Here’s my situation. I had a front office finance job before I decided it was best to leave for a myriad of personal reasons. I don’t regret this choice but I’m at the 6-12 months unemployment mark. I started looking for a job about 4 months ago, had a decent amount of interviews for good positions but no offers. Ideally, I want to get the right job (came close through these interviews) and stay there for a while. Assuming that I have enough savings to get me by for the next year or so, do I continue to hold out for the right job or take anything before it gets too late? I truly feel that this next position will dictate my career path so I’ve been hoping for the right fit. I don’t want to take a job that I feel unexcited to go to and get stuck in that type of career with no hope of getting out. Thanks in advance for any advice that you can provide.
Take a job and keep looking.
If you do have enough savings for the next year – which reflects a munch higher savings rate than the average American – then I would probably keep looking for the right opportunity. However, there are way too many unknowns to give you credible advice without discussing further – I have no idea what worked / what hasn’t worked for you, what jobs you’ve been interviewing for, what feedback you’ve gotten, how close you’ve been to getting these jobs, what the competitive pool looks like, what your other skills are, what family members (if any) you support, and what you do to keep yourself sane…these are all things you need to be thinking about to figure out what your risk tolerance is.
I know for myself, I would rather hold out for a job I was excited about and have done so myself. I graduated business school without accepting any job offers because I was very particular about which hedge fund I wanted to join, and several months later it worked out for me, but it was a pretty trying experience at times. I guess if you’re in dire financial conditions you have to do what you need to do to pay the bills, and certainly if another employer ever asks why you’re looking to move after just taking a new job recently, tell them you needed to do for the time being something to make ends meet. However, again, you have to figure out what your risk tolerance is. It helps to continue waiting things out if you have a bunch of interesting interviews lined up, but if your path to potential jobs is dry to the bone then you need to probably rethink your gameplan.
I have hired people in the past that had something similar…in a bit of an unrelated job, but they needed to make some money…I was ok with that. At the same time, I have hired someone that stayed out of work a long time as he got us comfortable that basically he had the means to do that and wait for the right position.
Depends on a lot on your personal situation though.
I have to disagree with Numi on this one. unemployed approaching the 1 year mark starts to look really bad. Perhaps try looking for a lower tier company. Maybe you are shooting for the best company and most desired position there is, and getting those jobs are much more than just talent.
Is it better to do something like compliance at a bank or a role in Big 4 over trying to land a better fit?
would I have trouble getting out?
I would say no, as long as you exit within 2 years. Once you go past that, then getting out gets harder and hrader
Good point from itera – it’s possible you may be barking up the wrong tree. You need to really talk this over with someone that knows you well or an experienced career mentor. If you’re a qualified candidate and are waiting for the right fit – as some of my friends that were experienced senior analysts or PM’s at big hedge funds that got shut down did – then that’s more acceptable. But let’s say you’re like an analyst/associate/VP and you’ve been on the beach for a year, then that probably raises some questions. There are a lot more roles that are “plug and play” for those levels of seniority and at the one year mark, if you’re still unemployed, then people will really wonder what happened and whether it’s the case that you’re being truly selective, or you just haven’t been able to convert for one reason or another.
I think it depends on how skilled you are (have to be honest about it here)…
But in general if it’s as long as you’ve already been unemployed that’s a really bad sign. I would probably take the first things that’s somewhat close to what you want to do but I def. woudn’t do something like compliance if you want to do equity research.
Also, this is a bit of 20/20 hindsight and rubbing salt on the wound… but why wait 2 months before starting. It usually takes over a month between sending an application to getting an offer. Every week counts in this kind of situation. The best months to be looking are the months right after. Also, my job search took ~7 months which is probably a little faster than average from what I’ve heard (among 2-3yrs expereince folks).
Yes if you don’t have any other option then there is nothing harm in doing any job because you know the importance of having a job rather than being unemployed. There’s a Quote” In God we believe rest all are numbers.” so try to keep searching a better job that you really want to get into.