Job Hunting Tips: How To Make Sure Your Next Job Isn’t A Waste Of Time

Job hunting is a two-way street. Employers need to be able to weed out the good potential employees from the bad, but you also need to be able to tell the good jobs from the jobs that are just a waste of time. If you are currently job hunting, keep reading for tips on how to spot red flags so you can avoid committing to a job that isn’t worth your time.

Pay Attention To The Job Description

According to LifeHacker, one of the best tips a person should remember while job hunting is to always read the job description. You can learn a lot about a job – other than the obvious – by taking a deeper look at how the description is written. This includes examining the choice of words the recruiter used when writing the description.

“Must have a good sense of humor,” for example, should fire off a few red flags. The first issue with this phrase is most occupations do not require their employees to double as comedians. This phrase is a way to feel out potential employees when the culture or work environment is a little relaxed or – in some cases – unprofessional. It, however, could also mean the employer is looking for someone who isn’t going to fall to pieces in a stressful and chaotic work environment.

“Flexible” or “ability to multi-task” are also code words in job descriptions that should send up a few red flags. It is not uncommon for an employer to look for someone who is flexible and able to multi-task because they want you to do your job as well as other jobs. So, don’t be too surprised if you end up doing your work and the work of other employees if the original job description claimed to need a flexible multi-tasker.

Check Out The Website

One of the job hunting tips that most people do not think about is checking out the website of the employer. Take the time to check the website of your potential employer to see when it was last updated. If it looks like the website hasn’t been updated since AOL and Hotmail were the emails of choice, you may want to consider another job.

Maintaining a website is an expense that some companies may not be able to afford, but there is no reason for a website to go untouched for 10 or 20 years. Per Cheat Sheet, the biggest concern with an outdated website is the technology the business uses. If the job you are applying for relies on business, you can expect the technology to be outdated because the website is outdated. If the job isn’t reliant on technology, this may not be as big of an issue.

It is, however, worth taking a step back and asking yourself whether or not you want to be employed by someone with an outdated website – or no website at all. More and more people are using the internet to do business. A company that has not invested in an online existence of their business may not be worth your time in the long run. This is a red flag that the business may not be going anywhere.

Don’t Forget Social Media

Social media and a website go together. A company without a website or social media accounts is a business that is not interested in growing with the economy. You have to stop and ask yourself if you want to work for a company that is stuck in the past while you are job hunting.

They Have Bad Reviews

Any business owner knows you are going to have a few bad review on review sites such as Yelp. You may even have a few irate customers leaving negative comments on your social media accounts as well. As far as job hunting tips go, this one requires you to use your best judgment. There is no magic number of bad reviews that is or is not acceptable for a business to have. The more customers a business has, the more bad reviews they are likely to have as well.

The best thing you can do for yourself is do some research on the company and see what customers have to say. Don’t just look at how many reviews there are, actually read the reviews. What are the customers complaining about? Is there any merit in the bad reviews? If you are truly concerned, just as your potential employer about the negative reviews. If the employer doesn’t want to talk about it, this is usually a bad sign too.

Job Hunting? Helpful Tips on How to Make A Great First Impression By Cleaning Up your – https://t.co/D89wCZmNgO

— Paul Sorin Ti?a (@paultita) November 21, 2016

As you can see, a number of the most helpful job hunting tips involve doing research. The potential employer is going to do research on you before they decide to hire you, it is only fitting that you do research on them to make sure they are worth working for. There are so many hours in a day, the last thing you want to do is waste time working for a company that isn’t going anywhere or has a lot of bad press.

Do you have any job hunting tips you find especially helpful? Please share them with us in the comments section below.

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