{"id":68117,"date":"2014-04-11T08:00:22","date_gmt":"2014-04-11T13:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=68117"},"modified":"2014-04-10T19:13:37","modified_gmt":"2014-04-11T00:13:37","slug":"things-you-should-never-say-to-a-job-hunter-and-what-to-say-instead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=68117","title":{"rendered":"Things You Should Never Say to a Job Hunter (and What to Say Instead)"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Claire Schmieder, Head Editor, INALJ New Jersey<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Things You Should Never Say to a Job Hunter (and What to Say Instead)<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"Claire.Schmieder\"<\/a>Just be satisfied with what you\u2019ve got right now.<\/strong> You know who\u2019s never satisfied with what\u00a0they have right now? Driven, highly-successful people. In fact, the drive to learn more, to lead,\u00a0and to innovate goes hand in hand with never being satisfied. From education<\/a> to business<\/a>, never\u00a0being totally satisfied is a common characteristic of the leaders in those fields, and in many\u00a0others, including librarianship.<\/p>\n

What to say instead: I love how passionate you are!<\/strong> You may not understand their drive to\u00a0succeed, to keep moving, and to do better, but that doesn\u2019t mean that they\u2019re wasting effort.\u00a0Being supportive means accepting people for who they are, even if you don\u2019t understand them.\u00a0Instead of telling a job hunter to accept defeat, why not support them in their path toward the\u00a0finish line?<\/p>\n

Wow, it\u2019s too bad you spent all that time and money earning a Master\u2019s degree and now\u00a0<\/strong>you can find a job.<\/strong> Yeah, it really is too bad that I spent time and money becoming well-educated and developing new skills. Being smart and talented is the worst. When people decide\u00a0to go to graduate school, it\u2019s rarely a half-cocked, poorly-thought-out scheme. And while there\u00a0are some bad reasons<\/a> to go to graduate school, there are plenty of good ones<\/a>, too. The most\u00a0obvious reason to go to graduate library school is that you need the degree to get the job.<\/p>\n

What to say instead: Why did you pull the trigger on grad school?<\/strong> To wit, if you don\u2019t\u00a0understand why someone would bother going to grad school, then just ask them why they did.<\/p>\n

I\u2019d really hate to be in your shoes.<\/strong> Well, of course you would. Who actually enjoys being a job\u00a0seeker, especially an unemployed one? Nobody, that\u2019s who.<\/p>\n

What to say instead: What\u2019s the most exciting job you\u2019ve applied for recently?<\/strong> Librarians\u00a0are passionate people who care deeply about the work they do. Why not find out more about the\u00a0jobs they\u2019re applying for and why they applied for them?<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll get lucky eventually.<\/strong> Oh, boy. This one is the worst. When people say this, they\u2019re\u00a0negating all the hard work, effort, and time that job hunters put into their search. People don\u2019t\u00a0get jobs because they\u2019re lucky. They get jobs because they\u2019re qualified and a good fit for the\u00a0workplace. Yes, of course \u201cwho you know\u201d comes into play, BUT job seekers who do a lot of\u00a0networking often know one or two people who are connected to hiring organizations. In fact,\u00a0knowing someone can be a good reason to apply for a job in the first place.<\/p>\n

What to say instead: I can tell how much effort you\u2019re putting into your job search. I\u2019m\u00a0<\/strong>really impressed.<\/strong> Job hunting is, well, a job. And, it\u2019s one of the least rewarding jobs ever.\u00a0Cover letters, applications, researching positions, networking, and professional development \u2013\u00a0these all take time, energy, and effort. Why not take note of hard work and give the job hunter in\u00a0your life a positive boost?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Claire Schmieder, Head Editor, INALJ New Jersey Things You Should Never Say to a Job Hunter (and What to Say Instead) Just be satisfied with what you\u2019ve got right now. You know who\u2019s never satisfied with what\u00a0they have right now? Driven, highly-successful people. In fact, the drive to learn more, to lead,\u00a0and to innovate…<\/p>\n

Read more \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":57897,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[145],"tags":[69,3592,3858,3632,4390,3343,6113],"class_list":["post-68117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","tag-article","tag-blog","tag-claire-schmieder","tag-inalj-new-jersey","tag-job-hunter","tag-job-hunters","tag-things-you-should-never-say-to-a-job-hunter"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/Claire.Schmieder.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1WoMK-hIF","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=68117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68117\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/57897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=68117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=68117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=68117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}