Rules for Job Hunting Survival

1. Use as many different methods as you can.

2. Invest the most time in those methods that work best.

3. As much as you physically can, go face-to-face with people - rather than inserting a piece of paper (i.e. resume) or an instrument (i.e. telephone) between you and employer.

4. If your problem is that of even getting an interview for a job, you will have to work harder on 'alternative methods of the job hunt,' which ignore the question of whether or not a place has a vacancy. In other words, you will need to have a 'Plan B.'

5. If you have no trouble getting interviews, but nothing ever comes of them, work on your interview techniques.

6. If you are truly at the desperate-survival level, be willing to take any job temporarily, so long as the job is something you can handle.

7. If nothing is turning up, and you're really down to rock bottom, run - not walk - to those agencies and centers which are very experienced in dealing with survivors of the job hunt. Hunt for such agencies and centers diligently, and when you find them, pick their brains for all they're worth.

8. Pay particular attention to your main relationships - family or otherwise - during this whole period. Under the strain of job-hunting, and the preoccupation of survival, some good relationships get neglected, go down the drain - unnecessarily.

9. When (or if) you go get a job, don't assume the issue of survival is all taken care of. You ought then to expend as much energy on not getting fired, as you did on the problem of getting hired.