Wednesday, 21 December 2016

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Tuesday, 20 December 2016

The five most common CV problems – and how to fix them

Do you have gaps in employment, or lack relevant experience? Here’s how to turn these issues into positives

Anyone who has written a CV has probably had to overcome a number of challenges – whether they be lack of work experience, gaps in employment or explaining a short stint that didn’t work out.
Facing these issues when writing your CV does not mean you’re not a worthy employee, it just means that you must find ways to explain areas that may appear negative to recruiters. If you’re struggling to explain discrepancies on your CV, the following examples will show how you can reflect your experience more positively.

I have gaps on my CV:

Many people go through periods of unemployment, it’s perfectly natural. But leaving unexplained gaps on your CV will arouse suspicion with recruiters, so you need to meet the issue head-on and explain it. Whether you have taken time out to travel, taken on a personal project or cared for a loved one – you need to include this information and put a positive spin on it. These activities still involve core workplace skills such as planning, organization and communication, which can be included on your CV. If you have taken time out for illness, there’s no need to be ashamed about it; mention it on your CV and show that you’re ready to take on the rigors of work again.

My CV is too long:

If your CV is three pages or more, you need to cut it down to hold the attention of hiring managers. Two pages is ideal to sell yourself without boring people. Take a look at some of your older roles and see if you can condense them. Recruiters don’t need to know about a role from 10 years ago in great detail, so a short summary will suffice, leaving you more space to explain your most recent work, which is more important. Also, check your formatting and make sure you are not wasting space with large margins and poorly structured contact details.

I lack direct work experience:

If you are an inexperienced candidate such as a recent school leaver, you may lack the work experience your target employers are looking for. To get around this, you need to draw out transferable skills from other areas of your experience and highlight them. For instance, you could use experience from your studies, voluntary work, personal projects or anything else that relates to the jobs you are applying for. If your current role isn’t relevant, then reduce the amount of detail and only include skills that could be used in your new field.

I have done lots of short roles: Nowadays it’s common to have short roles on your CV but it can still be a turn-off for employers if not properly explained. Some recruiters may assume you have been fired or lack commitment. To avoid appearing unreliable or a job-hopper, explain the purpose of each role and what you achieved before moving on. This will show you added value and fulfilled an important purpose for the organisation. If you have done lots of temping or contract roles make that clear so readers do not simply think that you haven’t lasted long in permanent posts.

I want to change career:

When you are looking to make a career change, it can be difficult to craft a CV that appeals to your target employers, as often you won’t have the experience they are looking for. With the right preparation and adjustments, however, you can create a CV that sparks interest.
An essential step is to make some form of commitment to your new field and highlight it at the top. This could be enrolling on a vocational course, doing voluntary work or even freelancing. Make it prominent on your CV to show employers that you are serious about your new career aspirations. You will also find that many of the skills used in your current line of work could probably be transferable to your new profession, so ensure you use your existing work experience to sell your cross-industry skills.

Stop Worrying about Failure

All my life long I was afraid about the events that might happen in the future; I worried about the outcome of my actions and their negative results for my life in the future and I also questioned if I could cope with the challenges I was facing back then.

Please don’t get me wrong; I wasn’t a scared-cat at all and my worries never started to take control over my life or reduced my quality of living, nevertheless, negative thoughts remained inside me and often kept me awake for hours in the night; thinking about things I couldn’t control or influence anyways.

I was worried about many things, from absolutely minor things such as messing up in school and flunking school (when I was 9), towards worries related to my former job, such as committing major errors with drastic consequences for me (losing my job) or the involved “customer” I was responsible for, when I was approx. 19- 20. In general I would say, most of the time these worries can be attributed to only one thing: my fear of failure. All my worries and fears had only this one thing in common: the fear of the possibility of failure.

I wasn’t worried about writing bad marks in school being concerned about what my teachers and friends would think about me; I didn’t fear the possible punishments for bad marks (maybe because I never was punished for bad marks, luckily); I simply was fearful of failing in school, failing classes and being separated from all my best friends. I simply did not wanted to be labeled as a failure, with my 9 years of age back then.

