Don’t forget the contacts… and hopefully they won’t forget you.
As soon as I knew I was jobless, I started to let friends, family and acquaintances know of my new situation – and my availability to do anything.
But I didn’t stop there. I’ve always been good at keeping in touch with people, usually a couple of people at least from every place I’ve worked/done work experience, and even if there aren’t any job offers immediately available, the moral support I’ve received has been great. Believe me, you need it to keep you going through the job applications.
However, what I also recommend is going through your work contacts book. While I never met with anyone in my contacts book on a social level, there were some people I could think of immediately with whom I had good working relationships and who I knew would not only be sympathetic to my situation, but were also well-connected.
Again, they won’t necessarily hand me jobs on a plate, but the important thing is they will have dealt with me on a professional level and know of my work enough be able to recommend me where possible.
I can’t divulge too much about how this is going yet – but what I can say is that there’s been enough activity on this front to make it worthwhile, and I highly recommend it. After all, in the incestuous world of journalism, you never know when you might cross paths with your contacts again.
A new blog series which will run until our new guest blogger, The FleetStreetBlues Redundant Journalist finds a job or gets too busy to blog. Follow the Trials of a Redundant Journalist series, by the Redundant Journalist, here. She is also posting her updates on FleetStreetBlues.
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