Free Career and Job Search Advice

drmarks23 · Newbie Joined: 27 Feb 2007 Posts: 1 Career Advice: +0/-0

Have you ever been fired? Laid off? Shown the door? Downsized? Well, join the club! So have I – and a large percentage of people in this country.

I’m a(n) (unemployed) writer and journalist who is looking to tell our stories. I want to tell the heartbreaking, surprising, infuriating, and yes, inspiring stories of those of us who have found ourselves out-of-work. How did you feel? What did you do? Did you have help and a good support system? Any false starts or funny anecdotes during your job search? Do you have advice for other people who are panic-stricken about being out of work? Did you land on our feet again? Do you have a story that may inspire others to persevere and keep their hopes up?

Each of us has a unique, personal story that may help others who find themselves in a similar situation. Let’s support them… and each other.

Please contact me. I’m looking forward to talking to you. Thanks.

drm@drdavidmarks.com

safri · Expert Joined: 20 Sep 2006 Posts: 213 Career Advice: +1/-1

So.....let me see this again...you're looking for stories to write about? I'm sorry if I failed to get your message deeply, but I got it on the surface and I am ready to answer.
I can be considered a JOB HOPPER. Not because I fail to deliver my job correctly, but because I get bored easily or have a problem with my work and merrits not being recognized. So I have been laid off at least 4 times up to now, and have left the job (resigned), at least 10 times up to now. I'm 28. Currently working in the advertising field, basically doing spots. I like my job, I'm innovative, and I can say I know my value.
My first time being laid off I have suffered. Of course, the boss didn't agree with my point of view, which I continued to sustain over and over again until I annoyed him enough to kick me off. Did I stop doing that? Nah....I still sustain my pov.
And guess what? I got my current job not by searching, but by being asked for. Smile

) Pretty convenient I guess.

Randy · Posted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 3:10 am Post subject:

Hmmm. Looking for employer #51 at 54 years old. Yep, been fired a few times, had companies close from under me, made some changes that seemed good at the time and for all the right reasons but which proved to be disastrous (in terms of money and "careers," but never in terms of my personal life), lost a couple of great opportunities due to a divorce, and....

Where would you like to start?

Randy · Posted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 3:19 am Post subject:

Gotta add this, and please don't take it as a personal slam against your purpose in all this:

No one gives a damn except those of us who go through it. This country is still believing in and repeating what are nothing more than the echoes of a "work ethic" that died a long time ago and was replaced by a new "business model" in which nothing else is of more importance than coroprate greed and profit. We long ago substituted "education" for "intelligence" and ceased rewarding hard work and integrity and chose mediocrity, compromise, conformity, and capitulation as the standards by which we're all judged and subsequently rewarded, or punished.

The day we took down the "Personnel Manager" sign and replaced it with "Human Resource Manager" was the final nail in the coffin for American workers.

I'm not a damned "resource"!

ank06 · Expert Joined: 20 Sep 2006 Posts: 247 Career Advice: +1/-0

Unfortunately, Randy, you are right about everything and this phenomena is happening all over the world, not only in the US. People over 45 are practically doomed, even here, in France. However, it seems to me that we pay just a little bit more respect to them and the firing conditions tend to eliminate the facor of age....which is good (if we forget that other factors can actually be invoked).
Anyway...employer #51 sounds sad and hopeless....I'm so sorry to hear about something like that. It is amazing we are in 2007 and something like this happens.
I've never been fired. But I quit my job once. Sorry...no such experience from this point of view Smile

Randy · Posted: Sun Mar 04, 2007 4:50 pm Post subject:

[quote="ank06"]

...even here, in France.

Oh, and I gotta tell you that you can count me as one American who's positively sick to death of "us" talking about how much "better" we are than y'all (southwestern VA here, can't escape some of the more enduring aspects of "southern-speak") are in France because we continue to work 40 hours (or more, lots more!) here in the states. Yet we keep right on talking about "all work and no play" and scratching our collective little brains and wondering why everything's going to hell in a handbasket.

Just proof that advancements in technology does not equate into advancements of the human condition.

Anyway...employer #51 sounds sad and hopeless...

It does sound that way, but it's really not. Clearly, I have little use for the advice of the so-called "experts" regarding the "hiring process," but one thing is true: Finding employment is very much like sales in that it's a "number's game" simply because when all is said and done, the person most likely to get hired is the one the potential employer likes the most or, perhaps, dislikes the least. And eventually even someone as cynical as I find that person who "likes" me and I bust my butt for them until the "inetivable" happens and it's time to move on.

I'm so sorry to hear about something like that. It is amazing we are in 2007 and something like this happens.

I appreciate that, very much. I do indeed acknowledge my own culpability for much of this, but things are changing rapidly and so much these days really is beyond the individual's control. And most folks really don't like that feeling of having little control over one's own destiny.

Stay safe over yonder in France!

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