What the Tour de Yorkshire can teach you about your job search

Albert Einstein once said, “Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving” and he could have been talking about the modern job search. Like the cyclists currently embarking on the Tour de Yorkshire, keeping up your momentum and motivation while searching for a new role can be a challenging endeavour.

As our road racers will attest, the path to success has its ups and downs, but even through the most mountainous of climbs, they must learn how to keep their momentum going.  Your job search can also feel like a bumpy ride – it’s not unusual to feel optimistic after an interview, only to find out you crossed the finish line in second place.  It’s at these times that it is most important to get up, get back on your bike and keep pedalling.  Here are some things you can do to help keep your motivation and momentum going to help ensure your job search is as productive and positive as possible:

Strategise

Make sure you have a well thought out strategy. Understand your strengths and weaknesses, and have clear actions to help reach your end goal. Establish the types of jobs you are looking for and be clear about what you are targeting and identify the job boards that are going to be most relevant for the roles that you are looking for. Using a variety of job search methods will not only ensure you are covering all areas but will also help keep you more motivated than just endless hours trawling through job boards

Identify your ‘zone’

Identifying your zone means making the most of your energy during that particular time frame. Are you a morning person, a night owl or do you sit somewhere in between? What time of day do you feel most productive? If mornings aren’t for you, don’t force yourself to use this time for the things you need to really focus on. Professional athletes too will create a training schedule for themselves, factoring practice and training in when they are most energised.

Avoid cabin fever

Fresh air and exercise is scientifically proven to increase productivity and create a positive state of mind. Plenty of coffee shops, public places and libraries have free Wi-Fi, so take your laptop or tablet and search for jobs whilst you are out and about. If you structure your day so that you are out of the house during core working hours, you will feel more productive when you return home. If you are conscious not to spend too much money whilst you are out of the house, you could take a packed lunch and some drinks to have during the day.

Manage other responsibilities and commitments

If you are a parent, primary carer or have other responsibilities and commitments, it’s often important that you keep structure in your day and maximise productivity. Share your timetable with the people you have commitments with so they have an awareness of your current priorities and how much time job searching takes. It may be much better for you to keep your routine as close to a working day as possible, that way the re-adjustment back into the working environment will be a smoother transition.

Give yourself a break

Cyclists will ensure they have down time to recover after each race. Try not to job search all day every day, job seekers who do this end up demotivated and disheartened. Give yourself an afternoon off to meet a friend for coffee, go to the gym before rush hour or just enjoy a bit of free time to yourself. You will feel much more motivated and balanced knowing that you have done some job searching but also given yourself a bit of time to just relax.

Visualise the finish line

It’s easy to get stagnant in your search if you’ve been job hunting for a while. So try to imagine what your ultimate goal is as a way to not fall back in your job search. Whatever your goal is, try to keep it in the forefront of your mind as a mental motivation to keep pushing forward and keep up the momentum. Job seekers who are organised, have structure and set goals leave employers with a positive impression and are more likely to succeed in finding suitable opportunities. Using these techniques will enable you to remain focussed, productive and motivated throughout your search.

During the Tour de Yorkshire, competitors often find that with changing weather, terrain or other outside factors, there may be times when priorities change, or something comes up that is more important.  As with your job search, acknowledge any challenges as they arise, and get back on track as soon as you can to keep up that positive momentum.

Renovo is one of the UK’s leading providers of outplacement and career transition support. We work with both organisations and individuals to support all their career transition requirements. If you would like to understand how Renovo can help you please call 0800 612 2011 or email info@renovo.co.uk