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Start by being outgoing. Try talking to anyone and everyone you meet. No matter where you go.
Networking is crucial.
I guarantee that you will meet someone looking to hire someone soon.
Most jobs are not posted.
Networking? Yeah I agree, but do you know how many people I know who works for the government and has never helped me get a job. I guess folks think you will come and take their jobs or something Idk, but it has gotten ugly out here.
Yes, I'm also in the same situation. Looking for another permanent position while doing freelance work for a former colleague's company.
You didn't say what kind of jobs you're looking for or your experience level, but if you are in DC, I would check out some of the agencies that place people in quasi-substantive temporary positions in the area. I saw a posting today for a four-month position assisting in a government relations department (entry-level, so if that's not you, it's probably not applicable).
DC is very difficult right now, despite all of the news articles claiming this is one of the best markets in the country. This is the over-educated, over-qualified capital of the world right now and the competition is very intense.
Thank you and it is difficult. I wish folks would stop saying that we have the strongest job market, that is so not true. Our UE rate is at 10% now.
DC is very difficult right now, despite all of the news articles claiming this is one of the best markets in the country. This is the over-educated, over-qualified capital of the world right now and the competition is very intense.
This is true. I live in the DC area and I have been getting interviews for the past few months, but no job offers. It really hurts as being a recent December 2009 college grad trying to get a first job. Interviewers for "real jobs" really don't care. The whole interview process is based on superficialities to a large extent. They expect a heightened level of "professionalism" from 20 and early 30 somethings. This means you always have to dress nice and conservatively and speak like you are also a 45 year old CEO with decades of corporate experience. Interviewers are also usually very condescending and unforgiving towards someone with little professional work experience. The DC area is also ultra conservative and they look at young folks, or people who even look young, as being lazy entitled unemployable members of the scarlet letter wearing "Generation Y". However, there are many young folks out in here in the DC area that got jobs immediately after graduating college and don't even know there is a deep ugly recession going on. This is because the DC area is all about connections. If you don't have any connections out here, you are on the outside looking in. But sadly, this is the case everywhere. You need to be lucky to make it these days. People who established themselves in careers in good times years ago don't understand. I know people who graduated right before the brunt of the economic downturn in early 2007 who were able to establish themselves in secure high paying government jobs before things got really bad. Everyone I know who has graduated after about May 2008 is either chronically unemployed or under employed.
But trust me, the employment situation in other places is much worse than the DC area. I am from San Francisco, originally, and I moved in with my mother's side of the family over there for a few months last year trying to find a job. You can't even get a job at McDonald's in the Bay Area if you can't speak fluent Chinese and or Spanish. The uber-liberal Bay Area, that is packed to the nostrils with immigrants from Asia and Latin America, doesn't believe that people should have to learn English in America. I wasn't getting ANY interviews out there. At least here in the DC area, I get about one interview a month. In fact, I have a job interview in NoVa this Thursday. Poverty is much more visible in the Bay and California as well. It's a sad situation in California. I never left the house at night for fear of being robbed when I was back home in the Bay last year. People who aren't rich in the Bay don't dress as nice as even ghetto kids in DC. Ghetto kids in DC wear authentic Prada, Purple Label, Gucci and have every pair of Jordans and Nikes from the past 20 years. The mall in the town where I live in Maryland is packed with cars and people buying expensive things every weekend like its Christmas! I'm glad I moved back to Maryland because money is much more distributed throughout the entire population out here in comparison to California. There is money out here and a lot of it, we just have to find a way into the party so to speak and get out of the cold.
It is rough out here. You are not alone. Rarely in American history have the odds been stacked so high against people who have "done all the right things" by going to school and getting educational credentials. But American higher education has become an insanely expensive institution dedicated to teaching young adults nothing but how to binge drink and party everyday. College is now also more expensive than ever. Most college grads took out massive loans to finance their educations. It doesn't help that most employers will check your credit score before deciding to hire you. All of the recently unemployed and underemployed college grads who don't have Mommy and Daddy to pick up hefty monthly payments of hundreds or even thousands of dollars will be forever scarred with the scrawling of "Bad Credit" written across their forehead like a scary looking jailhouse tattoo. Also, nowadays, even a single immature drunken Facebook posting or photo tagging that someone else posted of you can bar you from employment or get you fired from your current gig. Sad days...
Last edited by goldenchild08; 02-28-2011 at 06:50 PM..
