Sometimes I see a job description that I just know is perfect for me -- I have the required skills and experience and it's located in a place I really want to live. So, I send off my application and then stop looking at other job postings. I tell everyone I know about the perfect job in the perfect place.
I spend hours on the perfect job's website, critquing it, imagining myself working there. I think about how I will spend my lunch times and how I will personalize my office. And I start house hunting. I email real estate listings to my mother with subject lines that say things like, "Look at the garden!" and "OMG The Kitchen!!"
Then, when I don't get the job, the door slams shut on the life I thought I would have. I mourn for weeks. And because I told everyone, people ask me about the job, about the interview, and I have to reveal my rejection. This is a soul sucking process.
Only after I convince myself I never wanted to work there in the first place do I return to the recruitment sites and start looking again, and invariably the cycle repeats. Maybe it's time to try a new approach...
Keep your head up! We've predicted a HUGE wave of librarian retirements, and it's starting right on schedule! You'll be in your new kitchen in no time! Check this out:
ReplyDeletehttp://wikis.ala.org/recruit/index.php/ALA_Initiatives
Denise Davies
ALA Recruitment Statistics