I can’t tell you how important it is to maintain a daily routine… even a highly regimented schedule while looking for a job is best…there is so much doubt uncertainty and fear involved in looking for a job that a highly regimented schedule gives you the comfort of process.
If you’ve followed anything that I have ever written, you know that I want people to focus on the process of getting a job rather than just the result… focusing on the result of getting a job, by itself, is too difficult to do… but focusing on the process of getting a job, that is, doing all the things they need to do to get a job, is much more controllable.
So, I recommend that, if you are out of work and able to look for a job full-time, which sometimes gives you a lot more focus than having to look for a job while you were keeping one, develop a strict daily route that you religiously follow… for instance, wake up every morning at exactly the same time, dress in business attire just as though you were going to a job and lay out a structured day.
www.thejobsearchsolution.com provides a very specific regimented daily plan that people can follow… for those who are looking for a job on a full-time basis and those that have a job.
A highly regimented schedule saves time for thinking and allows the job seeker to focus their energy on the most important aspect of the job search, getting and performing well on interviews… set aside the first two or three hours of the morning, when you don’t have interviews, to cold calling and sending resumes as well as following up those resumes with phone calls… try to schedule interviews at about the same time every day… a few weeks ago in this blog, I wrote about the best and worst times to interview as well as the best and worst places to interview… so try to avoid those.
Microsoft Outlook provides a great daily calendar and it’s very easy to use… it creates a situation where you don’t have to rely on your memory… this is a different discussion, but worrying about the things you need to remember uses up a tremendous amount of emotional and physical energy.
Over the past numbers of years various researchers have shown that making conscious decisions… any kind of conscious decision from “which shirt should I wear?” As well as “what should I eat?” tire your brain, much as a muscle fatigues from exercise. So keeping a daily routine keeps you from having to make conscious decisions about trivial things tiring your brain out and depleting energy for the most important things getting and doing well on interviews… even having the same thing for breakfast every morning helps.
So, developed a very strict routine… save your emotional and mental energy for the most important things in your job search.
