The job search - aaaaagghhhh!

I'm going to revive this thread b/c I'm looking for part-time work for the next 9 months or so. i'm a grad student, finishing up a PhD. up til now i've been teaching part-time. for whatever reason the teaching positions dried up for the fall, and may do so in the spring as well. whatever I do, it'll probably been a steep pay cut since other teaching jobs are few and far between and I don't have specialized skills to do much other professional work. i have zero desire to switch careers, i just need to pay the rent for the school year, just like a lot of other grad students.

i haven't been on the "market" for 8 years so I'm pretty rusty. and frankly i was never that good at finding jobs. most of the jobs I've had came because I was in the right place at the right time and/or knew somebody with an inside connection. i've only ever gotten one job simply by applying and then having an interview and then being hired (and that was the best-paid job i ever had, and I was stupid enough to quit it after a year because I was bored).

my biggest problem is that I just can't work up much visible enthusiasm for doing shit work for a while and am the worst liar--I can't pretend that I'm looking to switch careers, that I _really_ _really_ want to work your crappy office job, and that I'm looking to stay in the job for more than 9-12 months.

one question is, is it customary for employers not to even acknowledge receipt of an application? i've sent out like 10 applications over the past week+one half and have only received a reply from one potential employer.

any tips, commiseration, etc. much welcomed.

it is the norm. if you really care, call them up and bug them about it, perhaps repeatedly given what they say.

also, a week is not very long, at least given that some employers may dawdle for months before getting around to finishing a hiring process.

sign up with temp agencies if you're willing to do office work.

be ready to do multiple interviews.

if your applications are sent anywhere with anything like professional hr people, be sure to modify them to match the stated qualifications as literally as possible. they have so many applications to go through, just at the triage stage, let alone when they're trying to make decisions for interviews, etc., that they'll exclude anything that doesn't skill-match without a second thought.

also be ready to fail for a prolonged period of time.

(the skill-matching may even be done, or be facilitated by, a piece of software at the earlier stages of the process, so you can't much count on a human being looking over your application and being struck by your badly fitting but otherwise remarkable qualifications.)

(consider also that anything normally requiring a bachelor's degree, or previous experience in any field, will have the same kind of standards applied to it, so if you literally fail to match some basic criterion, all your experience and education are likely to go unconsidered.)

it really, really, really, really, really, really sucks out there. the hardest part is keeping up your will to smash you head against the wall again and again, but if you can keep torturing yourself, it's possible

oh yeah, i know about the experience stuff. i don't bother applying if the job requires some basic skill or training or degree I don't have. and I not only tailor my cover letters to the specific position but I often make subtle revisions/additions to my resume as well (not false ones, just emphasizing different things).

i wish i knew more software packages. i could try to start remedying that, but i don't know if the time investment would be worth it given how many conceivable programs jobs might want you to know. my MS office/video editing knowledge is pretty ace, but any specialized administrative software, forget it. and my HTML knowledge dates back to the late 90s.

when i got canned last year i hadn't been in an interview sitch for five years, so i was reeeeeally rusty once i started getting interviews again. i found interview practice with a friend in the industry was really helpful - the usually have a good grasp of what you're likely to get asked.

if your applications are sent anywhere with anything like professional hr people, be sure to modify them to match the stated qualifications as literally as possible. they have so many applications to go through, just at the triage stage, let alone when they're trying to make decisions for interviews, etc., that they'll exclude anything that doesn't skill-match without a second thought.

would second this. You might have to literally copy the person specifiction stuff to your CV/application.
Fake enthusiasm as much as you can in interview (without seeming crazy obv).

They'll often use software to filter out applications that don't have key words from the JD, rather than having an actual human look at them.

this is good advice. it hadn't even occurred to me that a human wouldn't be looking at my letter.

i'm a writer, so I mistakenly strive to make my application cover letters well-written and not jargon-y. but it strikes me that a lot of the folks i'm sending these to are probably not that bright, and are caught up in jargon like "strategic goals" etc. so maybe I should include some meaningless corporate catchphrases in my letters?

also hard to strike a balance b/t rattling off all of your relevant skills and experience and making the damn letter concise

also, any tips as to where (online) to look for jobs? i've been looking at all the educational institutions, temp agencies, and a little on monster.com. (and a few other more specific employers around here.)

Are you on LinkedIn?

no, should I be? I don't want random people knowing my life history and contact info.

You can put as much information as you like on there, and make it private i think. You can sign up for alerts in areas you're interested in. A small, but increasing, number of employers are doing 100% of their recruitment through it now.

look at your state employment services, too.

educational institutions are among the slower ones i was thinking of above.

goddamn i finally make a new resume and the laptop it is on dies. back to it. bcz i am not working in a thrift store 4 life.

Recently I found a job I'd applied to previously - and not got, even though I could match everything on the job description, right down to the type of degree I had - advertised again. I thought, hmm, here's a bit of a chance. So I emailed them my CV again and made a cute comment about how I was applying again because I really wanted the job, and could they give my CV a second look? Thought that could only make me look keen.

I got a curt email back saying that candidates needed this one piece of experience, which I didn't have, and ... which wasn't mentioned at all on the advert.

