<p>This young man graduated from a highly regarded school with a GPA slightly under 3.0, worked for almost a year in a good job related to his major, then got caught in a massive layoff in late 2011. Since then, he has not been able to find anything in his field. He does have a very part-time virtual job. There always seemed to be something pending but they all just disappear without a word (ex. was told in December that he did great on a phone tech screen and they wanted him to come to the office in January; no word or response to followups in January). He was turned down for grad school despite stellar GPA’s, probably because he didn’t have undergrad research or anything much to show since college. He’s been through all the networking he can drum up.</p>
<p>So he’s back home and trying to figure out a new career path. But without the pertinent education or experience, how does he get there? Where does he even start? Community college? Adult university? Online courses? Where can you learn subjects like data analysis or Quickbooks? He’s extremely bright and a good worker; strongest in areas like math and analysis. But will anyone really hire him with only something like a certificate and no recent experience?</p>
<p>I am confused. What his GPA slightly under 3.0, or “stellar”? You said both, but maybe I am not understanding.</p>
<p>QuickBooks is accounting software. Without accounting skills, I am not sure how much good it would do to learn it. It also tends to be small business software (do-it-yourself for small business owners). So not sure how it would lead to a job.</p>
<p>Does he have a LinkedIn profile? Has he linked with older students from his college, his peers and bosses from the company where he was laid off, and others he has met during his job search? If not, he should do that right away.</p>
<p>It sounds like he has a college degree and some work experience – I am not sure CC is the right route for him now. You don’t say what his major was, might get better suggestions if you are more specific. </p>
<p>He might try working through temp agencies – sometimes that leads to job offers. It might allow him to continue to leverage the skills he used in his job before he was laid off.</p>
<p>Sorry, GRE was stellar. Undergrad GPA was not.</p>
<p>He is on LinkedIn and other online sites recommended by a recruiter. He has tried connecting with alumni, former coworkers, college internship bosses, connections of a relative who’s a recruiter, and more. He’s signed up with temp agencies; no callbacks there. Best recent leads were consulting companies but they are the ones that were so encouraging in December and absent in January. Major was computer science. He thinks he could work with numbers - manipulating, analyzing, etc. Also very good at picking up new software.</p>
<p>He’s not really sure what else he could do other than programming, which is just not happening. Some kind of desk job using a computer; there are lots of admin type postings on Craigslist for people who know Quickbooks which is why it’s a consideration.</p>
<p>Just a random out there thought, I work for an insurance MGA and it’s a good jump off point for a career for someone who is stuck and just wants an office job-- people like your friend are what a lot of our new hires are. Most of the people who are hired there are new or recent grads from all different disciplines, some find out they really like insurance and stick around, others move on after a year or two. Being an MGA is nice because it’s not sales, it’s not commission, I am salaried and am not responsible for making sales. I just decide what is a good risk and what isn’t, what company to place the risk with, and how much do I want to charge. We are always hiring and we have had an open position that we CANNOT fill and it’s been two years. We need focused, detail oriented people who can sit at a computer and focus on minute details all day long (like a programmer?) and process vast amounts of information without getting confused or making mistakes. We are professional analyzers. Not everybody can do it. But if you can, it’s a good place to start a career and easy to get your foot in the door, because almost nobody majors in insurance-- we take people from all disciplines. We have a joke, “it doesn’t matter what you major in, you are just going to end up in insurance anyway!” My boss has no degree, I majored in political science, and we also have a communications major, a retail management major, an actuarial sciences major, a psych major, and an english major. We don’t care what your degree is in, if you have the skills we will teach you.</p>
<p>I have been considering getting into something different and was considering computer science, your friend’s position concerns me!</p>
<p>He should make an appointment with the Career Counselors at the closest community college, and find out what quick programs they have available, and ask about specific job placement. Our CC has a number of programs offered through the Workforce Development and Continuing Education division, some of which flat-out guarantee jobs (entry-level healthcare and apartment maintenance) or all-but guarantee jobs (pharmacy tech and computer tech). At least this would give him a sense of opportunities.</p>
<p>Things are tough out there. Good luck to both of you!</p>
<p>We are in the Boston area and I know of a number of young people who have moved here for greater employment opportunities - and it has worked out for them.</p>
<p>Not saying he should move to Boston, but – it is definitely easier to find jobs in some cities than in others.</p>
<p>Temp agencies should help. Linkedin is the way most jobs are showing up these days, not sites like Monster. He should be sure to join some groups on LinkedIn, especially related to his field. Has he worked with anyone at his “highly regarded college”? They should care about helping him and have the staff to do that. They may also use a particular website that posts jobs that only they list. Be should to look there.</p>
<p>A big concern you mentioned is this: he graduated in 2011 in computer science and still hasn’t had a job? at least part time jobs? He should be sure to keep his resume current and a part time job says something about him. Is he getting too fussy about finding a job that’s beneath him? He’s not going to post his salary on his resume, so even if he’s only getting minimum wage, that’s better than nothing.</p>
<p>Last comment: my son also struggles. He too did not graduate with a job and has had lots of struggles finding something. The process of finding a job has been a process, and I say that sadly. He had no concept of what’s involved when he started, but his first shock was when he had to make a phone call to someone he didn’t know as a follow-up about a job. (He nearly threw up and he was only hoping to get a job as a driver for an elderly man.) Previously, he had only been a student and he knew how to do well there, but work is much less predictable. Over time, he has discovered how hard it is to do well, to keep a boss happy, to be a self-starter, and problem solver. We celebrate every day that he feels successful because it’s been a long process. A very long process for him.</p>
