When Patience Pays Off

Rev. Dr. Kitty J. Boitnott, NBCT

Life Strategies, Stress Management & Holistic Life Coach also Working as

Career Transition & Job Search Coach

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September 10, 2015

I have a friend who was offered a contract for a new job today. That would be good news in any event, but it is especially good news for my friend because she has been job hunting for over a year.

I say she is a friend as opposed to being a "client" because she wasn't ever in any position to hire me as her Career Transition or Job Search Coach. She was barely making ends meet by substitute teaching and cleaning business buildings for a friend who owned a cleaning business.

I met her almost exactly a year ago at a networking event for individuals who were looking for work. I still remember the look of sheer panic and fear in her eyes. She had been told that she might meet someone who could help her find a job at this event. That was a mischaracterization of the event, and she was well and truly lost, not to mention completely overwhelmed.

Someone in attendance at the meeting asked her if she had a LinkedIn profile. She had never even heard of LinkedIn. When she said as much, someone else told her to go find Kitty. "Kitty is teaching a class later this week on how to set up a LinkedIn profile. Go find her." She found me, and that is when I saw the panic in her eyes. "I can't attend your class on LinkedIn," she said in a rush. "I have to substitute teach that day. Right now substitute teaching is the only source of income I have."

I assured her that it was okay. There would be other classes. I gave her my card and told her that if she needed anything to feel free to call me. Two days later she did, in fact, call me, and what has evolved over the course of the last year is a warm and sincere friendship. She needed someone who could help her figure out what she needed to do to find her next job. As it turns out, I needed some real world experience helping someone job search since I had just more or less hung out my shingle as a Career Transition and Job Search Coach in addition to being a Life Strategies and Stress Management Coach.

Over the course of this past year, we have met countless times. I helped her revamp her resume. I built her LinkedIn profile for her from scratch...and it is beautiful if I say so myself. She created a strategy for where she wanted to work, and she went to every event and completed every single task I suggested for her. She did everything right. And time after time, she got close...and then nothing. 

As I said, we have become good friends. I have prayed for her to get a job because I know how much she wants--and needs to work. I have returned every one of her calls over the course of this past year even if it was just to offer support and encouragement. I have offered the moral support that I could...and together we have waited patiently. I have fretted and worried and so has she. But neither of us ever gave up hope. Neither of us ever said..."Okay, that's it. We're done. No more job hunting. This is just too much rejection for one person." No...we have kept the faith and she kept plugging away.

And today, she was offered a position. It is fitting somehow that it has taken almost exactly a year (although I would have preferred that it hadn't and I am sure she feels the same way). During this time she didn't know that she was my first "real" job search client even though she wasn't paying me a penny. She had no way of knowing until I told her tonight that before starting to help her, I had only had a couple of clients who needed very limited advice. She didn't know that she was my first client in desperate need. 

She has told me that she wouldn't have gotten this far without me. I know it is true that I helped her with her resume and LinkedIn profile. It is probably true that she got the first look from the recruiter who contacted her because of her profile on LinkedIn. What I know for sure, however, is that the "magic" that finally worked for her was her determination, her perseverance and her patience. She didn't give up. 

I have written before about how job search requires one to have patience and perseverance. I knew it was true then. I have the evidence of my good friend to offer as proof positive now. She starts work September 21. She and I met almost exactly one year ago this week. It has been a long year full of doubt and heartache. The wait has paid off for her.

If you are in the midst of your own job search, it will pay off for you...but you cannot give up, even when you feel like it.

Winston Churchill said it best. “Never give in--never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”

Stay the course. And never, never, never, never give up.

Until next time.

Photo by Shutterstock 

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