So fuck them. They'd obviously not found anyone and there I was, for once a real plum of a candidate, held back by a hidden requirement.

at least they emailed you.

ctrl-f riaa 0 of 0 hits. ;_:

yeah the not-getting-back thing is frustrating. it's frustrating in general when people don't reply to emails, esp. when a job plays into it. really, it wouldn't take very long to copy/paste a brief "Thank you for your application. BLAH BLAH BLAH" note into a reply and hit "send." It's a small task for a significant kindness. But a lot of employers say they don't have time to do that. Fuck them.

how soon after applying should I send a brief follow-up? two weeks?

One to two weeks seems right to me?

any job interview tips?

i'm guessing the environment is a bit relaxed (so I can probably get away with not wearing a tie), and I feel confident that I have the experience/skills required. so I'm not quaking with fear. but I also haven't been in a proper job interview situation (at least one for a decent job) in 13 years.

should I be ready with some statements of why I want the job, etc. or just be ready to answer questions? etc.

i've got one interview tomorrow (the job I'm hoping to get), and another on Monday (a decent job, but nothing too interesting)

both, definitely imo?

read and re-read the job spec etc if there was an ad, have an answer for each point on it- that's the bare minimum iirc

Have an example to back up each answer too. Like, if the job spec says 'target orientated' or 'customer focused' or something, have a little story you can roll out about a time when you really demonstrated those qualities.

To add a little to that, lots of employers are using "behaviour-based interviews" that require you to back up any statements you make with examples. They work on what's called a SAR model - the example should outline the situation you were in, the action that you took and the result that came out of it.

For example, if you were asked 'can you work with minimal supervision?' you could point to a time when you had a project to work on but your manager was tied up with something else or away, or something, outline how you went about tackling that task on your own and detail the successful outcome. It can be quite mechanical because HR departments like to have clear numerical scores they can track and, in theory, justify - so you might be marked out of five for each question with one point given for clearly outlining the scenario, two for detailing the action, etc.

Of course they might take another approach but it's something to have in your pocket should they go that route.

thanks gals/guys! i wrote down a lot of little stories as you suggested (or rather, wrote down a few words that would jog my memory about the stories)... but I didn't end up needing more than one or two.

the first interview ended up being fairly informal (I mean, we were sitting across a table and all that, but the interviewer didn't fire a million difficult questions at me and her attitude seemed positive and relaxed). i was interviewed by the boss rather than HR folks. and i got the job, before the interview was even over... although my acceptance is pending a final confirmation of how much they can pay me. and i'm paranoid that something will happen in the next week to sabotage it, because I'm like that.

i'm still doing the other interviews just because I won't assume I have a job until I've signed on the dotted line, but hopefully my search (at least for the next or so) is over.

Congratulations!

nice work
behavioral interviewing is allthe talk around me. "tell me about a time when you..." hard to be ready to roll off a story on the spot, but in the people i counsel, practising (like above) helps a ton. nothing word for word, just a half dozen outlines you can fit to the question.

well done amateurist!

Submitting resume online for consideration for a temp research job, not even a full-time permanent gig! And they want the most incredibly detailed self-review of your performance at previous jobs! This is ridiculous. Do I just lie and say, I was awesome at everything?? They can't make you impugn yourself, surely!

Oh, they'll have some horribly precise requirements - you need to be X% positive abt yrself to Y% negative, be one out of ratio either way and they won't have it.

Maybe.

I just chose neutral responses--it's not that one has to "lie," it's that your performance on a previous job is not necessarily a prediction of your performance at the next one, depending on a lot of things. Also, it's their manager's and HR department's job to decide whether you're right for them, not yours to potentially disqualify yourself so that they can weed out their stack of applicants for things that may not even be relevant.

The whole process of fitting applicants to jobs is a nightmare of inefficency and irrationality - for everyone. No one knows yet how to make it any better, but HR departments keep flailing around looking for magical answers, and dodgy consultants are happy to provide them with as many magical answers as the market will bear.

Good luck. My heart goes out to anyone caught in the job-search wringer.

Btway, anyone have any experience of going into warehouse work, as an adult, having not done it before?

fuck this shit X-(

i have a 'job' now, should be searching still but barely have the time or energy to search anyway. kind of feels worse than not having a job. at least there was some dignity in that.

If anyone is looking for a customer-services type job in central London, or knows someone who is, send me an ILX-mail. There's a role going in my department. Not exactly entry level but not something you need 5 years of experience for. Not a call centre or anything like that. idk what the pay would be but it's not likely to be amazing. Would be a good foot in the door at a very good company though.

idk if there's anyone with a background in international student recruitment, a good understanding of SE Asia and a burning desire to work in KL, Singapore, London or Melbourne on ilx but if there is, hit me up.

imagine if racoon tanuki was that person

also imagine I could spell raccoon

lj.vn?

proven record of module delivery including recruitment of children to postcolonial studies graduate programmes

I highly recommend listening to this series if you are in the clutches of job search:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fsyd467-JCE

If you just want money you can avoid the unpleasantness of a job search altogether and just live the remainder of your life as a crusty cyber beggar collecting funds for a non-existent child's terminal case of rickets

... or if you need background meditation music. It's pretty droney.