Top Tips For Lockdown
We know it’s a difficult time to focus on your career, so we have put together some tips on how you can stay positive and keep motivated.
1) Practice self-care
It is essential to ensure that you feel mentally and physically nourished during these times. Take time regularly to relax, exercise, get a good sleep, and do things that make you feel good. This will lead the way in how you feel each day, and subsequently how motivated you feel.
2) Keep a routine
Having a routine gives you a structure to follow and work around. This can give you a sense of normality, which helps you focus on feeling more motivated.
This could be: setting your morning alarm for a certain time, going for a run each afternoon, scheduling a call with a friend/family each evening.
Also, sitting down and writing a to-do list or a schedule will help you to follow your routine. This also helps you to manage your productivity, and designate tasks for your day.
3) Get Inspired - Research for the future
Research companies and roles that you like the idea of - you could even create a list of these to remember for the future, including how and when to apply for them.
4) Update your LinkedIn
This is a great time to review your LinkedIn profile and optimise everything that you’ve written on it. You could also consider creating content for your LinkedIn page, such as blogs or posts. Check out our Top 10 Tips on LinkedIn blog for more ideas.
5) Increase your network
Networking can be a bit difficult at the moment, but there are still ways to make connections! This could be in the form of:- joining groups on Facebook that you have an interest in (e.g. Female Entrepreneurs, Behavioural Economists Network)- thinking about clubs or societies you’d like to join if you’re at university, and seeing if you can connect with their social pages.
It is also a good time to develop and practice an elevator pitch which covers a bit on you, your background and your ambitions. An elevator pitch is a quick speech on a topic - 20-30 seconds. The reason it's called an elevator pitch is that it should be short enough to be presented during a elevator journey!
6) Get Informed about your Industry
Find material such as articles, newspapers, or podcasts that give you information about the industry you’re aiming to work in. This will provide you with a lot of useful insight and make you feel more confident about your industry. Some useful podcast examples are: The Property Podcast, Freakonomics, This is Money Podcast
7) Use Decade On’s Progress Plan
If you don’t know where to start when trying to build your career, why don’t you check out our Progress Plan blog - it will help you reflect about what you most enjoy and your motivations, and help you develop some goals and actions.
8) Explore remote work or volunteering / Look out for others
If you are able, why not look for some volunteering opportunities. You could look at the Royal Voluntary Service for the NHS. It is also worth taking a look at local opportunities, as waiting lists for national roles can be long - https://do-it.org is a good resource for this.
Taking on a remote (or physical, if feasible) opportunity can help you to feel good, and will also give you routine and purpose.
9) Build your CV (there’s still ways!)
Many companies and brands are adapting to the current situation and creating remote ways of providing their services. There are many platforms providing:-online courses: you can find websites that provide free online courses here https://nationalcareers.service.gov.uk/find-a-course/where-to-find-free-online-learning/
10) Develop skills that you normally wouldn’t have time for!
There may be many skills or hobbies that you have wanted to develop, but never found the time. You may have more time to explore these at the moment. These could be art, learning a language, yoga, learning to code… It doesn’t have to be linked to your career - but you never know when something might come in handy!