Attributed to comedian and entertainer Emo Philips is the paraprosdokian “When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle.  Then, I realized God doesn’t work that way, so I stole one and prayed for forgiveness.”  Undoubtedly funny, Philips’ comment should provide a revelation to unsuccessful job seekers employing traditional methods in attempting to uncover opportunities.

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Summertime and the living is easy; that is, unless you happen to be unemployed and searching for a job.  In that case, you are tortured and your level of anxiety grows daily.

In job hunting and recruiting circles, it has long been axiomatic that the periods between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day and between Memorial Day and Labor Day represent the least probable times of the year to secure employment.  And, if one considers the circumstantial evidence, that supposition rings true.  Since achieving employment today involves multiple interviews with decision-makers at various levels of the potential employing organization, opportunities to arrange these interviews in a timely fashion are limited by vacations, holidays, days off, and hiring manager preoccupation with non-business matters.

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As the economy totters on a seesaw weighted heavily on the losing end, job hopefuls continue to flood the market.  Armed with current resumes and persuasive cover letters, and pursuing Internet and direct networking techniques that are beginning to bear fruit, many candidates take a false step at that crucial, pre-interview stage.  They request that friends or other individuals with whom they are acquainted review their resumes.  These persons may be former human resources managers, recruiters, or even administrative assistants charged with screening applicants for the head of the department.  Interactions of this nature often result in angst and doubt on the part of the once-optimistic candidates, for the hue and cry that invariably arises from at least one of the reviewers is, “Your resume is terrible!”  Chagrined, the candidates then ask for advice; specifically, what should be adjusted in the format or content.

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Commanding officers and enlisted service people in every branch of our military often strategize and live by an interesting and sound concept whose adage advises, “If you want to eat an elephant, eat it one bite at a time.”  Unless stranded on the African veldt or the jungles of India with the barest of supplies, our armed forces are not advocating initiating a giant barbeque featuring a pachyderm as the main menu item.  Rather, the United States military recommends that, when confronted with an enormous task, one should break it down logically and methodically into manageable parts and then tackle each portion one step at a time.

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Several years before Taylor Hicks was crowned the 2006 American Idol winner at the famed Kodak Theater, it was a much smaller stage that he claimed in his native Birmingham, Alabama.  In a venue called The Open Door Cafe, Hicks and his band mates tossed up a mixed salad of classic-bluesy rock and Southern rock, a Ray Charles’ heartbreaker, and some of Taylor’s original material.  Peppering his set with observations tossed out to the audience, Taylor noted rather wistfully that, “The blues don’t pay.”  Quickly and prophetically, he then added, “But they will someday; they will.”

Although Taylor’s public pep talk underscored both his devotion to his music and his commitment to landing a lucrative record contract, it also presented a dichotomy.  The kind of music that swept commercial radio represented a calculated, formulaic route too narrow to allow the undeniably talented and diverse, albeit unknown, artist to set off on a path of his own making.  Taylor understood that in order to get his foot in the door, he had to reinvent or repackage himself, balancing the primal need to remain true to his musical roots with the necessity to market himself to a broader audience.  As demonstrated by his song choices and as demanded by the judges throughout the Idol process, these were the decisions that informed Taylor’s strategy.

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The process of confronting one’s own termination can be rather similar in its phases to the loss of a loved one.  This is especially true of employees long embedded in their career with one particular company.  The immediacy of disbelief is followed by a sense of betrayal, engendering the next stage, which is anger:  itself a two-edged sword.  Properly channeled, righteous anger can serve as the impetus through which you vow to succeed and begin to do so by devising a well thought-out job search.  Directed inward, however, with self-recriminations of – “What did I do wrong?” - anger may lead to depression and ultimately, inertia:  the inability to move forward.  The longer you are held captive by your emotions, the more difficult it is to resume your entry into the work force.

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