I watched a BBC news piece this morning about the state of the job of the market. This did not fill me with a lot of confidence, especially when it came to us that are of a..certain age. I have applied for approximately 46 jobs in the last few months. In at least one instance I received the feedback that I had "too much experience". This was code for either "I am scared you might take my job away" or "Nope you are too old and we want to hire a young gun". Maybe I am doing that particular employer a disservice. A lot of the people in that BBC vox pop mention the companies will go the younger option. They see employing someone older as too risky. I watched a documentary last night about an unemployment office in Cardiff. I did not watch most of the program. I am trying not to depress my self any more than I am. Yet they were interviewing a woman and asking her to prove that she has spent "35 hours a week looking for a job". In other words every waking moment of her poor life she was to be actively looking for work!
This got me thinking about the last time I had a prolonged spell of unemployment which was in the early '90s. I had left University with a Sociology degree that was not worth the paper it's written on. I was 22 years old and I did not have scooby about what I wanted in life. In those more enlightened days, the council contributed rent. I could afford to live in Edinburgh and look for work. I thought I would take a couple of months "gap" and enjoy life in Edinburgh. I was used to living with no money, so being on the dole was no great hardship for me. I was sharing a flat with some like-minded people I had gone to University with. I was poor but happy. I got on with unwinding from being a Student layabout to being an Unemployed layabout.
In those early days, I did apply for a few jobs, retail/pub jobs and the rejections came thick and fast. "Overqualified" rejection was common. The only pub job I applied for was down to the fact that my only experience was on the other side of the bar. I had once collected glasses at University for about an hour. ( I did not mention that this had not ended well. I dropped my stack of glasses after stumbling over a drunk individual who was sitting on the floor. For the next two years or so I remained unemployed. I got used to having no money, lived a very frugal life. What money I did have I spent on cheap cider and rolling around at punk rock gigs. My lifestyle was not healthy, what few photographs I have of me at that time is me looking unwell. I was living on pasta, veg, and cheap booze. I went from being a reasonable happy to disillusionment with ever getting a real job.
The dole every 6 months would ask me in for an update, and they would encourage me to do training. I did these courses as they offered an extra 10 quid on top of your dole. It got the dole off your back as well which was an added bonus. The courses were run by people who were less than suitable. While some of the people on the courses were even more dubious. I remember being on a SQL course, the leader of which was a woman who spent more time talking about her belly dancing. She was also seemed to be only one page ahead of us in the SQL book we were all plodding our way through. The training room was something from the dystopian 1970's sci-fi film. The recreation/break room was full of people smoking industrial-strength cigarettes. It was the 90's you could smoke indoors.
Another of these training courses was a little bit better. It was a Media and Desktop publishing course. 6-8 weeks of learning how to write for newspapers using DTP tools. There was also some radio production training which I loved. The group that giving the training tried very hard. Some of the people there had great connections within the local media. We all got the chance to write a "Social Action" piece for the Edinburgh Evening News. Write a film review for one of the local free papers. This was the beginning and end of my dream of being a Film Critic. The opus I went to see was "Splitting Heirs" by then fading comic star Eric Idle. My initial submission of "That's an hour and a bit of my life I am not getting back" was rejected. My second attempt was 200 words of plot exposition of rampant racism and sexism in the film. I also got to sit in on a Radio Forth radio show. Well, I sat in a cupboard next to the studio and answered the occasional phone message. There was also a stint on the Festival FM. A radio station that had a limited broadcast during the Edinburgh Fringe. It allowed me and Mike ( another guy on the same course) to blag a press accreditation for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Long story short we rocked up the Festival press office and said we worked for the Festival FM. We waved a letter typed up by some random harassed Film and Media student at Festival FM. It more or less said, "Brian is a volunteer reviewer at Festival FM, please give him a press ticket to your show". The young girl on the desk was none the wiser and gave a press pass. We were not supposed to have this as we were only volunteers but she was not to know this. All she heard was 'radio station' and 'worked at'. STAMP.. here is your official Festival press card. This did lead to many drunken adventures in various press rooms( they venues like their press reviewers well greased-the amount for free booze was incredible) I did not see daylight for about two weeks, and I suspect some serious damage to my poor liver. All the rubbing shoulders with the great and good of the media luvvies made me consider a career in the media. This was soon crushed after a rather sozzled discussion with someone who worked a certain very large public-owned broadcaster. This individual told me getting a gig in the media was a matter of luck and knowing the right person to talk to. This theory did seem to hold some water. I did apply for some media jobs found myself rejected quite quick but politely. There were better candidates, who knew the right person.
After a couple of years, the dole office was seeing me as a lost cause. In one last great hurrah, they sent me to Napier University to see if could get on Msc course Multi Media technology. CD Roms were all the rage. These applications need to be created! The course, which was in the first of its kind in Scotland needed some guinea pigs. That guinea pig turned out to be a lot of people who were long term unemployed and need a new set of skills. I blagged the interview and that was me for a year. I am eternally grateful to that course, even if it was a bit of a car crash. The people running the course were not sure of where we actually should be- Creative media or software engineering? While we were there I am not sure they managed to crack that conundrum. Still, I somehow managed to come away with an MSc and a fairly good understanding of how computer programs work and the process of making them. This did, after a few false starts that included working Edinburgh City Council as a data inputter. An ill-fated return to Stirling Uni to learn Java Programming, lead me to a good career in Sofware Testing.
