When I arrived in Ireland I was burned out from Corporate America. Too many hours spent at work - not enough time spent at home. In many American companies, there is no such thing as work-life balance. You live to work not the other way round. This was the state in which I had found myself for the last 10 years of my life in New York. In 2009, my husband, newborn son and I moved from Queens to Long Island for a home with a back garden. I had romantic notions of spending my free time in that very beautiful garden. It never happened. We all know the definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over and expecting something to change. That was me and work. Every year I hoped my quality of life would improve - and unfortunately it never did. Therein lies one of the reasons I left the US - to get out of the endless rut, to escape the rat race.
So how to go about finding a job in Ireland? My job in the US was in Human Resources but was a specialized role so I knew it may be challenging to find a similar role here. I would definitely be limited to larger organizations with larger HR teams that had multiple specialties. My last role was Vice President of Total Rewards (Compensation and Benefits) in a media company in NYC. I didn't want that level of responsibility any more so I made a decision that when I began my job search in Ireland I would look for an individual senior contributor as I didn't want to manage a team anymore either. I was looking for that elusive 9-5 job I had never had!
I converted my Resume to a CV format which is not much different. I remember back in the 90s having a CV with my hair color, eye color and hobbies listed. How crazy that all sounds now! In my opinion the most successful path to finding a new job nowadays is through LinkedIn. I got working on updating my LinkedIn profile, made sure to change my location and clarify that I was legal to work in Ireland and all that jazz. Years ago after I lost my job, I was provided with Outplacement Counselling services to help me find a new role and on that course, they facilitated a session on the power of LinkedIn. I thought how novel - and that was way back in 2012. The platform has only grown stronger since then. Did you know that the more complete your LinkedIn profile is, the higher in recruiter search results it will appear. Obviously your profile needs to include key words that match with roles in the market, but beyond that it's critical that you upload your profile pic, detail job experience and related employers, ask prior managers and peers for recommendations and provide some as requested as well. You should spend some time detailing your soft skills and technical skills, as these will help recruiters match your skills to jobs they are trying to fill. There are so many neat features that can aid your search like the "Open to Work" tag. I had great success with LinkedIn in the US and so far I have had a decent amount of recruiters reach out since landing in Ireland.
The STAR interview technique was recommended by a family member. It's the tried and tested response outlining the Situation, Task, Action and Result (google for more information). I was lucky that my first job search didn't last too long - within a few months I landed a temporary job covering a maternity leave at one of the major Irish banks. It almost felt like my first day at work all over again - I was like a college grad as I had never worked in a corporate environment in Ireland before. When I arrived in New York in 1994 there were many expressions I would use when chatting to colleagues that would result in confusion. I'd get a sideways glance whereupon I would respond - "Is this not a universal term??" Terms like "giving out" (it was compared to "putting out" which is slang for something I can't print here so I will let you google it instead!) and "craic" had to be thrown out of my vocabulary. I was the Irish girl talking about sex and drugs in the workplace. So green. There were many chuckles over the years about how I used to talk. I also had to slow my speech considerably - I do think the Irish tend to talk on the fast side and in my case, people over the phone couldn't understand me! I've had the reverse happen since I came back and have had to ask people to repeat themselves...
Long before I started searching for a job though, I was worrying about a place to live. I knew it wasn't feasible to buy a new home right away, so I went online in February of 2023, which was about 5 months prior to my move. There was nothing appearing in my rental searches for the Greystones area. I called some of the local estate agents who told me it was too early on and to call them closer to my move. I was fortunate that I had my sister to support me through this move. She and her husband and two dogs landed in Greystones right before the Pandemic. Thankfully even before we arrived she had started networking on my behalf and asked friends, hairdressers, and beauticians if they knew of any leads. She decided she would text her Pug group of friends as well (a group of Pug owners who meet periodically with their dogs in tow). One of those owners happened to be renting in Marina Village and provided us with the contact name and number of the Lease Management Agent. I stayed in touch with the leasing agent prior to my move and was able to secure a 2 bedroom apartment in the Marina Village area of Greystones. Alleluia!
If I was to summarize all of the above, it would be to pay attention to the power of LinkedIn and always embrace networking. Neither can be under-estimated!
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