Do It! Ask for Help with Your Job Search

When I was first laid off, I resisted the admonition to get out there and “network.”  I remember thinking, “I can get a job on my own.  I don’t want any favors.  I don’t need help.”

After about six months of this kind of thinking (and no job), I decided to try a networking event.  Even that felt so awkward, so artificial to me.  I felt a little bit like a piece of meat that I was trying to convince someone to buy.  I think I was still experiencing post-layoff feelings of self-doubt at that point too.

Lately I’ve been going to more of these kinds of events.  I’ve been contacting people I know when I’m thinking of applying for a job where they work.  I’m “advertising” (like right here!) to everyone that I’m looking for a job.  I am finding that, the more I do these things, the easier they become.  I’m also learning that most people want to help you if they can.

It still feels makes me feel a little uncomfortable, though.  I grew up at a time when young women were just beginning to experience that feeling that we could do anything.  I wanted to be independent and successful on my own.

That was easy enough to do when I had a good job and when I had a husband who also had a good job.  I truly had “no worries” until I became a young widow when my husband died of a heart attack (he was 45).  Suddenly I was solely responsible, not only for myself, but for our little boy, a kindergartner.

I’m mentioning this only because I think it was that trauma 15 years ago that made me more determined than ever to be self-reliant.  I felt like I had no choice; I had to be.

So letting people help me voluntarily (I have no trouble paying someone to cut the grass!) doesn’t come too easily to me.  It feels like weakness, like an admission that I can’t handle things on my own.  I’ve really had to work hard to reorient my attitude.  I’m finally accepting that it’s not a sign of failure to let people help me in my job search.

I don’t think it takes being widowed, though, to make it hard for the unemployed to reach out for assistance from their friends and former co-workers.  I’m sure that part of it is the unemployment stigma; sometimes people are embarrassed or ashamed to let people know that they’ve lost their jobs.  Unfortunately, though, unemployment is so widespread these days that it’s not unusual at all.  It’s happening to everyone.

One way to make networking easier, I’ve found, it by joining LinkedIn.  It is a fantastic way to connect and reconnect with your past and current professional contacts.  It’s easy to simply send someone a message; you don’t have to worry about tracking down a phone number and then figuring out how to say what you want to say.  I love LinkedIn because the whole concept of it is to facilitate professionals helping each other.

I’ve also learned something surprising (to me): it actually feels good when people offer to help you.  I just hope that someday I’ll be in a position to help someone too.