thing on the list to move your application into the rejection pile.

Here’s how NOT to get shortlisted  

Your motivation letter:

• Get the name of the company wrong, or spell it wrong.
• Apply for the wrong job.
• Write ‘Dear Sir’ – chances are a woman is reading it; try ‘Dear Madame/Sir’, or if you know the name of person you are writing to, use it!
• Spell words incorrectly – I get tired at the thought that I would have to correct your work constantly.
• Use bad grammar.
• Explain that the reason you want the job is that you need to develop yourself further or explore new life options – yes, I hope you’ll get fulfilment in your work, but my main interest is whether you can do the job!
• Say that you’re absolutely suited to the position – um, let me be the judge of that.  I know the job better than you do.
• Include documents you weren’t asked for – read the advert and give only the documents asked for!
• Say that if you aren’t eligible for this job, you’d take any other position that’s on offer – you may be desperate, but don’t tell me.
• Say that you’ve just been retrenched – keep that detail for your CV when you cite the reason for leaving your last job.
• Say that you’ve applied for sixty other positions and have been unsuccessful, and you’re perplexed as to the reason (am I too old, too fat, too overqualified?) – for Pete’s sake, I’m a prospective employer, not your psychotherapist!

Your CV:

• Send me the standard boring format that half of South Africa seems to use (the one that starts with your name, gender, date of birth, ID number, criminal record YES/NO etc., etc.).  Stick to your name, age, contact number and then start with a short paragraph on who you are (e.g. I am a 29 year old South African woman skilled in….. I was trained in … at …. I am committed to…) – this paragraph will tell me what is unique about you, and potentially set you apart from other applicants.
• Include the minute details of every training course that you’ve ever gone on in your life – nobody reads that stuff.
• Include the minute details of every small task that you ever performed in each job you’ve ever had.
• Make spelling errors.

OK, enough of that.  You get my point. 

HOW TO DO IT RIGHT!

Let me tell you what I DO look for:

Your motivation letter:

I’m interested in someone who:

• grabs my attention in the first line with an honest appraisal of her or himself, or a statement about the position on offer;
• keeps the letter short – I don’t have time to read two-page letters;
• clearly knows something about my organisation – can relate their application to the priorities on our website.

Your CV:

• I want to get a sense of you as a person and your key achievements in the first paragraph.  Keep the boring admin for the end.
• In describing your prior work, draw out in one or two sentences how this will add value to the job for which you are applying.
• Include up to date details of referees (but don’t include references unless asked for).

Basically, I want to get a sense that you’ve really thought about this position and it’s not one of fifty you’re applying for.  I know that means spending more time on each application with no guarantee of shortlisting, but I think you’ll have more chance of getting shortlisted if you submit fewer, tailored applications than many, general ones.

Good luck!
Written by a Cape Town employer

‘You never get a second chance to make a first impression.’ – Anon