COMMON MISTAKES MADE WHILE HUNTING A JOB

When you start your job hunt you are filled with enthusiasm and hope for a bright future. However, as the hunt progresses your optimism gets lower with every rejection you have to face. Ever wonder why you are not getting the job that you are perfect for and have all the relevant credentials?

The reason is simple: You are committing some basic job search mistakes without even being aware of the fact that you are doing something wrong. Even the most experience people, who have searched for jobs time and again and even found one, are committing these common mistakes which can eventually lead to failure on all accounts.

Make sure that you are not committing any of the job hunt mistakes mentioned below and if you are its time to stop.

1-     Limited Research:

The most common mistake by all job hunters is that they look for jobs in selected few industries and that too from a single platform. You need to widen your circle and look into all industries which can possibly cater to your profession. There are so many job titles nowadays that there is no saying who can enter a company and who can’t. You need to keep an eye on all the job openings and apply to any job that is relevant to your education and experience. Applying to one or two jobs a month’s is not sufficient in the current job market.

2-     Standardized Resume:

A large majority of the job seekers make this fatal mistake and have to learn sooner than later that standardized resumes don’t work. You cannot make one resume and apply to a dozen jobs by sending the same resume. It is important that you alter each resume and customize it according to the job specifications.

Employers don’t pass as much as a second glance at these resumes which are not specific to the jobs. Focus on the objective part of the resume and write related sentences which make your resume attractive for a specific job.

3-     No Research on Potential Employers:

When the job seeker gets an interview call from a prospective employer, he prepares for all the questions that are asked by the employers but often neglect to research the history of the prospective employer. This is a big mistake as all employers will ask what you know about their company. Admitting ignorance in this regard, points towards a lack of effort and preparation at your end. You need not know everything about the employer but you can get the basic information by simply logging on to the company website and reading about their history and their profile. This little effort will help you tremendously during the interview.

4-     Wasting Valuable Time:

When you are looking for a job you can often end up spending months in the pursuit of the perfect job. Meanwhile you end up wasting a lot of time which will be difficult to explain if the employers asks you about your activities when you were not employed. Make sure that you employ this time in improving your skills, studying additional courses or attending workshops so that you can show the employer that you value time and are proactive in life.

5-     No Long Term Goals:

Not having a long term goal is a very important mistake as you will apply to random jobs and end up not getting a response from any of them. When you have a long term career related goal you can focus on the specific jobs that are good for your career and apply to those only.

6-     Focused on salary alone:

When you are focused on salary only, you end up showing it to the employer. An employer wants to see willingness to work and passion rather than the need to get a high salary. So change your priorities now and see the difference it can make in your life.

Inspirational Quotations for Business and Work

1. "There are few, if any, jobs in which ability alone is sufficient. Needed, also, are loyalty, sincerity, enthusiasm and team play." --William B. Given, Jr.
2. "When people go to work, they shouldn't have to leave their hearts at home.” --Betty Bender 
3. "One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man." --Elbert Hubbard 
4. ”To find joy in work is to discover the fountain of youth.” --Pearl S. Buck 
5. "One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important." --Bertrand Russell 
6. "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." --Thomas A. Edison 
7. "Far and away the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing." --Theodore Roosevelt 
8. ”Being busy does not always mean real work. The object of all work is production or accomplishment and to either of these ends there must be forethought, system, planning, intelligence, and honest purpose, as well as perspiration. Seeming to do is not doing." --Thomas A. Edison 
9. "Going to work for a large company is like getting on a train. Are you going sixty miles an hour or is the train going sixty miles an hour and you're just sitting still?" --J. Paul Getty 
10. ”When your work speaks for itself, don't interrupt.” --Henry J. Kaiser 
11. "The world is full of willing people, some willing to work, the rest willing to let them." --Robert Frost 
12. "People might not get all they work for in this world, but they must certainly work for all they get." --Frederick Douglass 
13. "In order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: They must be fit for it. They must not do too much of it. And they must have a sense of success in it." --John Ruskin 
14. "So much of what we call management consists in making it difficult for people to work." --Peter Drucker 
15. ”Nothing is really work unless you would rather be doing something else." --James M. Barrie 
16. "Real success is finding your lifework in the work that you love." --David McCullough 
17. "The more I want to get something done, the less I call it work." --Richard Bach 
18. ”The important work of moving the world forward does not wait to be done by perfect men." --George Eliot 
19. "Whenever it is in any way possible, every boy and girl should choose as his life work some occupation which he should like to do anyhow, even if he did not need the money." --William Lyon Phelps 
20. ”I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it." --Thomas Jefferson 
21. ”You've achieved success in your field when you don't know whether what you're doing is work or play." --Warren Beatty 
22. "The test of the artist does not lie in the will with which he goes to work, but in the excellence of the work he produces." --Thomas Aquinas 
23. "The secret of joy in work is contained in one word - excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it." --Pearl Buck 
24. ”Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately degenerate into hard work." --Peter Drucker
25. "Success in business requires training and discipline and hard work. But if you're not frightened by these things, the opportunities are just as great today as they ever were.” --David Rockefeller

