Today’s word is brought to you by the letter “R” for the word “references”.
January is one of the busiest months for hiring. Especially, the middle of January when the last of the decision-making, stragglers have returned from winter vacation. If you are currently job hunting please do me a favor and check your references.
Call your references and let them know you are job hunting. Explicitly, ask permission to use them as a reference.
I spent the last four years of my life job hunting/ being a solopreneur (more on that later). I thought I knew what I was doing. I had a dope resume and I landed so many 2nd and 3rd round interviews.
However, for some odd reason, I could not stick that landing. I was not getting job offers.
So I humbled myself, reached out to people for help. I had my resume reviewed no less than 4 times. And still nada.
Then I decided to make one small change. The change was just what I needed. I landed my last contract and the current full-time job I have.
The small change: my references.
I’m grateful for the one potential employer who took my request for feedback seriously and responded to my query of why I didn’t get the job. They very heavily suggested I check my references.
At first, I hesitated, all the people listed as references loved me.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
I made some phone calls using my google voice number.
One of my references said THEY DID NOT KNOW ME. Another reference gave me a very neutral leaning towards negative review. And my last reference? They stopped responding to requests on my behalf years ago!
These were all people who had my actual cell phone number (Which is a big deal because I’m an extremely private person.) I kept in contact.
All this time of politely engaging in small talk over the years and it never occurred to me to ask if they still wanted to be used as a reference.
Professional betrayal always hurts. I endured four years of career hell over people who couldn’t simply say, ‘don’t use me as a reference’.
Check your references. Then check them again.
Please don’t make the same mistake I did.
May all who are job hunting be successful.
Insert your profile info here, by going to Users -> Your Profile -> Biographical Info. Profile image (avatar) comes from gravatar.com. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Nullam faucibus ornare lectus nec cursus. 
