Approach Finding a Mate Like Looking for Work
A successful career or a happy marriage can be the keys to happiness in someone’s life. So, too, achieving either one can be accomplished through similar methods.
Use Face to Face and Online Networking
Online professional networking sites have become a powerful tool for business and for job hunting. Sites like LinkedIn help people connect with friends, colleagues, and friends of friends in order to make personal contacts and perhaps get a foot in the door at a company where a resume might otherwise have been lost in the crowd.
Similarly, social networking sites are becoming a source for romantic dates. People already know they have friends in common and share similar interests. Strangers interact virtually on sites like Facebook through posting comments to mutual friends. A gutsy next step would be to make one-on-one contact with someone in a friend’s network and perhaps eventually suggest a live meeting. A newly married couple was featured in People magazine in 2009 because they “met” online when one emailed the other just to say, “Hey, we have the same name!”
Write a Good “Cover Letter”
Cover letters to potential employers that are an obvious cut-and-paste job generally wind up in the circular file. It is obvious that they are part of a careless mass mailing with no regard for the particular job being filled, and Human Resources will see them as weak and lazy.
Likewise, introductory emails that make no reference to the reader’s personal profile will show that the sender has blanketed the masses with this email with no rhyme or reason. A good email will demonstrate that the writer has read the reader’s profile and has legitimate reasons for thinking they might be a good match.
Go on Informational Interviews and “Practice” Dates
Sometimes a job hunter is uncertain about a particular job or a company and may be ambivalent about going on the live interview. Rarely, however, is such an interview a waste of time. Perhaps through a live meeting the interviewee will make a favorable impression on the employer and learn about a more suitable opening that is becoming available in the upcoming weeks. Maybe the interviewer will ask a provocative question that solicits an answer that the interviewee had not anticipated, but at another interview for a better job should a similar question arise again then a good response will already have been thought through.
A single might be ambivalent about whether or not to go on a date with someone. Approaching such a date as “practice” can yield unexpected consequences. At worst it will take an hour or two out of someone’s life. At best, the date can turn out better than expected and lead to something more. Somewhere in between a platonic friendship could be made, or the daters can practice small talk, always a useful skill.
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