There is no need to worry about failure!

Suddenly, something became very clear to me when I was facing my darkest hour, at age of 21. There was simply no need for me to continue worrying as I had drawn for me personally a remarkable conclusion (later explained) that would change my life from that point onwards.

I accepted failure as simply that what it is: an inevitable challengethat I would have to face every once in a while in my life. Failure is an omnipresent part of my life, my past and my present; and each failure helped me to become the man I am nowadays. Every failure was a painful experience and knocked me down in the short run, but in the long run it helped me to do better in the future, avoid similar mistakes and honestly, most of my failures opened new possibilities and promising chances for me and allowed me to change my life and start over again. Before I forget,… the “remarkable conclusion” I talked about earlier was that I recognized that the only way I could avoid any kinds of failures entirely would be by not even trying, which might as well be comparable with not having lived at all. The attempt to avoid failure down to the ground would cause the biggest failures of all, the irreversible mistake of not having tried at all.6

If I was an old man, I would always prefer to choose to laugh about the awkward mistakes and errors I committed and poeticize about the biggest failures in my life and what amazingly refreshing opportunities these brought into my life, rather than having to worry about “what could have happened”, if I would have tried. I do not want to reflect on my entire life and notice all the great opportunities I’ve missed, the glorious moments that could have taken place, the amazing things I would have experienced and the exciting chances I’ve lost, just because I was worrying about the possibility of failing. Not a single second do I want to spend with acknowledging to myself that I squandered all the big opportunities that I was given in life, as this would be more painful for me than actually having failed.

J.G. Whittier

“Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been.’“ ~ John Greenleaf Whittier

There is no necessity of being afraid to fail at all, as in most cases it might just scare you off from doing it; the decision between success and failure lies often beyond your own control, when you did everything possible and made above average efforts to accomplish your targeted goal. Nevertheless, you should keep in mind that a failure is the logical reason of being lazy and it might also occur when you’re not willing to do “whatever necessary”, so make sure to erase as many factors that could lead to a defeat.

Nonetheless, every one of us is going to fail every once in a while, so why worrying about it anyways? When looking at the biographies of extraordinarily successful people you will see that the enumerations of their failures outweigh all their accomplishments, successes and valuable contributions by far.

Here are some famous failures:

§ van Beethoven:

§ was told that he was hopeless as a composer and started losing his hearing in 1796, but continued to compose masterpieces

§ Abraham Lincoln:

§ lost his job (1832), failed in business (1833) and was defeated in eight elections (1838 – 1858)

§ Thomas Edison’s:

§ teacher told him he was “too stupid to learn anything”. Also he stated that he “discovered six thousand ways that won’t work”, while developing the light bulb.

§ Walt Disney:

§ was fired, as his boss found he “lacked imagination”. Later, MGM studios told him that the idea of Mickey Mouse would not work; a giant mouse would scare women.

§ John Grisham:

§ was rejected by twelve publishing houses and sixteen agents, before his first novel was accepted. Grisham is nowadays a best selling novelist.

§ Steven Spielberg:

§ was placed in a class for learning-disabled children, before he dropped out of school forever

§ The Beatles:

§ were turned down by their recording company telling them that “[ . . . ] guitar music is on their way out”.

§ Michael Jordan:

§ was cut from the high-school basketball team as he was “lacking skill”.

After all, only the failures these successful people had to experience and the mistakes they made in their lives allowed them to become the geniuses, inventors and idols they have become. Without their failures they wouldn’t have become the person they are nowadays acknowledged as. Those that never failed in life are the ones that no one remembers of today, the ones that never won as they never tried.

