A different approach to job hunting: building your network and free work

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You’ve been rewarded throughout your entire life for showing up and playing or working hard. You got yourself involved during your school years and managed to get through it all with decent grades and only $50,000 in debt. You’re a new grad – eager and passionate and deserving of a well-paying, intellectually-stimulating job, right?

Welcome to the real world. It doesn’t take long to realize that you’re competing with more than just classmates born within the same calendar year. You won’t be rewarded for just showing up anymore and you’ll need to prove that you deserve that dream job – but how?

Build and use your network

The easiest way to find a great job is through your existing connections and network. Get the word out on what you are interested in and what your skill sets are. Blasting a hundred resumes to various employers may yield something but the odds of that job being something you are passionate about is slim to none.

A great way to build relationships in an industry is by offering free work.

Embrace the idea of Free Work

Many people can justify spending thousands and thousands of dollars on a degree but couldn’t fathom the idea of working for free for a few months to gain much needed experience and relationships.

Charlie Hoehn describes free work in his e-book as being different than an internship. In an internship, the employer usually feels they are doing the intern a favour and the intern is usually force fed mundane work and rarely given any real responsibility.

Free work is done strategically. You are able to research an industry and employer that you are genuinely interested in and propose a project that you will be passionate about.

Charlie mentioned the importance of removing all risk from the employer – not just financial. He recommends doing this by arranging a remote working environment. Not only are you working for free, but since you are not working at the office they will not have to worry about any overhead or training that would be involved.

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There are jobs out there. If you are struggling to find a job you are passionate about start asking why. Reevaluate how you are approaching your search and spend your downtime more productively than watching reruns of Golden Girls all day.