Performance Management

Concept of Performance Management

• Getting maximum from the available resources
• Maximizing the productivity and Profits
• Lowering expenses and increasing efficiency
• Having right-sized resources for the Company
• Having proper plan for the future growth
• Having sufficient funds to run the operations smoothly
• Lowering Production losses and wastages
• Having maximum knowledge, Control and understanding about Operations of the Organization
• Doing everything in the Organization systematically

Symptoms of Low Performance

• Shortage of funds – often funds not available to meet needs
• Lower utilization of productive fixed assets
• Higher claims and complaints from customers
• Higher wastages than industry standards
• Low morale of employees and higher turnover
• Lot of miss deadlines from employees on critical assignments
• Sales and Production departments regularly fail to meet their targets
• Management low control on activities of the Organization
• Difficult to obtain important and critical information on time
• Surprises during operational activities – like un-availability of required raw material, sudden breakdowns of productive fixed assets, resigns from important positions on critical times
• High pressure on Top Management

Effects of Low Performance

• Normally the first impact of low performance comes on funds of the Organization.
• When shortage of funds starts then Organizations start compromising on multiple issues, which leads to further low performance
• Poor utilization of resources, inefficiencies, losses, lack of attitude and discipline lead these organization to heavy losses, where it become even difficult for these even to survive
• Because of low funds, often funds borrowed from other sources at higher cost, which place additional burden on the Organization’s operations
• When main focus is not placed on the problem areas, the overall losses ultimately lead to Organization to heavily dependent on high cost borrowings and in compromising state
• High pressures always remain on Top Management, which lead to wrong critical decisions at critical stage
• High wastages and high claims

Reasons for Low Performance

• No proper business plan
• Goals and targets for Organization and Departments are not clear
• Not appropriate resources – either on lower or higher side
• Human Resources are not according to requirement
• Poor utilization of main resources – Human resources, material, fixed assets and funds
• Organizational Culture, Discipline and Behavior
• Errors in Costing, Contribution Margin and Breakeven calculation
• No Budgets or poor implementation of budgets
• Lacks of System, controls, policies and procedures
• Accounts Department not fully functional in implementing controls and checking effectiveness of activities
• Non-availability of important and critical information to make timely right decisions
• Lack of usage of Software and IT Technology for higher performance

Treatment and solutions

• First of all we have to establish the potential of the Organization and resources required to perform up to maximum potential
• Establish desired performance level
• Present performance is compared with the desired performance
• Business plan is prepared and based on the Business Plan, Plans for all departments are prepared
• Adjustment of resources required – mainly Human Resource, Material, Fixed Assets and Funds
• Establish correct Costing, Contribution Margin and Breakeven analysis
• Implementation of budgeting across the Organization
• Establishing systems, controls and policies for all activities
• Usage of software for immediate and correct availability of information and improved controls
• Establishing system for taking timely and correct information and knowledge from all departments
• Establishing a strong monitoring system for true implementation of Business Plan

Areas to be considered

• Strategic Planning and Management
• Business Plan
• Departmental Plan and Profile
• Human Resource – Job Descriptions, establishing responsibilities and Performance Parameters
• Material Management
• Fixed Assets Management
• Fund Management
• Systems, Controls and Policies
• Costing, Contribution Margin and Breakeven analysis
• Budgeting
• Accounts Department – establishment of role of Accounts Department
• Information and Knowledge Management – through software and system
• Monitoring system

Results to be achieved

• Improvement in Gross Profit margins
• Increase in Production Efficiency
• Decrease in Production losses and wastages
• Decrease in Working Capital requirement
• Improved utilization of Fixed Assets and other Resources
• Availability of information timely and accurately
• The employees should be very clear regarding what work they have to perform in order to achieve overall Company’s Objectives and Goals