Are you a furloughed employee? Or have you been made redundant due to the economic impact of COVID-19?
Priority should be keeping healthy, spending precious time with loved ones and supporting our key workers if possible.
However, you could also use any spare time to focus on yourself professionally. Finally update your CV, expand your network or evaluate your employers’ culture and values. After helping several professionals within the engineering and manufacturing sectors in a similar situation, we thought a guide to get you started would help!
This is a great time for you to add all those new skills, qualifications, certificates and achievements which you have not had the opportunity to do when working full-time. Ensure that the top half of your CV reflects your most recent experience and all your key achievements. The latter is a great way to show off to an employer how you would add value to their business whilst also improving on your own confidence along the way.
Share and connect with those from your industry on LinkedIn and other forms of social media. Find out how they are coping with self-isolation but also build relationships for the future. Think long-term, are they working for an employer you would like to work for in the future or maybe the type of job role you would like to see yourself in? By interacting with others and gaining knowledge you are better placed to make things happen through mutually benefitting relationships.
How does your current role’s overall package stack up against your peers? How long ago did you check? This is a good time to conduct some research and find out. There are many tools online such as https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Salaries/index.htm or why not contact a specialist recruiter from your industry to find out first-hand?
Use this time to reflect on your career to date. Are you receiving the experience you require from your current employer? Is your current employer aware? How does this fit in with the long-term plan for your career? Try not to just think of the here and now and more of your future.
This is more than purely online presence. It is about defining who you are and the audience you want to engage with. Then you will find it easier to build your professional online presence with your audience in mind. Ensure you remain in contact with industry experts and up to date with news within your industry as it is important to never stop learning.
Elearning.com reported that students learn 5 times more material for every hour of training when using this method. Especially for those just starting out your career, this can be a great way of bridging the skills gap for your employer and taking ownership of your own development.
A study by glassdoor has found that 57% of people consider workplace culture more important than salary when it comes to job satisfaction. Has the culture of your organisation changed since you first walked through the door? Have you taken a step back to think about this? A culture of an organisation is important and sometimes there is no right or wrong, just more a right fit for yourself.
Remember it will take time for you to see the benefits of some of the points addressed here whilst for others you will see the benefit quicker. It is important however that we put in place actions to continue best practice past our current economic crisis.
If you require support or advice on any area, please feel free to contact Rikin Suchak directly on 0115 786 0443 or email opportunities@source-talent.co.uk.
