Job Hunt in Covid-19 – What You Need To Know
Job Hunt in Covid-19 is not fun. The coronavirus pandemic has had an unprecedented impact on our society, dramatically changing the way we interact with one another. Tragically, for many people who do wind up contracting it, they may sustain lasting negative effects from it. That’s why as a global community, we need to do our best to make sure that others don’t suffer the same fate. One way we can accomplish this is by changing the way we do things in society.
Unfortunately, for many job seekers out there, this also means you need to change your hunting strategies to secure gainful employment. Covid-19 may have changed the world, but not our basic physiological needs. Humans need to eat. In order to eat, we need money. To get money, we need a job. And to get a job, we need to act like modern humans and hunt for it.
What makes Job hunt in COVID-19 different, exactly?
One major problem with the coronavirus is that it’s very highly contagious. Just a whiff of air from an infected person who just sneezed could infect you with this disease. That’s why we do social distancing: so you won’t inhale someone else’s infected biowaste. But what we’re really afraid, of course, of is the mucosal microdroplets that tend to invisibly float around in an enclosed room for some time.
However, many interview rooms tend to be inconveniently small. Too small, in fact, that social distancing won’t work — unless you’re talking one on one with the interviewer. That’ll be too inefficient for a company if they’re mass hiring. Unless you are expecting that you could be the only applicant for the job, you should not reasonably expect a group interview to be available anytime soon.
Online Interviews
Instead of physical interviews, most companies prefer online interviews to keep things safer, instead. It may also help if the recruiting officer is expected to work from home. For many clerical jobs out there, there might not be a need for a real, physical interview at all.
However, please note that this is never a full replacement for physical interviews and assessment. There is only so much that could be seen through a webcam and computer screen. Some things, such as tests of physical strength in some workers, can best be seen offline. The same goes for most positions that need some form of demonstration of skill.
Searching for a Job in COVID-19? Work from home
Because of the pandemic, many companies have allowed their employees to work from home for most of their workdays. This shouldn’t be much different for someone who applied to work for a white-collar job and got in through an online interview. You can, therefore, expect more companies posting work from home as a benefit for getting into their company.
However, you shouldn’t expect much of this in all industries, especially in the manufacturing and hospitality side. Those two industries do need people to operate their physical stations, unlike programmers and virtual assistants (who could work at home with a laptop and decent internet connection).
Confused about job hunt in COVID-19, here’s where the jobs are — in one chart ➦
Face masks
Of course, if you expect to work in manufacturing or hospitality, then you will definitely need to wear your face masks right and get used to it. To some recruiters, a sloppily-worn mask might turn them off, especially if they have a ton of other potential employees who may be as good as you but wear their masks better.
Here’s a tip in case you aren’t sure how to wear yours right: if it doesn’t form a seal over your nose, cheeks, and chin, then it doesn’t fit right. Your nose should never be bulging out of the mask, and the sides should lie snugly on the skin of your cheeks. Although the recruiter might not notice the latter, they will definitely see your bulging nasal organ over your mask.
You should also think of your mask as something similar to your hair and clothes. If you wear them right, then they will look good. But if you wear them wrong, it will probably look like there’s something wrong with you. Sure, they might not be perfectionist critics who get annoyed over an uneven mask. But they will always want to make sure their customers won’t get mad at them for seeing a waiter’s bulging nose over their food. They could teach you to keep it in but having someone who already knows it saves them time and effort.
Will this ever change?
Now, as with most things, some of these can be expected to be gone after Covid-19. After all, we waste so much money and generate trash while wearing disposable face masks every day. But some, such as work from home and online interviews might stay for good. That said, only time can tell if they’re worth keeping or not.
