How To Deal With Unemployment

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Dan from Giveacar Ltd. In it he talks about dealing with unemployment in a constructive way. Enjoy!

Almost immediately before I graduated from University, the entire economy tanked and no companies wanted to hire anybody because they didn’t want to spend the money on anyone with less than two years of experience in the job they were advertising.

I went on job seeking courses that reminded me of those sketches in The League of Gentlemen with the evil dole worker, I signed up to every website, every agency and sent CVs to everyone. I was just about ready to give up… and then something changed.

I started getting replies, because of my blog.

Back when I graduated I started up a website to keep writing after I left university, my traffic had been building up and one day I decided to put my site’s traffic on my CV. It turned out to be enough to get me noticed by employers.

I attended a few interviews, and decided to work for Giveacar. During the interview they told me they thought I had flunked University because I hadn’t mentioned my grade in the CV. They thought I was a dropout, they only invited me to an interview because my blog got 5000 visitors a month.

In the end, my blog did more for my career prospects than my degree.

You never know when an opportunity will come along, so if you’re stuck in a loop trying to get a job but failing. Do something with yourself, take your hobby and push it as far as you feasibly can, and see if it helps you. At the very least, you will benefit from it on two counts.

1. You will have something to do while you look for a job.

2. You will develop a skill that will set you apart from the competition.

After a year of temp work, voluntary work and repeatedly being told I don’t qualify, I struck gold. And I very much doubt you couldn’t do the same thing.

So my advice? If you’re unemployed, find something you’re good at, and then do it.