<p>He could try registering with as many temporary/staffing agencies as he can. The goal isn’t necessarily to get the job he wants right off the bat, but to get any position that can help him eventually get to where he wants to be. </p>
<p>A lot of software companies need people to help with implementations – technical consultants, project managers, etc. Being young and not tied down can be an asset if you are available to travel to client sites. Medical software and higher education software are two industries I’m fairly familiar with that seem to be hiring.</p>
<p>I think the goal to start with might be to find any full time office type job he can. When I was job hunting in 2011, I actually came across postings that said not to apply if you were unemployed. I know people with large full time employment gaps, or young people who have never really had a job and have been out of school for a while, is a big red flag. Having a respectable full time job, any job, will make it easier to find one he really wants. </p>
<p>And in terms of programming, is he just looking at software companies? Because I know we have programmers in the IT department at my insurance company, and my fiance works at a bank and they have programmers there, too. Where is he looking to find opportunities? How many resumes is he sending out in a week? Is he only submitting resumes for open positions, or is he sending his resume out to any company that looks interesting?</p>
<p>I have to wonder if he has gotten discouraged and maybe isn’t trying as hard as he could be. That is a really long time to be essentially unemployed, for a young educated person who wants to work.</p>
<p>He did have a job in a giant corporation for about a year; was still in training level when the layoff came so no transferable experience. He did get a short-term holiday stocking job. His virtual job is formatting text et al into web pages for an online education website. He’s been in discussion with his college career center but they aren’t very good at returning calls/emails.</p>
<p>I’ll suggest he contact the nearby CC to discuss their programs, adding more temp agencies and following up on the ones he’s registered with, and looking for any kind of office job.</p>
<p>He’s looking at all sorts of companies and submitting resumes but his application is not being selected by the screening software at this point. My impression is that mass applications without a connection are highly unlikely to get a resume looked at. Big problem getting past that “big red flag”.</p>
<p>Are you sure his “training year” didn’t include employable skills? He might be blowing that off and not really mining that experience for something he could put on his resume. A lot of young people don’t have much perspective on what is valuable in the workplace, so might overlook something he could add to his resume from that period.</p>
<p>Also… those resume filters are looking for certain words. He should be sure he lists every tool, language, etc. he has used someplace in his resume (I used to have a section at the end of mine where I said “Also have experience with blah, blah, and blah.” Just to get the words in. Again… some young people think if they are not complete experts they should list something. But if he took a class in Java – it should be listed in a section like that. Etc.</p>
<p>I agree with intparent. My S learned to customize the resume for the position for which he was applying. He would use the ad then make sure to incorporate the words/terms/skills desired used in the ad in both the cover letter and the resume. It was time consuming, but he got more responses when he did that. As was noted, the filters look for key words.
Can’t just send out a stock resume.</p>
<p>And a year working even in training mode is still a year working. He has to be creative when discussing it. He should not be dismissive of it. He had to be learning and getting experience in “something”. Now he needs to put that in written words.</p>
<p>My first year at my job they had me doing the DUMBEST stuff. 90% of my job literally consisted of formatting text in excel spreadsheets-- bold this cell, italicize that one, color this red, etc. My eyes would literally glaze over and cross while I was doing it-- I could work with my eyes shut it was so mind numbing. Then when I was done formatting all the data, I had a summary sheet for each report that listed all the counties in all the states we write insurance in for that contract that listed the limit we were allowed to write there, and I had to copy and paste the numbers from the data onto that summary sheet. Copy, paste, copy, paste, copy, paste, bold, italicize, copy, paste… ZZZZZZZZ. I think I could have actually trained a monkey to do it. I was the dead bottom of the ladder in the company, below the bottom, the receptionist was being paid better than I was.</p>
<p>I still managed to make it sound pretty decent when I was applying to move to another department. There were still some skills learned, I became extremely proficient in Microsoft Office (excel in particular) and in the software we were using to run the reports I was working on, I became an expert on data entry (I did 30 some reports each month some of which with over 5,000 entries), I was doing quite a bit of data analysis by the end of it when I had to compile reports for the executives to take on their trips, and I’d also changed the procedures quite a bit for how I did things in order to streamline. I had some stats like I had reduced the number of errors per report from an average of 200 to fewer than 5, I reduced the average time to complete all of the reports for the month from 30-40 days to 2-4 days, etc, etc. I became proficient in the concepts and terms used in the industry. You do have to get creative.</p>
<p>I have a “skills” section of my resume that I tailor for each job and list anything that could be applicable. I also tend to remove skills that aren’t applicable to focus on ones that are, because I know when my boss looks at a resume if she sees a lot that makes her think you aren’t really interested in THIS job, she hesitates.</p>
<p>He’s had lots of professional critique (including recruiters) on the resume; there is a large portion on the “real” job and has tweaked other portions. Probably all applicable key words are in there. He’s been self-studying different programming skills but isn’t yet confident enough to add those to the resume. Soon I hope!</p>
<p>If he is self studying the languages, have him put “some training in blah, blah, blah”. He can crash study in the couple of weeks before the job starts if he gets one based on that!</p>
<p>Sounds like what’s holding him back is his confidence. That’s why I think he should pursue some part time jobs. Take on two or three. He’ll have a better sense of the kind of boss that he’d like to work with and the kind of office. Most importantly, he’ll start to see his value.</p>