5 ways to get a high salaried job during an economic downturn

“Singapore has to take the expected economic slowdown in 2012 in its stride” quoted Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong during his 2012 New Year Speech recently.

A slow and gloomy economy may be knocking on our doors soon. It may or may not happen, but somehow, it has caused much worry to most of us. Employers may not want to hire at the moment fearing no sales to support the increase in labour costs. On the other hand, employees may scared to lose their jobs or salary cuts. Some people will also start complaining about the many things around them such as the government not helping, may have no bonus this year and foreigners ‘snatching’ their potential jobs away.

Many will feel that it is impossible to get a high salaried job, especially during an economic slowdown. However by following these 5 ways to “market” yourself to your potential employers, you can get a high salaried job even during a recession.

Let’s look at these 5 ways.

#1 Write an Outstanding Resume
Imagine you are an employer; you received more than 100 resumes in a day for only one senior managerial position in your company. What is it in the resume that attracted you so much that you are dying to see this interviewee and wanted to employ him or her so badly even before the interview?

Yes, because the interviewee is…
DIFFERENT

Most importantly, you have to think out of the box in creating a different kind of resumes reading experience for your potential employers.

You can write a resume in a different format, different from the standard word or pdf format. You can state your achievements instead of writing down your job scope or characteristics in your resume. What did you do to make your past company or yourself succeed and so on? Writing down job scope is boring and waste time. Remember, sell the sizzle and not the steak.

#2 Don’t Think About Security
Do not look at your job as a form of security. Nothing in this world is secured, you need to fight for it. If you have time, watch the first two seasons of The Apprentice and you will understand the real meaning of fighting for yourself.

If you think that a job is secured, you will fail to grow, simply because you are sitting comfortably in your own comfort zone. Hence, don’t think about job security, think of winning consistently in your work instead. Don’t ask what kind of benefits the company has for you; ask the company, what are the things that you are going to achieve for them instead.

#3 Build Your Industry Value
Your industry value simply means that not just people in your industry know who you are because they are aware of the achievements that you have made in your current company. In this case, even during recession, you will still have headhunters and employers in your industry approaching you and offering higher paid jobs.

This is the benefit of having your industry value. For example, if you are a HR manager, you must be one of the top HR professionals in your country and your company has grown tremendously due to your contribution during your employment. People will notice you and they don’t mind to invest heavily on your paycheck. Hence, continue to build your industry value, starting from today!

#4 Be an Expert in Your Industry
One thing that you can start doing so is by contributing and sharing your opinions and knowledge in your industry. It is always easy to hear, read or listen to some story and advice.

However, it is never easy to write, to create and to give advice as most people are lazy to do all these. Yet, you may not know that when you start giving advice and sharing your knowledge, people will begin to view you as an expert in your industry.

And this will therefore, give you the edge of others who are competing with you for the same high paid job. Just by putting in more efforts than your peers in contributing your knowledge to your industry people, getting a high paid job even amidst a recession, will be as easy as lifting up a feather for you.

#5 Be Confident, Stop Complaining
Complaining will just make you more depressed, angrier about your life and worse still, you will gain nothing, you are still stuck in the low paid job and nothing good will happen at all.

Stop bothering about your potential dream job been taken away by a foreign talent. It is you that is taking your dream job away. And the only thing that you can do to get that high paid dream job, is to be confident about yourself and be positive about the world out there.

No matter what happen to the economy, that confidence inside you can consistently help you achieve, the things which are so great that many people will think it is impossible to achieve.

So, in summary, it is you that determines the amount of salary paycheck you are going to get. Listen to your instincts and trust your confidence. Be an expert and increase your industry value. And in no time, you will definitely see yourself as one of the top percentile of high salaried employees in Singapore someday. Good luck! 

Jacky Tan, Senior Marketing PR Manager (Asia Pacific), Evorich Flooring Group