This got me thinking about the last time I had a prolonged spell of unemployment which was in the early '90s. I had left University with a Sociology degree that was not worth the paper it's written on. I was 22 years old and I did not have scooby about what I wanted in life. In those more enlightened days, the council contributed rent. I could afford to live in Edinburgh and look for work. I thought I would take a couple of months "gap" and enjoy life in Edinburgh. I was used to living with no money, so being on the dole was no great hardship for me. I was sharing a flat with some like-minded people I had gone to University with. I was poor but happy. I got on with unwinding from being a Student layabout to being an Unemployed layabout.
In those early days, I did apply for a few jobs, retail/pub jobs and the rejections came thick and fast. "Overqualified" rejection was common. The only pub job I applied for was down to the fact that my only experience was on the other side of the bar. I had once collected glasses at University for about an hour. ( I did not mention that this had not ended well. I dropped my stack of glasses after stumbling over a drunk individual who was sitting on the floor. For the next two years or so I remained unemployed. I got used to having no money, lived a very frugal life. What money I did have I spent on cheap cider and rolling around at punk rock gigs. My lifestyle was not healthy, what few photographs I have of me at that time is me looking unwell. I was living on pasta, veg, and cheap booze. I went from being a reasonable happy to disillusionment with ever getting a real job.
The dole every 6 months would ask me in for an update, and they would encourage me to do training. I did these courses as they offered an extra 10 quid on top of your dole. It got the dole off your back as well which was an added bonus. The courses were run by people who were less than suitable. While some of the people on the courses were even more dubious. I remember being on a SQL course, the leader of which was a woman who spent more time talking about her belly dancing. She was also seemed to be only one page ahead of us in the SQL book we were all plodding our way through. The training room was something from the dystopian 1970's sci-fi film. The recreation/break room was full of people smoking industrial-strength cigarettes. It was the 90's you could smoke indoors.
Another of these training courses was a little bit better. It was a Media and Desktop publishing course. 6-8 weeks of learning how to write for newspapers using DTP tools. There was also some radio production training which I loved. The group that giving the training tried very hard. Some of the people there had great connections within the local media. We all got the chance to write a "Social Action" piece for the Edinburgh Evening News. Write a film review for one of the local free papers. This was the beginning and end of my dream of being a Film Critic. The opus I went to see was "Splitting Heirs" by then fading comic star Eric Idle. My initial submission of "That's an hour and a bit of my life I am not getting back" was rejected. My second attempt was 200 words of plot exposition of rampant racism and sexism in the film. I also got to sit in on a Radio Forth radio show. Well, I sat in a cupboard next to the studio and answered the occasional phone message. There was also a stint on the Festival FM. A radio station that had a limited broadcast during the Edinburgh Fringe. It allowed me and Mike ( another guy on the same course) to blag a press accreditation for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Long story short we rocked up the Festival press office and said we worked for the Festival FM. We waved a letter typed up by some random harassed Film and Media student at Festival FM. It more or less said, "Brian is a volunteer reviewer at Festival FM, please give him a press ticket to your show". The young girl on the desk was none the wiser and gave a press pass. We were not supposed to have this as we were only volunteers but she was not to know this. All she heard was 'radio station' and 'worked at'. STAMP.. here is your official Festival press card. This did lead to many drunken adventures in various press rooms( they venues like their press reviewers well greased-the amount for free booze was incredible) I did not see daylight for about two weeks, and I suspect some serious damage to my poor liver. All the rubbing shoulders with the great and good of the media luvvies made me consider a career in the media. This was soon crushed after a rather sozzled discussion with someone who worked a certain very large public-owned broadcaster. This individual told me getting a gig in the media was a matter of luck and knowing the right person to talk to. This theory did seem to hold some water. I did apply for some media jobs found myself rejected quite quick but politely. There were better candidates, who knew the right person.
After a couple of years, the dole office was seeing me as a lost cause. In one last great hurrah, they sent me to Napier University to see if could get on Msc course Multi Media technology. CD Roms were all the rage. These applications need to be created! The course, which was in the first of its kind in Scotland needed some guinea pigs. That guinea pig turned out to be a lot of people who were long term unemployed and need a new set of skills. I blagged the interview and that was me for a year. I am eternally grateful to that course, even if it was a bit of a car crash. The people running the course were not sure of where we actually should be- Creative media or software engineering? While we were there I am not sure they managed to crack that conundrum. Still, I somehow managed to come away with an MSc and a fairly good understanding of how computer programs work and the process of making them. This did, after a few false starts that included working Edinburgh City Council as a data inputter. An ill-fated return to Stirling Uni to learn Java Programming, lead me to a good career in Sofware Testing.
So what how do I job hunt in 2020. I sit in front of a computer pressing F5 on my email box. I think you know what decade I liked the most.....
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