Need Some Help

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Hello There,

I am working to find a job...even in this ecomony. I don't have much job experience. Last job was in 2002 (I got fired), so most employers don't even ask for it on the application. I have volunteer experience, but nothing in the customer service field.

I don't want to work at like Mickey D's or in fast food (that is all my mother thinks I can do) and am looking at some electronics places like HHGregg (think Best Buy, but more regional) and Walmart. Even applied at Panera (a national sandwich chain) and Borders. I haven't heard back from anyone. I know it has to be because of my lack of job experience.

What can I do to get someone to hire me (especially at almost 29)? I feel like I put in applications and nothing happens. Where are some good places to put in applications? I live in a fairly big town (national chains like Target, JCPenny and such are here in town) but they pretty much specify experience in their ads.

What has worked for you all?

Thanks,

Dude From VA

Um wow. Fast food, that's kind of an insult. Considering how much it takes to work in food industry and stuff. I work at a pizza place myself. They take almost anyone. Do you put your volunteer work on your application? That may help a bit. Why customer service? Why not look at clerical, or something else? Like healthcare. Internet job searches work pretty well.

I have done alot of internet job searches and found that clerical and healthcare require 1 to 2 years of experience (at least in my area) and some require special certification (like for medical coding and such). I figured I would start with customer service, which also would give me a chance to build on my social skills, and go from there.

I didn't put the volunteer work down on my application as it was an online application and only gave you spaces for jobs you had. My way of thinking is if they called, I could tell them about the volunteering. I was able to speak to someone at Walmart who seemed impressed I did some volunteering. I am going to call them back today and get an update.

What sort of volunteer work did you do? Do you have any special interests and unique knowledge or skills? What are the characteristics of an ideal job for you?

If you describe these, maybe someone here might be able to suggest other types of jobs to pursue that you might not have thought of.

I suppose the worst case scenario is you could make a plan to get a job doing anything, fast food, janitorial whatever, in order to build up some recent job history and use that as a stepping stone to a better job. Obviously when doing this sort of thing, you need to plan it out a little. You don't want to fall into doing a job you hate, but you just keep doing it because it's easier than getting another job. You should set out with a plan to get one job and plan to move to another job in 6 months or a year.

Hope this helps,

Lars

I volunteer with a weekly Autism group, but am in the process of moving to a bigger volunteer job at my local branch of The Arc, though that will require their Board of Directors approval. Not sure what that job will entail just yet.

I am excellent with computers. I am a quick learn on anything. I pick things up very quickly, but may need to ask a couple questions as I put it to memory. Once I get things to memory, I am fast at my job. I get my work done quickly, to get onto the next thing.

My ideal job? Well, I want to be a DJ, the guy on the radio. I have since I was 6. But the radio business has become nothing but computers. A person in Omaha can do what is called voicetracking (recording a shift and sending it to another station) a shift at a station in Pittsburgh and people don't know. It sounds like someone is there, but they aren't. Saves money, but cuts down on quality...and people. So, my dream job is going away to computers quickly. I have actually giving up on that dream, but that is for another post.

-Dude From VA

So what about doing a podcast? It's more unpaid work, but if done well, it can give you experience that may be valuable in future work. I have a couple of friends who do a weekly podcast on politics and that has been picked up by in internet radio station and they are trying to get picked up by an over the air local station here in L.A.

Since so many industries are using computers for all kinds of things, your skill with them could be quite valuable. If you are good at dealing with OS level stuff; networking, storage integrity, network services etc, you can look for work in a wide range of industries. I work in film and video production and currently we are shooting a huge amount of stills and video which have to be cataloged and backed up. My point is that there is a need for people who can work with large volumes of media or data and make sure that it stays available and safely backed up. I don't know if a local radio station would have this sort of need, but I'm sure that plenty of companies would. Certainly networks that distribute programs to local stations or stream media on the internet would.

You might try identifying 5 industries that you think might be interesting to work in and then do a bit of research as to what their likely IT needs might be. Look at where your skill are and see where you might be able to fit in. Identify who the people are that you would need to contact about getting a job. (The business section of a library often will have reference books on businesses that sometimes even list the specific individual you need to talk to. And web sites often list this information) Create a list of as many companies as you can. Try a few calls and expect to make a few mistakes. If no one is hiring, ask if they can recommend a company. Be polite and friendly.

For a time, I was pursuing work as a commercial photographer. This can be very hard work to get. It helped that I'm a pretty good photographer, but that would have meant nothing if I hadn't done the above work. I looked up the art directors of a number of magazines, I sent them promotional material and then, most importantly, I called them. Some times I was only able to leave a message on voice mail. Other times I talked briefly with someone. At any rate, the ONLY jobs I ever got were from magazines where I had CALLED the art director. And I made some mistakes. I still am embarrassed by my call to "Rolling Stone"

In the end it was this need to keep selling myself for every job that made me prefer to do other work, but if you are not looking for freelance work, you can do the calls at least enough to get one job. It is hard, I know. But it can be done.

I think the key to getting through this is to break the problem of researching, calling and interviewing down into small chunks. Do as much as you can every day, but don't get yourself overwhelmed. Don't think you have to do everything at once. If you do a little every day, each individual part of the problem becomes manageable and over time you can accomplish a lot.

Back to the issue about radio. You write that "But the radio business has become nothing but computers." One point I would like to make about that: Yes, computers have become very important to the radio industry as they have in almost every other industry. Digital cameras have taken over in still photography and film production. But this doesn't change the need to create good content. It has only de-centralized where a lot of production is done. This is both good and bad, depending on your outlook.

What I'm trying to say is that the radio business is NOT "nothing but computers" They still need to create content the same as they always did. They just use different tools. Much of the smaller, local broadcasts have disappeared and podcasts have filled that space in the market. This can be made to work to your advantage if you pursue it.

It can be very hard for an Aspie to get noticed and to work their way up in an industry. Usually it's the person who makes a lot of noise and schmoozes with people who can get the jobs easily. Maybe you are not going to climb a job ladder as quickly as that sort of person, but you can work at getting a job somehow connected with a radio station. This at least puts you into contact with people who could hire you as a DJ. Think of it as a way of getting from one job to another, not as a single big jump to your dream job.

I always hated the idea of having to start at the bottom and climb my way up to the next job. The socializing and selling of myself was more than I felt I could handle, but I could deal with some of it. I don't have the job that I wanted to have at this point in my life, but I do have a good job in a large part because I did figure out what I was good at and I made the occasional effort to let people know about it.

I hope some of this is helpful.

Good luck,

Lars