LinkedIn Contacts Lend A Hand

Once of our readers wrote in how they once landed a great job without submitting a single resume application. Hopefully you find value in this approach and learn to never forget the power of networking.

I believe that we live in a time where there is a very small population of people who haven’t felt the ache of unemployment. After being laid off, which seemed like the norm after so many occurrences, I felt the immediate panic that always follow that announcement.

“What am I going to do now? How will I pay my bills? Will my future employer believe that this happened again? (Because I can’t!)” For a self-supporting woman in her 30’s, these thoughts are undoubtedly the scariest thing ever.

That night I allowed myself to feel sorry and fell into a bottle of wine. A cheap one of course, I’m broke again after all. The next morning however, it was down to business. I had to fix this.

Being no stranger to the demotivating painful process of applying for job after job, I decided to take a different approach; a risk, became vulnerable, confessed the embarrassment, and told all of my LinkedIn contacts, in a professional manner of course, that I needed work.

Luckily, those contacts amounted to over 1,000 strong. Unfortunately, private messages are capped at 50 per send. This truly became my new job that day. Frankly it took all day. It was tedious and humbling and with every click I made, I hoped something or someone would open some doors for me.

Thankfully the response was greater than expected and it did! Over the next few days I received a handful of solid leads. In all, I ended up being out of work for only 4 business days. Never forget the power of networking.