I don’t want to downplay how hard it feels to fail, as some failures can be exceptionally painful and make it extremely difficult for us to stand up again and continue to do what we love. There are failures that might knock you down on the ground and let everything else look pointless. Failures that are so striking that you don’t even see any hope to recover from that defeat. BUT, with every failure we are given the chance to “start from scratch”, change negative patterns, rearrange our lives towards a more successful future AND most important of all: with every failure there comes an important decision. The decision to allow a failure to defeat you once and for all, leaving you behind in a broken down state of mind for the rest of your live, or to pat yourselves on the back for not having squandered an opportunity, for having tried, for having given your best and for having gained some important experiences that could become very valuable in your future. It’s the decision between being left behind on the ground and (figuratively spoken) reaching out a hand to yourself, helping yourself to stand up again, brushing off the dust from your clothes and to continue pursuing the dream you always wanted to realize.

I failed many times in my life and luckily the vast majority of failures and defeats were so unimportant that I either forgot about them over the time or are able to laugh about it nowadays. I’ve nearly failed classes when I was 9 years old and was separated from some of my best friends as I wasn’t entitled to enroll at grammar school, which was only for the brightest and smartest pupils in a class. My class teacher told my parents that I should definitely repeat that grade to close the gaps in knowledge I had. Nevertheless, I chose to march on and so I went on secondary school, my grades improved drastically and two years later I was entitled to enroll at junior high school.

I could go on and write down all the defeats and failures in my life I can remember of, whenever I was turned down, ignored, knocked down on the ground, got dumped, failed at work, saw my plans fail or messed up with my duties, but that would increase the word-count of this post into the infinite. Nevertheless, every of these defeats helped me to accept failure as an inevitable part of my life, which took a lot of pressure from my shoulders. It helped me to see more opportunities than before, as I simply had ignored many of them because I estimated them as too risky or to be doomed to fail. It helped me to focus my attention on the things I enjoyed doing – in the one area I knew I belonged – and to strip off what I considered to be dispensable and unnecessary. If everything I did had turned out as a success, I would not have discovered what I truly loved to do and might have awoken one day in a life where I didn’t belong with a job that didn’t fulfill me.

Without my biggest failures, I wouldn’t have concerned myself so much with my personality, faced my biggest fears and discovered my strong willpower, enduring persistence and my positivity. Every failure taught me – in its very own painful way – things that cannot be found in books, characteristics about myself that cannot even be articulated and friendships whose value lies beyond the imaginable. After the most painful defeats and setbacks I ever had to experience, I arose out of the ashes like a Phoenix, stronger, more knowledgeable and wiser than before, having gained very valuable life experiences. I became more focused on the things I loved most and knew who my true friends were – those that stood on my side, whenever I was down.

10 Things To Do To Change Your Life Forever

“Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future”
~ John F. Kennedy

The one constant thing in our life is change. We cannot avoid it and the more we resist change the tougher our life becomes. Trust me, I know this because I was very skilled at deflecting change in my life. We are surrounded by change and it is the one thing that has the most dramatic impact on our lives. Change has the ability to catch up with you at some point in your life. There is no avoiding it because it will find you, challenge you, and force you to reconsider how you live your life.

Change can come into our lives as a result of a crisis, as a result of choice or by chance. In either situation we are all faced with having to make a choice – do we make the change or not? I believe it is always better to make changes in your life when you choose to rather than being forced to.

We however cannot avoid the unexpected events (crisis) in our lives because it is these events that challenge our complacency in life. What we can control when we are experiencing these challenging events, is how we choose to respond to them. It is our power of choice that enables us to activate positive change in our lives.

Acting on our power of choice provides us with more opportunity to change our lives for the better. The more opportunities we create to change our lives the more fulfilled and happier our lives become. Here are 10 things that you can do in your life that will change your life for the good, forever:

1. Find Meaning In Life

Spend some time trying to sort out what is important in your life and why is it important. What is it that you want to achieve in your life? What are your dreams? What makes your happy? Your meaning in life gives you purpose and sets the direction of how you want to live your life. Without meaning you will spend the rest of your life wandering through life aimlessly with no direction, focus, or purpose.

2. Create A Dream Board

When we were children we would daydream all the time. We were skilled at dreaming and visualising what we would be when we grew up. We believed that anything was possible. As we grew into adults we lost our ability to dream. Our dreams became hidden and once we started to feel like achieving our dreams was impossible.