I feel your pain, goldenchild, I really do. It sounds like I'm a bit older than you, but I'm having the same problems. My field is so oversaturated right now that it's not even funny. For at least 3 of the jobs I've interviewed for, I got beaten out by someone with 20+ years of experience (I have less than 10). Personally, I can't believe I'm competing with people with 20+ years of experience - in normal times, we definitely wouldn't be applying for the same types of jobs.
I'm 28. It took me six years to complete college because I was busy taking remedial courses at the local community college early in my higher education career because I had poor grades in high school. I also didn't go to college right away after graduating high school either. But I figured that going to school was the right thing to do because I didn't want to work in a warehouse at $8 an hour for the rest of my life. And this was in 2002-03 back when most ignorant self-involved Americans weren't predicting the global economic meltdown that we are currently experiencing today. I never liked school. But I still managed to attain a Bachelor's degree right around the same time such a merit rapidly declined in value. I also worked one to two part time or full time jobs during my entire school career and took a year off of school before transferring to a four year school with a good national reputation. But my story is not uncommon. It takes most students an average of six years to attain a Bachelor's degree these days. The few people who enter college and actually finish do it in about this same frame of time.
I have significant internship experience but I also can't compete with people who have 20 years experience in my field who have prestigious portfolios who are willing to work for entry level wages. But I believe that if I stay here in the DC area and fatten up my portfolio, I'll maybe eventually land something. But it's a gamble for everybody these days to say the least. My pipe dream has always been to move to NYC, but you have to take extensive personality tests just to work at a McDonald's in NYC. I couldn't imagine a job market more competitive than the Big Apple. Not to mention you have to shell out $1,000 a month just to live in the projects in the worst neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York and hear sirens and gunshots all night and be scared to even walk to the train at night.
Last edited by goldenchild08; 02-28-2011 at 10:56 PM..
DC Conservative? Hardly, it will be even worst once Obama is out of here (2012)
D.C. might vote Democratic. But the way corporate DC acts, talks, dresses and moves is highly conservative. DC is the nation's capital. Because of this, the way grown up professionals conduct themselves must be very conservative. Do you think anyone would take America seriously if Senators were lazy video game playing, trampoline bouncing pot heads like some of the employees at highly successful yet laid back California technonolgy/web firms in Silicon Valley? Hell no.
People with real money and influence in DC work solely to preserve their own interests and truly don't care about anybody else; which is what conservatives do. I guess it might be because I'm from the exact opposite side of the spectrum. I'm from the most liberal city in America: San Francisco. Even people who work in the most corporate white collar jobs in SF aren't as uptight and conservative as some DC folks. In SF, there are 40 year old White CEOs who skateboard and smoke weed everyday. This is unheard of in DC. Most, if not all, government jobs require that their employees have no type of criminal record and haven't even smelled weed in years. The professionalism required in most DC careers is based completely in conservative fashion and beliefs. Unlike SF, there are no heavily tattooed employees at prestigious firms in DC. DC is all about wearing business attire at all times and always having a game face on. Northwest DC is a sea of dress shoes and slacks, oxfords and suits all year round. Not everyone walking downtown in every big city in America is like this; I hope you aware of this. You can't even sit down to eat at many places in NW DC after a certain time because they have such an uptight conservative dress code. DC is also all about degrees, certifications, income levels and such. DC is also very socially segregated. There isn't any real cross cultural pollination between Blacks and Whites in DC like what exists in NYC and Philly. Although Blacks and Whites may work side by side in government offices, they don't associate with one another once it's time to clock out. If all of this isn't conservative behavior then I don't know what is...
Last edited by goldenchild08; 03-01-2011 at 08:15 PM..
We relocated to North Dakota - the numbers aren't lying. Unemployment here is incredibly low and there are more jobs than there are people. The biggest problem is housing, anyone coming to western North Dakota looking for a job can find one within a couple days, but they're living in a camper or their car. There aren't even hotel rooms available.
The best paying jobs are physically demanding, though. And not like 12 hours working in a shop... you will be working outside no matter how hot or how cold it is. Just as an example, today the high was -1 and after surviving my first North Dakota winter I can honestly say that -1 isn't that cold. A couple days ago it was in the -20's which seems to be pretty common up here. No 12 hours days, either. Often times you will be working 14-20+ hours a day almost entirely outdoors.
That being said, my husband is in his 3rd year in the oil industry and it's not difficult to make 6 figures.
Please forgive me for jumping in but I don't understand why more young people dont get a license. RN, CT Tech, Ultrasound Tech, PT, MD I mean if you really do want a job and youre young for gosh sakes g e t a l i c e n s e !
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