How to apply for a cleaning job and be hired

You may be wondering to yourself, “why do you need to prepare yourself so much before your cleaning job interview?”. Often a lot of people can get their head around why their cleaning job application was rejected. Like many other professional jobs, the cleaning profession requires some set of skills, which you may consider as the minimum required skill that all cleaners must have.

Following the Coronavirus outbreak, the importance of cleaners in the workplace has gained more importance. This means that more than ever, the pressure on cleaning companies to recruit capable cleaning staff is very high. So if you are looking to be hired by a cleaning company, there are 8 things you need to know about the cleaning profession:

1. Observation
2. Knowledge of cleaning
3. Tenacity and Determination
4. Intuition
5. Consistency
6. Communicable
7. Corrigible
8. Love of cleaning

1. Observation

There is a saying, “ you can only clean what you see”. This is very true for anyone who will excel in a cleaning role, whether you are at a cleaning operative level, supervisor or management level, your job is to ensure that hand prints, large or small debris, liquid stains and dusts are removed effectively. All of these require laser sharp eyes to pinpoint so in order to clean.

2. Knowledge of cleaning

Once you have identified the areas that need to be cleaned, you need to know how to perform the cleaning effectively. This meant understanding the right solution to be used, the right colour coded cleaning materials to be used as well the order of carrying out each cleaning process.

3. Tenacity

The typical cleaning hours are mainly early hours of the morning or late in the night. It is therefore not uncommon that you are assigned to look after an office and one day you turned up outside the office’s working hours and they have changed the lock. You were not informed about the change and to your knowledge your employers weren’t informed too. What do you do as a professional cleaner

The role of a cleaner is very similar to that of a carer. Your cleaning role actually is a form of looking after the workers of the office but a professional cleaner endures when you face hindrances in your job. Your tenacious quality plays a significant role as you allow your employers to resolve the issues with the customer on your behalf.

4. Intuition

Contrary to what many might think, a highly skilled cleaner can be highly resourceful. The reason for this is that many cleaners have to carry out their job outside their work place opening hours. This means working alone at early/late hours of the day. If the vacuum cleaner decides to stop working or the cleaning trolley is missing, the cleaner is left to think of “what to do” to get the building cleaned with the resources they have at their disposal.

Unforeseen situations like this coupled with the cleaner’s tenacious nature results in intuitive solutions. You will be surprised that you only need to love your job and that tenacious spirit kicks in.

5. Consistency of cleaning

Cleaning a commercial facility is totally different from cleaning your house. When cleaning your house, you can decide how much cleaning you want to do and when you want to do it. However, when cleaning a commercial facility, the client will be expecting the same standard of cleaning at all times.

In an office environment or a medical centre where cross contamination is not acceptable even by 1%, you have to follow a set of cleaning schedules generated by your employer or the client. This schedule is what is expected from you. An inconsistent cleaning performance can cause the client to doubt whether the cleaner did their job or not.

6. Communication

Due to working during the odd times of the day when you often don’t see the client,you have to turn to using notepads to receive cleanin requests and to pass on your responses to client requests. Communicating whether by notepad or face to face is a great way to show that you the cleaner exists and that you care about the client's site. Often, cleaner’s with great communication skills are often considered as part of the client’s workforce. This means that your site contact remembers to consult you before changing the lock or alarm code.

7. Corrigible

Cleaning is not a skill that you are born with, it is a very demanding job as it requires a high amount of brain power to effectively carry out each cleaning shift. This level of intensity may be hard to maintain at all times. This is why most developed cleaning providers have supervisors who are assigned to manage the cleaners. A professional cleaner does not get offended when they show how to improve their cleaning duties, instead they take on the great advice. This on-the-job learning experience are often the building blocks to cleaner’s promotion at work.

8. Love for cleaning

Like many other jobs, cleaning is easy to get into and easy to get out of. If you are only into cleaning because of the money or any other reason, you are unlikely to offer your best performance. You are actually unlikely to showcase many of the above skills even if you naturally have them.

Love for your job is the most important element you need to have or cultivate. Without it, you might have a miserable cleaning carer. If you struggle to love your cleaning job perhaps you have not yet understood the role and why it is important to others. Maybe this understanding can help you find the love for your cleaning job.