Job Hunting

[sanpaku_backup]

I am starting to get really, really, really depressed. There is nothing like spending a half day looking at page after page of job listings without finding anything I am the remotest bit qualified for. I am qualified for nothing except for teaching and the kind of entry-level editorial job that we cannot afford for me to take. All the web sites for former academics looking for non-academic jobs are full of smart-alecky deprecatory "advice" that I have already internalized, but no one explains how the hell they manage to find a job they are actually qualified for when they don't have a lot of experience.

Comments

I want you to want me.

[flw.livejournal.com]

I am telling you, baby, I am the last person on Earth to whom you should be listening, but listen to me anyway:

Don't make their decisions for them.

Just go out for whatever jobs you want, I guarantee you, you will be among the most intelligent people applying for the job. I guarantee it. I guarantee it. You are in the running for any job that you would consider having. They list all those "requirements" to sort out the schmucks (who still come in and apply anyway). They want you! Believe me. They want you.

Specifying that "We need someone who is familiar with "Oracle 2.3 Dbase entry procedures" (or some such nonsense) is like saying we need someone who knows how to operate a "Pentel K105 Hybrid Gel Roller". It's a pen, goddammit. What they really need and what they are really looking for are people who possess a trait called "adaptability". They can get some moron to learn whatever specific software they have today.

Again, I reiterate. Whatever they want, you got it.

Re: I want you to want me.

[sanpaku.livejournal.com]

You know, you would think this to be true. And so, believe me, I tell myself this every day. That is why I have been applying for dozens of jobs that I don't have enough qualifications for -- that is, virtually all of them. Because I am mostly applying for editorial jobs, and most ask for at least 3 years of publishing experience. So I write a cover letter saying that I am a smart person with experience doing this and this.

But I can tell you that I have applied for all these jobs and so far got one truncated phone call of interest and one crappy freelance assignment, and that was a month ago. And not so much as a rejection letter from the rest. So, empirically, when I say I qualifications matter, and that my lack of qualifications is hurting me, I must be right. They must be flipping to the resume and seeing I do not have that much experience, and then throwing my letter out.

So I have been taking your advice anyway, but I am telling you, I am behind the eightball here. It is, uh, not a good feeling that becoming a Doctor of Philosophy is of less use in the world than getting a certification for fixing air conditioners, but that is the reality. Have I ever fucked up my life.

Re: I want you to want me.

[librarygrrl.livejournal.com]

Hey, watch it. Librarydad fixes air conditioners!

Re: I want you to want me.

[sanpaku.livejournal.com]

Oops. You know I didn't know what your dad did. But he's out in Peters Township now or something, right? My point was not related to fixing air conditioners per se. It's just that I have no means of making a living at all right now. I might as well work at Starbucks...

Re: I want you to want me.

[librarygrrl.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know. Actually, Librarydad is in charge of the efficient operation of the AT&T building in downtown P-Burgh. Librarydad makes more money that you or I, with all our fancy education, will ever make. In other words, Librarydad is among the last of a dying breed: highly skilled labor. I suspect he would have been an engineer if he had gone to college. He's just got a mechanical mind. Much of my nostalgia from growing up revolves around my dad drawing really precise diagrams of the insides of stuff.