The country's unemployment rate may have stayed at 8.3 percent since October 2011. And even though 227,000 jobs were added in February, many people still can't find work and are wondering where their next job will be.

With the economic situation over the last few years, more and more entrepreneurs are springing up in a wide variety of industries. While entrepreneurship is an excellent choice, it's not for everyone. So if you are unemployed but don't want to tackle the entrepreneur route, what's left besides collecting unemployment? The answer?

Create your own job.

So you may be thinking that this is the same as being an entrepreneur but it isn't. If you liked working for someone else but you aren't finding job opportunities, start thinking about new positions that employers may not have even thought of yet. This takes a good amount of research, creativity, and assertiveness but it is possible. If you're unemployed and not even going on interviews anyway, now is the time to get busy and at least try this.

1. Review your resume. This is not for the purpose of sending it out to prospective employers. Carefully and creatively examine what your skills really are. Too often, people forget to include skills that they have learned outside of their normal job. Let's face it. Even the art of social media is a skill today that most people probably didn't need in their old job but now that they have it, they should be looking at ways they can utilize and monetize it.


2. Make a new list. It's not good enough to just look at your resume without taking action. Once you write your new skills down on paper, it's much easier to see what positions you could create for yourself.


3. Brainstorm and don't shoot any idea down. Outline your desired criteria. Get an idea of work environment, company size, industry types, location, etc. Think of this as your employment wish list.


4. Research, research, research. This can be very time-consuming but it's necessary. In the old days, I would have said to scour the business and classified sections of the newspaper but today, jump on Internet and start searching. Read business articles about your target companies and industries. Subscribe to employment sites. Do searches by some of the keywords that fit your desired job. Even check Craigslist frequently. Craigslist for jobs? Yes. Even if you don't think they would have what you're looking for, just poking around on their site may give you other ideas that you never thought of. You may be asking yourself, "Isn't this like trying to find a needle in a haystack?" Well, it could be but that's why you need to do Steps 1-3 first so that you have a solid idea of what you can offer, what type of company and industry you want to target, and also the location.


5. Hit the target. After going through these steps, you should be ready to make contact with prospective companies. If you don't feel confident in your new, creative approach and sales pitch to sell yourself and your new idea, find someone to be your sounding board; preferably someone who is experienced with out-of-the-box marketing.

I'm not going to kid you. Taking this route and creating your own job takes guts, a lot of patience and persistence, but more than that... creativity. Getting stuck in the rut of waiting for the jobs to find you will only make you good at waiting. Long gone are the days when people would come knocking at your door.

To read my own story of how I landed a job with a global company before they even thought of hiring someone, visit http://www.onedotadvice.wordpress.com.

Nancy O'Neill is the Common Sense Consultant. Combining her education and experience, she offers a common sense approach on a variety of topics for entrepreneurs of all ages, authors, speakers, parents, and kids. Life or business does not have to be complicated but many times, people make it that way. Nancy believes the most effective way to help people is by giving them the tools to think for themselves. Through practical, common sense education and coaching, a person can gain the knowledge to become confident in their own abilities and not rely on someone else to spoon-feed them information.

Nancy also uses her creative talent for web and graphic design, concept direction, writing, publishing, and marketing.

She lives in southern California with her husband and teenage son.

Visit http://www.onedotenterprises.com for any of her services.

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