A dream board is a great way for us to start believing in your own dreams again. Seeing our dreams every day on a dream board brings our dreams to life. Our dreams become real and we start to have believe in the possibility of achieving these dreams.

3. Set Your Goals To Achieve Your Dreams

Once you know what is important in your life and what your dream life looks like for you, you need to take action and set your long-term, medium, and short-term goals. It is acting on these goals that enable you to achieve your dreams

Remember your goals may change. Always be flexible with setting and achieving your goals as things in life change and your goals need to reflect these changes. It’s the small steps that you take that create the momentum for change to happen in your life.

4. Let Go Of Your Regrets

Regrets will only hold you back in life. Regrets are events of the past and if you spend all your time thinking about the past you will miss the present and the future. You cannot change what you did or did not do in the past, so let it go. The only thing you have control over now is how you choose to live your present and future life.

I had a heap of regrets that were holding me back in my life. I came across the “Balloon Exercise” and got rid of my regrets for good. What is it? It’s simple — blow up as many balloons as you need. On each balloon write a regret and then let the balloon go. As the balloon drifts off into the sky say goodbye to that regret forever. A simple and powerful exercise that works and can change how you live your life.

5. Choose Some Really Scary Things To Do And Then Do Them

This is all about you choosing to step out of your comfort zone. Public speaking is one of the most frightening things anyone can do. I was petrified of public speaking however, I knew that I wanted to be a motivational speaker. So I joined Toast Masters to overcome my fear of public speaking. My first speech was terrible, my knees were knocking, I broke out in a sweat and I couldn’t stop shaking. But I did it and the feeling of completing this speech, even though it was terrible was great. I chose to keep going and now I earn a living as a motivational speaker. I am still nervous when I get up to speak however it is an excited nervous and I love it.

Make a list of scary things that you would kind of like to do but are too afraid to. Put a plan in place and then go do them. Never stop doing scary things because if you do your life will become one of complacency and comfort.

6. Start Living A Well-Balanced Life

Our health does not remain the same. Our physical, emotional, and spiritual state changes, as we get older. What we can control however is how we feed our minds and our bodies. Living a balanced and healthy life builds our resilience to the physical changes of our body. Exercise is the best way in which we can attain a positive and optimistic attitude toward life.

Living a healthy, well-balanced life with lots of exercise is a lifestyle choice that without a doubt will give you a happier more satisfied and fulfilled life.

7. Face Your Fears

Its easy to ignore our fears and hope that they will go away. Unfortunately, it does not work like that. If you want to change your life, learn to master your fears so they can’t control you any longer. Our fears are only thoughts in our minds that are not real but over time we have become to believe that they are true. It is our fears in life that stop us from living our life to the fullest. We know when our fears are controlling our lives because we feel discontent, dissatisfied and unfulfilled.

Once we face our fears we take back our power to choose how we want to live our lives and when we do this we change our lives forever.

8. Accept You

The only person who is going to create change in your life is you! and to create that change you have to like you. There will be times in your life where you will face rejection and there will be people who will not like you that much. Accepting who you are and loving yourself helps you to move forward in your life. Putting yourself down all the time and wishing you could be better will only lead you to a life of unhappiness and discontent.

Find your courage, love yourself, and step out and do something crazy. Don’t worry about what anyone thinks or whether it is the right thing to do. In your heart if it feels right, act on it and go create the life you love.

9. Live In The Moment

Many of us tend to think that the grass is greener on the other side. Often, we get to the other side of the fence we find that this is not so. The motivation to change our lives comes from our desire to be happy. We are often so busy focusing on our pursuit of happiness that we miss the joy of actually living in the moment. Our desire to have happiness in our lives is a desire of a future state not of the present. We become so consumed with all our problems and discontent in the present we miss the precious beauty of the moment.

