If you’re looking for work or think you will be soon, you undoubtedly know to update your LinkedIn profile, refresh your résumé and up your networking game. But in today’s competitive, pandemic-fraught job market, just doing the basics isn’t enough.
Fortunately, I recently picked up several timely job-search tips while attending the Career Thought Leaders‘ 2021 symposium. The virtual event gathered over 80 career professionals to discuss emerging workplace trends and winning job search strategies.
Here are three of the experts’ recommendations to boost your chances of landing a job in 2021:
1. Hone your “career durability.”
To remain relevant in today’s workplace, you must develop what’s known as “career durability.” That means ensuring your skills, mind-set and knowledge needed make you an engaged and productive member of the workforce, even as it’s continually evolving.
“Unless you have durable value,” stressed futurist and author Alexandra Levit, “it’s going to be difficult for you to be consistently and gainfully employed, whether that means in two years or 20 years.”
The five key components of career durability are:
Soft skills. These are the interpersonal attributes — like empathy, being a strong listener and diplomacy — to collaborate well with others at work.
“As machines take over more and more work tasks, it’s the ability to leverage intuition, problem solving and good judgment that will set humans apart,” stressed Levit.
You can strengthen your soft skills by reading books like “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” by Stephen Covey or by taking on new work or volunteer experiences.