Keeping Momentum in Your Job Search (3 Practical Tips!)

If you’ve ever searched for a job, you probably will agree that it’s easy to start your search. What’s not so easy, however, is sticking it out through the weeks and possibly months of uncertainty and slow progression. You might be wondering how to keep up the momentum in your job search, so I’m going to give you 3 practical tips to help you keep the ball rolling! I’ll also share how you can download my top 10 favorite job search mantras so that you can make sure you stay committed and get excited about your job search ahead. You can watch the video below or continue reading along!

How to Keep Up the Momentum in Your Job Search

Tip #1: Celebrate all the Small Wins!

I want to ensure that you are celebrating all of the small wins and milestones along your job search journey. A lot of job seekers come to me feeling really disappointed when they get to the final round interview and end up being told that they decided to go with another candidate. And that’s understandable because the ultimate milestone we want to achieve is receiving the offer letter, setting up that start date, and negotiating the package. But in order to get there, we have to start way back in the beginning. And in order to get from the first step of the job search to the final offer letter, there’s all of these amazing little successions in between. If we’re only fixated on the offer letter and we’re not celebrating the small wins, it’s going to be really hard to stay motivated.

During the job search process, there is so much we can’t control. But what we can control is the way that we show up every step of the way. So it’s important to acknowledge ourselves for that, right? I’ve always told all of my job seekers that your job search is not a sprint. It’s a marathon! And in order to get to where you want to be and keep up that momentum, you must be able to acknowledge how far you’ve come already. The more you can step into that appreciation and express that gratitude, the more fuel and energy you’ll have to continue going.

Dispelling Negativity

After making it to the final round stage of an interview but ultimately not getting the offer, many job seekers immediately jump to negative conclusions. They come to me worrying that there must be something wrong with them. They decide that they must not be as marketable or as great as another candidate. They’re sure that someone else had more to offer than they did. When negative thinking takes over, I tell them to really think about all the things they had to do in order to get that interview!

Chances are, if you made it to a final round interview, you had to create an amazing resume and an optimized LinkedIn profile. A lot of you may have had to step out of your comfort zone and network your way in. You might have had to have a difficult conversation. You had to show up for the phone interview and by the way, I guarantee you at least 300 other people wanted that one phone interview and you got it. So that in itself is something huge to celebrate! It’s so important to keep track of all of the things that allow you to step out of your comfort zone and grow as a person, as a job seeker, as an employee. The more you can do this, the more momentum and fuel you’ll have on this journey.

Tip #2: Create Consistent Habits

I see a lot of job seekers who start off really excited upfront. They’re so excited at the possibility of a new job, so they immediately hit the ground running. They start to pour all of their energy into one thing, whether it’s putting out 20 applications a week or talking to everyone they know and sharing the great news. And then like clockwork, after a month they grow discouraged and start to taper out. They started off really strong, but gradually declined as the silence or the rejection emails started to pour in.

Measuring Success On Your Terms

To combat this trend, my goal for you is to come up with your own KPIs. We all know key performance indicators inside of our workplace. We know exactly what we’re measured on in our role when we do have a job. So I highly recommend you create your own as well, but for your job search. Make sure you’re starting off slow and steady versus getting really excited up front and then becoming discouraged when you can’t meet your unrealistic goals. Don’t create high targets that are impossible to reach and will inevitably result in you doubting yourself. Use the mantra, slow and steady wins the race. Create some habits, implement a structure, and set goals that you feel are challenging yet attainable for you and just start off small!

If you end up doing more that day, great. Count it as a bonus, but continue moving forward. The more steady you can be in your job search, the easier your job search will be and the more quickly you will find your new job. When it comes to tangible goals, it’s hard to give any type of quantifiable example. I always tell my clients, your background and your situation and your hours and schedule are not identical to anybody else’s, so only you can determine what is right for you, what feels challenging, what feels exciting and really fill in your schedule and commit to it.

Tip #3: Commit to Your Job Search

I want you to commit to your job search just as if you were the CEO of your own schedule, which you totally are, right? But think about it in the workplace. You might have a meeting scheduled and even if you don’t feel well, you’re not going to call all of your vendors or all of your bosses and be like, “Hey, you know what? I’m not feeling well. Can we reschedule this?” In the workplace, you can’t bend the rules to accommodate your off days or sick days. So whenever you have something for your job search on your calendar, you should just treat it as a meeting that must be attended. View it as a mandatory meeting that you absolutely cannot reschedule. No matter how you feel, you must step up your energy and commit.

You Are the CEO of Your Job Search

Think of yourself as the CEO of your own job search. Think about every meeting you put in your calendar as your dedicated time with the CEO. And that means no matter what, you’re never rescheduling, right? So if you decide that on Tuesday at 6pm, you’re going to take an hour to revise your resume, that means you have a mandatory meeting that can’t be moved. That means even if Netflix is on, or even if your roommates want to play Uno, or even if your favorite spin class is at that time, it doesn’t matter. You finish what you need to do first and then you reward yourself. And again, going back to tip number one, after you finish your resume, celebrate that! Not only will you be getting the necessary steps of your job search done, you will also boost confidence in your own ability to stick to your word.

Those are my top three tips for you as you start to build up the momentum in your job search. I’d love to hear from you in the comments down below, which one of these was your favorite tip? Do you have any tips that you’d like to contribute to our community? Plus, if you are looking for job search resources, you definitely want to download my top 10 job search mantras and affirmations by clicking the image below.