Are you sabotaging your chances of finding a new job by aiming WAY too low?

If you’re looking for a job, I need to warn you about this phenomena as it’s happened to me, and many of my clients.

It’s called “aim too low.”

Other coaches call this a process of “self limiting beliefs.”

The dispiriting thing about this phenomena is that if you’re like me – you don’t even know you’re doing it.

I’ll explain what happened to me because this is what I was doing.

And you if you see some of yourself in this story don’t stress.  I have a way forward for you at the bottom of this post.

So here’s the backstory.

When I was working in my last corporate job, I was stuck.

I was looking after customer and competitor research. It was one of those cog-in-the-wheels roles where my work went to my manager, where he would glance at it, and file it.

That was it.

Nothing much would happen from there.

I felt very dispirited.

I did not understand why it hit me so hard so much at the time. But now I know one of the key factors for people to feel engaged at work is that can see the end result in their work.

They are working for a purpose.

There was no outcome from the work I did.

Not one single thing would change in the entire world if I did not produce the work I produced.

Each performance review time my manager and I would have a discussion about what was next for me. I would say I am looking for a new challenge and that I’d like to make a bigger contribution.

He would say what do you want to do?

I would say I don’t know. You know me. Are you aware of anything within the company I can do?

He would shrug his shoulders and say talk to people, or have a think about something and come back to me.

So I did think long and hard and I did talk to people.

But the company on the surface of it seemed to be running like a well-oiled machine, and there was nobody around who seemed to be truly engaged with what they were doing.

So what I found myself doing was going back to my manager with a plan for my year that was based off the research projects I had done before. Then we’d go round in that same circle the next review time.

I could not see a way out.

I was sabotaging my chances of success because I was aiming too low, without even realising it.

That aiming too low was about basing what I could do in the future from what I was doing in the past.

The trouble was, I was only marginally enthusiastic about what I had done in the past – at best.

I was actually much more capable than what I was doing in the past, but that never occurred to me at the time.

So as this happened a few times I became even more dispirited with what I call low lying depression.

I know many people can relate to this feeling. Its where you’re stuck in one spot. Its hard to figure a way out. And the energy it takes to figure that and then get moving, seems overwhelming.

So you stay stuck and then it gets worse as you think things will never change.

via GIPHY

That was me.

The only thing that helped me at this point was to find things outside of work completely unrelated to what I was doing at work, but where I could apply my skills in a different way.

That’s when I started volunteering and doing a bit of networking. As part of that I contacted the Editor of the recruitment magazine for an informational interview.

That was the action, when I look back on it, which completely changed my life and my perspective.

I simply asked the Editor about what she did and what she loved about her job. At the end of the conversation she asked why I was there. I said I was exploring a career in writing, so she asked me if I wanted to write something for her.

She took me at my word that I was interested in writing.

Because she enjoyed writing, it did not seem strange to her that I would enjoy it too.

But finding work was not the primary purpose of the meeting it was for me, simply to understand what she did.

I don’t want to talk about my experience anymore, other than for the purpose of checking in with you about this.

If you think you have nothing to offer, but you really want to find a new job, then now’s the time to do something different.

My biggest suggestion is not to rely on what you see advertised to be your only guide to what you can do, or what is truly a great match with your values, strengths and skills.

Because if you rely on what’s been advertised as your guide, it’s highly likely you’ll end up doing more of what you’ve done in the past. (You may even end up wasting your talents and the opportunity to contribute something great).

You’ll end up with more of the same because recruiters generally look at your most recent or current experience as their first point of elimination. Hiring new people is risky. So employers tend to take the most obvious option and ask this question when they recruit – that is “do you match the skills and experience of the person currently in the job?”

Relying simply on the jobs you can easily get, does not leave much opportunity to broaden your horizons or try something a bit different.

So, if you see yourself in my story, stuck, with your expectations too low, then I have something different to suggest to you.

This is something I am super proud of developing, because I know it gets results.

Take a look at our next Straight to Shortlist Challenge.

This training will help you explore your curiosity and expand your horizons.

You can meet up with people who can give you great information about careers or organisations where you may never get the opportunity to be considered if you apply for a job there online.

My promise if you join the program is that you’ll get 5 meetings with 5 weeks, or I’ll refund the cost of the program.

In the first challenge, one of my tribe got 2 meetings with the ABC and 2 meetings with SBS to explore careers, despite never working in broadcasting before. One of those meetings has put her close to the top of the line before a job was advertised.

How exciting is that?

For more information, simply click on the image below.

I’m looking forward to personally meeting you and seeing what possibilities come out of this exciting program for you.