Advice

How to Boost Employability During Lockdown

With the job market in decline and the majority of internship programmes and work experience opportunities being cancelled, the current environment can make us feel very deflated about our future careers – but now is the perfect time to enhance our employability.

It is instead transformed into a sleek and professional snapshot of your life.

First things first, get your CV into shape if it isn’t already. On a recent talent webinar that I took part in, recruiters said that they employ a three second scan when looking at your CV, so if you don’t stand out straight away this means that you have little chance of advancing to the next stage of recruitment for most, if not all, industries. This means tweaking your CV so that rather than it being a lengthy summary of your life achievements, it is instead transformed into a sleek and professional snapshot of your life.  Whilst this takes time to perfect and work on, lockdown is the ideal time to be working on this.

If you have a LinkedIn profile, which I believe is essential in order to grow your network and connect more broadly, you should make sure that your LinkedIn matches up to your CV so that employers have a consistent picture of your work across all platforms. LinkedIn isn’t just good for reaching out to companies you want to be a part of, it is a well-known tool used by recruiters to look up your credentials before interviews, so you want to make sure that you leave a positive impression in their minds.

Another avenue that I believe is well worth exploring in order to boost employability is online webinars and workshops. Lockdown has meant that is there a wealth of resources online in order to learn from industry experts and develop skills which you can add to your CV. To give you a taste of this, I’m currently taking part in workshops with ScreenSkills, News Associates, The Student Publication Association and PressPad to name a few.

As well as these taught classes, it is also a great time to learn new skills in order to stand out in the job market.

So rather than not knowing what to do, I am finding it hard to juggle all the amazing opportunities online. As well as these taught classes, it is also a great time to learn new skills in order to stand out in the job market, such as making your own website, learning how to code or video edit. Currently I’m recapping on German and not only is this something that employers value, but it’s also a great avenue to distract yourself from everything else that is currently happening in the world.

If you don’t even know where to start with your future careers or you don’t know what sort of job you’d like to do, don’t worry because now is the perfect time to be looking into this and seeing which routes and opportunities are open to you. Don’t be afraid to reach out to career advisors, family or University of Nottingham alumni for career advice and tips because most are more than happy than help. Seeing how people got into the jobs they are in now and discovering what their typical workday is like can also really help guide you for the future.

So whilst you may feel that you’re not on track to gain that dream job or internship yet, don’t lose hope during this current climate, as taking time to consolidate your brand and develop your skills will put you in good stead for opportunities following lockdown.

Lauren McGaun

Featured image courtesy of World Relief Spokane via Flikr. No changes made to this image. Image license found here. 

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