One year after setting his personal goals Charlie Hoehn takes a look back at his achievements and offers some fantastic advice:
Your friends who don’t care or are stupid will use Monster, CareerBuilder, and Craigslist (I was one of these stupid people for a few weeks). They will compete with hundreds of people for mediocre jobs that they won’t get. There will be exceptions to this rule, of course, but not many. Your smarter friends will search for jobs through their network (e.g. a friend’s dad, their cousin’s former boss, etc.). Your smartest friends will travel. The ambitious will start their own company.
You don’t have to walk down the path that everyone else takes. If you haven’t realized it by now, there is no such thing as job security. You’re fooling yourself if you think a steady paycheck will ensure a safe future. The only real form of security is working on yourself.
There’s more great advice in the post—especially for those who are soon to graduate. This is the type of advice I wished I had read three years ago.
Comments
One response to “Advice from Hoehn’s Year”
Having said that i know a lot of people who have got jobs through Monster etc., myself included!
On the other hand unless you studied something with a very precise application (e.g. ‘open source database administration’ or ‘sports event facilities management’) then as he says, you’ll mostly be competing for mediocre jobs in a sea of mediocre CVs.
Travelling for its own sake is probably not really a career option, more like a temporary lifestyle choice, but a good idea for a while at least.