Inevitably, in every audience I speak to, there are people who find some reason not to follow my advice on using social media for their job search.
Sometimes these people really want jobs but are overwhelmed. Sometimes they simply don’t want to get a job and change their situation.
As long as you are willing to adopt new ways of doing things, new things will happen.
To help you identify where your resistance may be coming from, I’ve identified the top three reasons people don’t use social media in their job search. If you can name your resistance, it will have less power over you.
“I’m Too Old” or “I’m Too Young”
This is a sensitive one, and I want to get it out of the way first. I know ageism is real. My uncle had to lie about his age for years to keep his job in the dry goods industry.
This manifests in concerns such as, “I’m not comfortable putting my picture on my profile where they can see my silver hair” or “I look so young and inexperienced, they’ll never choose me.”
Another way this manifests is in the excuses “I’m too old to use social media” and the humorous “Twitter is not for old people.”
Fact: The fastest growing Facebook demographic is people 55 and older.
Fact: Many of the best-selling Twitter books are written by people in their 50s.
Social media is not about your age. It’s about your willingness to try new things and your openness to getting different results.
If age were ever a real issue, our 80-year-old citizens would never go to the movies, drive in SUVs or use pushbutton phones. Clearly this is not the case.
“I Don’t Like Spending So Much Time in Front of Computers”
The danger of wasting time on the Internet has been around since the Internet was invented. The advent of social media doesn’t change anything.
The point of your social media efforts is to get a job. So do as much as you need to accomplish that goal.
Write your plan and follow it; then there is no danger of spending more time than you’re comfortable with on a computer.
Remember: the main point of all of this is to take your online relationships and bring them offline.
“I’m Overwhelmed and Don’t Know Where to Start”
If you had a club sandwich in front of you, with 10 layers of BLT goodness, would you try to wrap your mouth around the whole thing?
Of course not.
Similarly, with anything new, begin somewhere and in small bits. I teach a five-step process, and each of those steps is broken down into even smaller bits.
No one expects you to be an expert on this stuff overnight.
Remember, you need to do only as much as you need to get the job done.
I play drums. My drum teacher, Paul Mason, used to say, “There is nothing you can’t do, as long as you break it up into small and manageable parts.”
Our lesson would start off with his demonstrating what he wanted me to do, usually some crazy display of rhythm and limb-independence. I would groan and say, “That’s too hard.”
So we broke down each limb, each part, then began to combine them one by one. Slowly I got two limbs working together, then three. Finally, by the end of the week, I could play for him what I had thought was impossible.
In this way, my confidence as a drummer was developed.
Take a part of social media, like your LinkedIn profile, and spend a day mastering it. Then move on to Groups, spend a day, and master it. And so forth.
The biggest resistance is resistance itself. Don’t accept any excuses. (Tweet this thought.)
If you want a job, the choice is clear: Use social media.
What’s your biggest excuse for not using social media? Share in the comments!
This post originally appeared on Career Enlightenment.
Image: Flickr