Sitting on the beach eating an ice-cream with your best friend or partner is a moment of happiness. Appreciating and showing gratitude on a daily basis is experiencing happiness in the moment. Helping those in need brings joy and happiness to us. This is what living our life in the moment is all about – don’t miss these moments because you are too busy focusing on your pursuit of happiness.

10. Experience The Joy Of Learning

Each time you learn something new you gain more knowledge and with more knowledge comes more confidence. Learning helps us to be more adaptable and flexible to new situations. Learning encourages us to be more creative and innovative in our thinking and we are therefor more comfortable with the unknown.

Reading books is a great way for us to learn. To fully embrace the joy of learning, never stop reading nor searching for more knowledge. Learning gives our life meaning and this is what makes our life worthwhile.

You have a choice to make as to how you want to change your life. Choosing to act on these 10 things will, without a doubt change your life forever. So what are you waiting for? Go do these 10 things now!

How Social Media Will Help Enhance Your Job Search

A new report has found that a growing number of job seekers are not just posting their resumes on job boards anymore, but also using social media to actively look for employment.

According to the 2012 Job Seeker Survey, 52% of all jobs seekers have used Facebook to find employment, regardless of whether they were already working. The survey also found that 38% of respondents have used LinkedIn in the past and 34% have used Twitter.

Online recruiter Dan Finnigan told Forbes that in today's challenging market, its more important than ever for people to be "well-rounded" job hunters.

"As social networking has become a core part of our cultural dynamic, we are continuing to see more and more job hunters taking advantage of a vertical they are comfortable with in order to find work," Finnegan told the news outlet. "We anticipated growth last year and the numbers do show that job hunters are expanding their presence on social sites. Simply put, social networks provide a way for job seekers to tap into a large pool of job opportunities easily."

And although the survey found that 1 in 6 job seekers credit social media with helping them find employment, as a candidate, you still must make sure you are using these sites to your best advantage.

Update constantly

Whether you use Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter, you should use these boards to let friends and professional contacts know you are not only actively looking for work, but also to let them know exactly what type of job you are hoping to land. You should constantly use these boards to update your employment status, which may also help you hear about openings before other candidates.

Create robust profiles

Since a majority of recruiters and hiring managers will do a Google or other type of online search if they are interested in your resume, you need to make sure that potential employers can find up-to-date professional information about you when they look.

Gen Y Career Expert Lindsey Pollack, who is also the official spokesperson for LinkedIn, told the news source that job seekers should make sure they tweak their Facebook profiles to be more professional. She said that if a candidate has too much personal information, videos and photos on the popular site, they should make sure they utilize their privacy settings accordingly or simply remove irrelevant information during their job hunt.

Check your "KLOUT"

Pollack said that job seekers can check their on-line presence through the monitoring site KLOUT.

If you find your professional profile is not where you want it to be, Pollack suggested that you build your brand by sharing articles, posts, blogs and professional videos that may be relevant to your career and field of interest.

A blog may also give you the opportunity to communicate with others in the online community who may be in a position to either hire you or recommend you for a job.

Use social media to research

In addition to using social media to increase your online professional profile, you can use a number of sites to conduct your own research about companies, hiring managers and current and past employees.

Digital strategist Alexis Grant suggested that job seekers look up a hiring manager on LinkedIn and Twitter before submitting a resume. She said that these type of sites are "goldmines of information" on individuals. Once you find out a bit more about a person who will be doing the hiring at a company, you can tailor your cover letter to meet their needs and requirements.

Ali Trimze

Job Seekers

Job Interview Tips

Interview Tips

Job Interview Tips

Interveiw Tips

5 Clever Ways to Get a Job

Over the last few years, the job market has been pretty brutal. With so many job seekers vying over the same openings, competition has reached sky-high limits. In response, some candidates are going to crazy lengths to get noticed. Whether candidates submit their resume on a chocolate bar, perform a guitar solo about why they're the perfect fit for the job, film over-the-top YouTube videos that have gone viral, employers have seen just about everything.

As crazy as some of these situations sound, they have one common denominator: they worked. The candidates captured their target employers' attention and sometimes even landed the job.

