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My husband was laid off after 30 years with a large corporation. He is 57 years old. Has anyone else found themselves in this situation? How are you coping? Can people find jobs at this age? Has anyone actually done so? I would love to hear your experience. What about support groups - even for spouses of unemployed men. Do any exist? I live in Braintree. This is all new territory - and I must say, rather frightening. Thanks for any feedback you might have.
What is his line of work?
Edit: Sorry I hit enter too soon.
What is his line of work, is it something he could conceivably do consulting work in? My husband is presently making a pretty penny doing IT consulting work on the side.
My 57 yr old father, lost a executive-level technical position due to corporate mergers nearly 10 years ago (can't blame the current economy). This was a tough thing for a guy that had worked steadily since his first paper-route as a 10 yr old. Pop thought he would be picked up by a competing company, but in the end, it didn't happen.
However, due to his reputation in his area of expertise, he ended up consulting, both domestically and internationally, occasionally acting as an 'expert witness' for attorneys.
Consulting doesn't offer a routine paycheck and one does need to budget carefully. If your husband has any technical skill, he may be able to do ok. Encourage your husband to join his professional organizations and continue membership, attending the conferences in order to network. Put together a simple, professional website & business card to hand out.
A recruiter friend tells me that 80% of all work is obtained through networks. Best of luck!
p.s.
Pop still consults if anyone needs an expert in high voltage arresters and capacitors!
I agree that consulting may be the way to go. My father-in-law did that for awhile and found it lucrative, although the downside was that their health insurance was extremely expensive. However, your husband might be able to get COBRA coverage at a reduced rate due to his layoff. He should check with his former employer's HR manager if they didn't share this information already.
Get on the internet and start researching gov't-sponsored training, etc. programs. The Dept of Labor is tossing a LOT of dough at states to help pay for benefits and programs.
more ideas: network by getting profiles out of professional sites like LinkedIn (even facebook is great just to get back in touch with folks...you never know where that opportunity might be!), if he's a college grad contact the college and see if they offer any services. Having been laid off myself several years ago, i'd say it's also very helpful to stay busy: dedicate some time and volunteer somewhere - it's good for the soul and not a bad way to network!
Network, network, network. Call your friends, professional acquaintances, and business competitors. Call your old company and see if they will hire you on as a consultant, (many companies do this, because its cheaper in many ways than a full time hire), put your resume on line.
Create the resume on their site, it works it's way thru the various questions as you're going thru it. Make sure he randomly checks Massachusetts for jobs on there, also other states close by. The last quarter of the year is coming up, that' s when a LOT of interesting jobs get posted on this site. Benefits and pay raises to boot with government jobs. You have to be quick when he sees something interesting that he'd like, print up the whole job description and the HOW TO APPLY is very important because it can be tricky. Make sure to follow all their instructions, they can be butes with their different forms they need you to send, in fact, they're famous for all the forms they have you do, just make sure all the ones they need are with the resume. If they're not, it' can be a royal pain and you don't find out until after the job closes, which is pretty annoying. The reason why you have to be really quick on the USA JOB site when you see a job that you like, GO for it as soon as you see it, not tomorrow or the next day. They will get say 300 applicants and freeze it at 300, the posting will say they have openings for 100 or 150. They take that 300 and cap it off, they take the application down off the site for good and work with what they have, so say you see that the job is CLOSING on such and such a date, well it's a week before that date and the application is GONE, well that's the reason why, they take it down for good once they get there number of applicants they're looking for. Remember that! That's why I'm saying you have to be quick when you see a job posted that you might like....
I worked with a couple of former VP's of companies that ended up getting jobs with the government. Really good $$$ for them within a few years, in fact, they're at that good $$ now and more importantly they got the really good benefits being employed there. NOT jobs that they ever thought they'd like, have or want, BUT they enjoy their new field now after getting axed the way they did in their previous jobs. Things worked out in the end for them, which was SO good to hear. A few we know go back and forth to DC a lot for various classes. NOT something I would want, but then again, they wanted people with Accounting degrees and masters degrees and all that with this particular job posting; not the BA or any of the other degrees. They strictly wanted accounting and masters degrees with this particular type of position they had on that site. A lot of interesting jobs on this site get posted over the last quarter and in to the first quarter of the following year, so remember that. Also, it's ALL walks of life, believe me, I know, it's all people up and down the corporate ladder that work there, you have NO idea how many former VP's are in there working away now, TONS of various people up and down the ladder! Wonderfully hard working ones too I might add, sitting right beside and near the Joe & Janey Smoe from Idaho to boot!
He also just has to sit back and chill for a while and grasp this huge issue! Because I'll tell you one thing, it's "attitude", if you have it you have it and if you don't? It's noticable, believe me, is it ever noticable!
Make sure you tell him that there's a LOT of us over 55 in the same exact boat, believe me there's a LOT of us now. "Networking" absolutely helps quite a bit. I find you get a lot of the quick jobs that last a few weeks or months thru networking and thru friends, there's NO doubt about that one.
I just heard this good news the other day with some one I worked with....
Continental Airlines is hiring. I heard of this manager I worked with in my former company that got a permanent full time job with them recently. He flies for nothing and so does his family. He got an apartment in New Jersey and where he flies for zippo he gets home all the time on weekends and his family flies there a lot of times where it's free. It's not a bad idea....it's working out for him & his family, all around. I was happy to hear that one after what he went thru with the company we were in and what they did to him.
You have to think OUT of the box and also yes, consulting is a really good way to start too.
Good luck with it all. Hey, some of us took the dancing shoes off and got off the stage for the young ones and some got booted off that stage, but we're still here in the background needing jobs big time!
One of the companies I worked in will ONLY hire the older worker! They said they would rather because we have better work ethics! That was kind of nice to hear. Hey, they were right, we do have good work ethics, don't we though! I enjoyed working there, but they weren't hiring permanents at all and I don't do 'temp' any more.
Last edited by CityGirl52; 09-20-2009 at 11:06 PM..
Absolutely--don't rule out consulting for you're old firm. Surprise, surprise. The company that let my Pop go gave him a call a few years later. Don't burn bridges.
I agree on volunteering; nothing is more depressing than being cooped up at home know your friends are working, and it is still networking. Personally, I find posting a resume on general job boards to be a useless (monster, careerbuilder, etc) maybe professional associations are better.
Absolutely--don't rule out consulting for you're old firm. Surprise, surprise. The company that let my Pop go gave him a call a few years later. Don't burn bridges.
I agree on volunteering; nothing is more depressing than being cooped up at home know your friends are working, and it is still networking. Personally, I find posting a resume on general job boards to be a useless (monster, careerbuilder, etc) maybe professional associations are better.
Good luck.
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