Every week we receive phone calls from candidates who are unemployed and feeling miserable, and our heart breaks for them.

We know what an incredibly tough, lonely and dispiriting time this can be. You can feel cut off from the rest of the world, your confidence takes a dive and it’s really challenging to remain confident and buoyant about the future ahead.

Here’s a few tips to help you manage this period:

Take charge: One of the hardest emotions to deal with when you are struggling to find a role is the feeling of powerlessness. So, control what you can – review your budget and remove unnecessary money-wasters. Pro-actively reach out to recruiters and potential employers. Create content showcasing your knowledge and share across social media channels. Take the first steps.

Structure your day: Don’t fall into the trap of mooching around and listlessly wasting the day ahead – instead plan out each day. Decide what your priorities are and then place parameters around how long you do each task for. For example, if you decided to spend 9am – 11am looking through job advertisements, stop at 11am and move onto household tasks or whatever else is on your list. Otherwise the tendency can be to meander through the day without achieving anything.

Exercise: It’s such a cliché but exercising really does help. Study after study demonstrates that moving and being active releases positive chemicals, which lift the mood and can even give you an adrenalin high. It doesn’t need to be super-charged – just going for a walk in the sunshine or doing an at- home routine (there’s plenty of exercise Apps) will make a difference.

Be social: Say hi to the barrister. Meet a friend for lunch. Help at your child’s school. Anything to keep you engaged and feeling part of a community. And don’t be shy about telling people about your job search – all it takes is for a Mum at school to know someone working at your dream company and there you have a new connection!



Set yourself a new challenge: All those things you never have time to do when you are working – this is your chance. Having a goal to aspire to really helps your state of mind too. It could be finally mastering cooking Paella (my personal nemesis – how do you make a soffrito?) or reading War and Peace or painting the hallway. Use this time to achieve in other ways outside work.

Remember “this too shall pass”. You will get another job. And maybe one day you’ll look back at this period as tough, but formative and productive too.