While filming a video and making it go viral might be a bit impractical for you, there are some more realistic ways to get noticed. Here are five clever ways that, when implemented, are sure to make you stand out from your competition and help you land that coveted job offer.

1. Impress with Your Resume & Cover Letter

Both your resume and cover letter need to be perfect. This tip sounds like a no-brainer, but you'd be amazed at how many people—qualified, competent people—lose job offers simply because of one lazy typo. Have a friend or trusted colleague take a look at what you've written. An extra 5 to 10 minutes can make the difference between securing an interview and being sent a “thanks, but no thanks” message from HR.

Better yet, use LiveCareer's Resume Builder to create an error-free, professional resume. Whether you're simply updating your resume or creating your first-ever resume, LiveCareer makes the writing process easy and fast.

2. Create an Online Profile

Hiring managers will likely Google you, so you need an online profile that accurately represents you as a professional—like LinkedIn. Your profile should match your resume, be full of job-specific keywords, and be 100 percent professional. Remember: you're not on Facebook. It's probably a good idea to delete that picture from your drunken weekend in Cancun—especially if it's your profile picture.

3. Get to Know the Right People

Getting your foot in the door can be as simple as knowing the right person. You'd be amazed at how many of your friends and acquaintances will know someone who's looking to hire a candidate with the same skills you have. Plus, they can also put in a good word for you with the hiring manager, which is icing on the cake.

Send out emails to former coworkers, ask around on Facebook, set up lunch meetings with social connections—do whatever it takes to keep your name on other peoples' minds.

4. Research the Company Website Beforehand

Once you secure an interview, take a moment to let out a sigh of relief and pat yourself on the back. But keep in mind: the hardest part of your job search awaits you.

Answering questions about your previous experience just isn't enough anymore. Before your interview, spend at least one hour researching the company you're hoping to work for. Spend some time on their website, and do a little sleuthing about the industry. Having a few really good questions to ask about the position and company is only going make you shine even brighter than the candidate who's just relying on his or her previous experience.

5. Show Your Appreciation

Take a few minutes to write a thank-you note. As simple as it sounds, you'd be amazed at how many people pass up this last chance to sell themselves. It's also a great time to ask that really good question that you thought of after the interview was over.

While these tips may seem obvious, you'd be surprised how many of them are overlooked or just simply ignored. Apply them to your routine and are you're sure to get that awesome job you've been dreaming about in no time. And if you need some help, remember that LiveCareer has your back. Whether you need to write a resume, cover letter, or a simple thank-you note, LiveCareer has award-winning tools that streamline the process.

3 Essential Skills in Today's Job Market

When you are looking for your first job or a new position or career, you need to market yourself by listing essential skills for which employers are looking. You can highlight these job skills in your resume or cover letter, but you want to make sure that the human resources or hiring managers don't pass over you because you lack certain essential skills. Highlighting certain skills along with specialized training can help you to have a better chance of landing a position in a competitive job market.

Essential Job Skills: Computer Skills

To work in almost any setting, you need to have at least basic knowledge of how to use a computer. Having experience with word processing and spreadsheet programs can help you to have an even better chance of landing a job. Employers in certain environments, such as offices, expect you to have these types of essential skills because they help you to be better able to complete important tasks such as creating reports, putting together spreadsheets or drafting letters.

Most employers want you to be able to do basic tasks such as searching for information and writing emails. In some contexts, such as marketing jobs, being able to use social media is among the essential skills that you need to be able to succeed at your job and eventually go for a higher position.

On your resume, be specific about your experience. Listing your experience level with certain applications, such as Microsoft Word, Outlook or Excel, can let employers know whether you would be able to handle the tasks expected of you. If you go through a staffing agency, you may be asked to take a test to show your proficiency at using certain computer programs.

Essential Job Skills: Communication Skills

On your resume and during the interview process, you need to show employers that you know how to effectively communicate. In any position, you are going to have to use non-verbal and verbal forms of communication, computers and telephones to communicate with your superiors and coworkers.

