The New Year Phenomenon

My husband likes to work out at the gym. He went the other day and couldn’t believe how packed it was. The New Year’s Resolution phenomenon in full swing. Ben (my husband) said to me, “Give it another month, and the gym will be back to normal”. I guess he doesn’t have much faith in all the people there excited about their new founded habit to get their butts out the door and to the gym a month from now.

As we start the New Year, many of us take this step into a new year as a symbolic opportunity to step into doing things differently. The key is whether we can sustain that new commitment to ourselves to make a lasting difference on the way we choose to live. This applies to any intention you set for yourself, like getting yourself a new fit body, a new job, or a new habit (like never being late again).

The first step is recognizing what didn’t serve you.

It might have been bubbling up inside you…a knowing that something didn’t work for you.   For example, in the past, when you searched for jobs, did you mostly search online (isn’t that what everyone does these days to find a job)? What about blasting out your resume to many places online and not hear back from the ones you really wanted to hear from? Did you use the same resume for every application?

Maybe it didn’t work that well, or maybe it worked ok, but boy was it a lot of work. You had a feeling that surely there must be a different less time consuming way.

All those people at the gym recognized the first step.  But why isn’t it always lasting? How can it be different this year with your resolution?

The second step is deciding what you want to commit to.  Commit to it, and then never look back.

Don’t bring any misery of regret, beating yourself up, or memory of your previous habit (or way of doing things) that didn’t serve you before along with you as you create your new habit or new mindset.

When looking for jobs, decide that you will only apply for a few jobs that you are most interested in, and put most of your efforts there. This allows you to take the time to understand the role, get to know the pharmacy or hospital you are most interested in (their vision, leadership, work environment, etc), and highlight yourself in a way that makes them want to chase you.  It also gives you an advantage because knowing this in detail will help you make an impression that other “spray & pray” candidates won’t have a chance in making.  Be committed to doing things differently with your job search & don’t look back.

This year, I’m taking my own medicine. In reflecting about what frustrated me about our company in 2011, this is what came to me…

What didn’t serve us: not being able to serve the pharmacists in our community the way we wanted.  Many pharmacists contacting us for our help, and not enough people/resources to serve them in an effective way that solved their problems/challenges in a timely manner.

What we decide to commit to & never look back from: Pharmacist Job Connection (which was trying to be too many things to too many pharmacists) is getting a facelift.

Pharmacist Job Connection is going to be about helping pharmacists learn how to stand out in their job search to beat their competition for interviews & offers.

RPh Temp Service (our temp division specializing in Indian Health Service travel assignments) will continue to be the most requested temp agency serving Native American pharmacies (IHS/tribal).

Now here’s the exciting news…

Hospital Pharmacist Job Connection is a fresh face in our family…it will exclusively help experienced hospital pharmacists get introduced directly to hiring decision-makers and access jobs before they’re advertised.

If you are a hospital experienced pharmacist (ie, clinical coordinator, clinical pharmacy specialist, informatics pharmacist, PGY2 residency-trained, or pharmacy director/manager), click here to be kept in the loop about how to cut down on your time consuming job-seeking process.

If you are a hospital pharmacy director/hiring manager tired of sifting through hundreds of resumes & getting backed up with your workload, be the first to hear about 1) secrets on how to hire “The One”, or 2) options to hand off searching, finding, & hiring “The One” to experts.