Job Tips, Job News, Job Search – Blog by Browse Local Jobs

In today’s market, the majority of unemployed individuals have been on the bench for months, if not years. If your financial reserves haven’t already dwindled, they are on their way. However, there are worse things than not having money today. If you have been out of work for too long, you may appear unemployable by many hiring managers. In these cases, contracting can prove to be a viable alternative to full time employment. However, making this decision can be career changing and could get in the way of landing your next job. This series of articles can help you stay relevant in the marketing and still lead to viable short-term income.

Define consulting objectives: Often times consultants open their doors with no defined objective and haven’t seen beyond the need to produce some level of income. Before following this path, assess your strengths, weaknesses, and career goals. Then define a number of short term consulting offerings that fit each of those. Remember the objective is two-fold: produce some short-term income & find a long-term “job”

Stay focused: Another common consulting mistake is expanding your consulting roles to a point where you are no longer working on things that are relevant to your career. Stay focused on offerings that are pointed towards your long term goals.

Don’t spread yourself too thin: If you are successful as a freelancer or consultant, you will have a number of requests for work. It is likely that these requests will spread you very thin. It is very easy to get spread so thin that there is no time to focus on the long-term career goal. Guard against spreading too thin and don’t forget to keep looking for that next job.

Know when to change your plans: If you are highly successful at consulting, it may be wise to permanently switch to consulting as a career. However, this is seldom a wise choice. It is suggested that you prove viable income for at least 24 months before making the change a permanent one. Even then, this change should be a carefully thought out decision involving your spouse and a number of other people in your support network.

In our next article, we’ll talk about unique ways to find consulting assignments while you are out of work.

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3. Job Hunt Tips for Generation Y
4. Downsized Executive… What’s Next?
5. Manage your money during a job search