You may be working with people who don't speak the same language or who have limited computer abilities. Finding ways to convey messages to them can be important to completing important tasks on time. Knowing how to communicate effectively with others can ensure that you get work completed faster and develop stronger relationships with your coworkers and superiors.

Essential Job Skills: Problem Solving Skills

To be a good employee, you need to know how to solve problems as they come along. Among other essential skills, you want to be able to list problem solving or critical thinking skills on your resume. Employers often search for individuals who can learn multiple jobs. To be versatile in the workplace and handle issues as they come up, you need to have critical thinking skills.

Problem solving skills allow you to understand how to look at tasks asked of you and find more efficient ways to complete the jobs. You could potentially use your essential skills to save a company money and time. You can also bring new ideas and positive changes to your workplace or contribute an idea, produce or service to the company.

When you are looking for a job or trying to switch careers, you want to make sure that you have developed certain essential skills, such as a the ability to work with computers or communicate with others. You work on improving these essential skills through your interactions with other people, school classes, other jobs and practice. The more experience and skills you have, the better chance you have on landing a position in your field of choice. To get help creating a professional resume that highlights essential and specialized job skills, use LiveCareer's Resume Builder.

3 Things You Need to Know About Today's Job Market

Economics is an entire field of study for a reason—it can be really complicated. Without some training, wrapping your head around even microeconomics—like your own household budget—is a tough task.

So when you read news items that boast of a low unemployment rate, it can sound encouraging. But even something as apparently cut-and-dried as the rate of unemployed people is more complicated than it seems. Here are three important facts you should know about today's job market.

1. The unemployment rate can be misleading.

Many people think the unemployment rate is simply a percentage of Americans that don't have jobs. In reality, unemployment depends on a variety of factors.

Generally, the unemployment rate isn’t a measure of how well the economy is faring or who has jobs in relation to their field of specialization. For example, while active members of the military are working, they're not included in the total number of Americans who are employed or unemployed. The data doesn't account for those under age 16, either, or those who are hospitalized or housed in an institution.

In addition, part-time workers, whether by choice or because they had their hours cut, aren't considered unemployed. Neither are people who are under-employed or "discouraged" (meaning they don't have the job they want but are technically working). Temp workers or those who don't work by choice are also not considered unemployed. Students, retirees, the disabled, and family caretakers are not part of the workforce and not counted in unemployment numbers as well.

2. The unemployment rate is a "lagging indicator" of the economy.

A lagging indicator is one that doesn't measure economic health at the time of its publication. Generally, the unemployment rate takes several months to catch up to other economic indicators. The reason for this is that hiring managers want to see upticks in the economy stabilize before they commit to hiring people for existing positions.

So while the unemployment rate doesn't seem to fall much in a down economy, don't get too excited: the drop is coming. And if the unemployment rate seems to stagnate at a high rate in a rebounding economy, have hope: the numbers will catch up soon enough.

3. There are different kinds of unemployment.

People tend to think that unemployment stems from a lack of jobs. In its simplest form, that could very well be the case. However, there are types of unemployment that show just how complicated the unemployment rate can be:

Frictional unemployment occurs when there are jobs and workers both available, but they don't match up for some reason. Usually this is logistical; the workers are in the wrong geographical area or each is mutually unaware of the other.
Structural unemployment occurs when there is a dearth of jobs for the kinds of skills available workers have. This happens a lot when industrial automation occurs.
Cyclical unemployment refers to a slowdown in the economy that requires fewer qualified workers, or the budget cannot support as many workers of a certain skill set as before.

Our recent economic recession seems to have been the result of all three forms of unemployment.

Stay Ahead of the Curve

This knowledge of the unemployment rate and the state of our job market should help open your eyes a little about your chances of becoming gainfully employed. You can use other tools, like LifeCareer's job finder and jobs news, to stay abreast of current and coming trends in the job market. Economies are always in flux, so it's a good idea to stay ahead of the game wherever you can.