Any tricks to getting hired (schools, colleges, tax)

[DaBurgh]

Just go to website of companies for who you would like to work fill out the general app, right now they won't have an opening, but rest assured in x number of weeks or months they'll pull up your app when there's an opening

[XRiteMA98]

Originally Posted by Hopes

Quite a few of Pittsburgh's major corporations don't advertise open positions anywhere but on their corporate website. U. S. Steel's website currently has a NOC Operations Analyst position listed for Pittsburgh. And PPG has posted 28 IT positions since September, with quite a few posted within the last few weeks. I could go on and on. Tell him to research all area corporations.

PPG has always IT positions. I worked with them - in several depts in IT for 6 years. Great company if you get hired. They are a bit slow in the hiring process, but a great place to work. I applied on line on their website.

[shadowfax]

PITT has quite a few openings in the Tech department.
https://www.pittsource.com/postings/...&commit=Search
It us VERY important to make sure the application is complete or they won't look at it. And have a good resume and cover letter to attach that are highlight your strengths for the job you are trying for. I have also been told it isn't a good idea to apply for more than one position in the same department at the same time.

I have been at Pitt for two months and am pretty pleased about my experience so far. I got my job by applying through their on line application portal which is the only way they will accept applications. It also helped that I had someone on the inside who gave me a recommendation. You should have your Husband apply for as many jobs as he can. Even of they are not his specific area if he has the skill set he should apply. You just never know. And I am in my mid 40's and held my last job in restaurant work for 10 years. So please don't let age or work in an unrelated field make you think you can't get the job you really want.

[Caladium]

Originally Posted by shadowfax

PITT has quite a few openings in the Tech department.
https://www.pittsource.com/postings/...&commit=Search
It us VERY important to make sure the application is complete or they won't look at it. And have a good resume and cover letter to attach that are highlight your strengths for the job you are trying for. I have also been told it isn't a good idea to apply for more than one position in the same department at the same time.

I have been at Pitt for two months and am pretty pleased about my experience so far. I got my job by applying through their on line application portal which is the only way they will accept applications. It also helped that I had someone on the inside who gave me a recommendation. You should have your Husband apply for as many jobs as he can. Even of they are not his specific area if he has the skill set he should apply. You just never know. And I am in my mid 40's and held my last job in restaurant work for 10 years. So please don't let age or work in an unrelated field make you think you can't get the job you really want.

Good post, but I want to point out that ageism is much more prevalent than people realize. So many people in their mid 40s think ageism won't happen to them, but sadly they may be in for a rude surprise. I can't tell you how many people I personally know who have suddenly been laid off and then discover they're unable to find work once they hit their mid 50s. I'm talking about people with stellar job histories who can show you page after page of glowing job reviews they received over the years. People who worked hard, made sacrifices for their employer, followed the rules. And you see it happening even more so to those who try to find work or hold onto a job in their 60s. On retirement forums, you rarely see posters who have had traditional retirements anymore. Mostly it's people who are older who tried searching for work for awhile and eventually gave up and started calling themselves retired.

[SorryIMovedBack]

Originally Posted by Hopes

When you moved here, you said he wasn't really looking at first because he was helping with the children--carpooling them everywhere and such. You later said he was going to study nursing because he hated IT. Now he's just in the nursing program until he finds an IT job. What happened? Has he decided he hates nursing too? Have the family finances changed requiring him to stop going to school and get a job? You even say he hasn't really looked much, so is it you who wants him to find something but he's still not ready?

Dorothy, It sounds like your husband is having a midlife crisis. That might be showing through in his resume and cover letters.

He needs a better explanation than he's studying nursing to keep busy until he finds an IT job. ...

A midlife crisis, Hopes? Seriously? Because he's trying NURSING as a possible career change? What an insult!! How many freakin' times have the regulars in this forum said that the jobs in Pittsburgh are ed and med. Repeat: Ed and med. How many times has a case manager at PA CareerLink said to a displaced worker or a trailing spouse "Nurses are in demand here. It's a demand occupation in PA, especially in the more rural areas." How many times do you read / see / hear that there is a strong demand for MALE nurses, in particular, because their presence settles the unruly patients a little better, because most of them can more easily lift today's 300#-400# obese patients, because, because, because. 2-5 years ago, new-grad male nurses were shoe-ins for immediate employment, and were having no problems getting hired when new-grad women were getting no offers whatsoever because there's still a glut of female nurses in that women's profession, somehow.

IT has always been a young person's game, as in it's about a 20-year career and then you're either out the door when you hit 40-45, or you are running your own IT company because there are no jobs for "older" IT workers. That was true back in the early 2000s when I looked at it as a career change. The IT trade journals were full of stories about age discrimination, even before outsourcing and offshoring was in full swing. Maybe healthcare IT is different, especially at smaller hospitals, because the nature of hospital IT requires conservative, mature, and stable thinkers, not kids and oddballs like business and financial and industry will tolerate.

So, to me, it's not too much of a stretch to simply have someone going to nursing school as a total career change, either because that's person's former field has disappeared like the vacuum tube and buggy whip industries did, or because the person relocated (God forbid that anyone do that and try to find a JOB in the new place, at least to hear city-data forums talk) and he or she simply has skills that are not in demand in the new location.

There's no _____in midlife crisis involved. Think it through. Only someone out of touch with reality and the region's job market would say that. Up here, people go into nursing and healthcare because there are jobs in that, but manufacturing and IT work died in the 2009 recession, if not with the numerous bank buyouts and consolidations, the 2005-2006 Delphi cuts, and the General Motors Ch 11 reorg.

I had some idiot at a CareerLink up here tell me to take nursing school off my resume. I was like "ARE YOU KIDDING? That is valuable experience to any industrial employer because it's directly relevant to emergency squad." He told me that my 20+ years of employment in the ____ industry, then I "suddenly went to nursing school" made him think that I'd "gotten totally disgusted with the ___ industry, and must have REALLY HATED IT, because I left and went to nursing school." !!!! What an azz that guy is! Obviously the dope had no clue what my industry was like, that the trends had been massive plant closures and offshoring for at least 12 years, and that there was absolutely nothing voluntary about my leaving that industry. I was Rif'd because the company I had that successful career with was bought by a competitor who shut it down.


Moral to this story, I guess, is some of the resume-readers are idiots. Get opinions from the locals on what your husband's resume says to them, OP, because he might find that they do not have a freaking clue what kind of work he did, or how skilled he is, and they are reading some completely offbase into it, like Hopes just did. The person who is screening the resumes might be a 20-something "Human Resources" recent college grad, or worse, an early-20-something Human Resources college intern, or some dolt hick, or the owner's wife's kid from her previous marriage, or whatever: Someone not qualified to screen resumes of experienced personnel, whose resumes should be screened by employees who are proficient in those fields.

[shadowfax]

I'm not saying it won't or can't happen. I was really concerned that it might in my case. But I think that also depends on the job. In the case of my job experience won out over the education credentials of several much younger people with degrees that I beat out for the job.

I am saying that even if you think your age might hold you back from getting a job don't let that stop you from trying.

[fleetiebelle]

Originally Posted by BarqCider

i did drive by there, but didnt see any place that isnt food service hiring.

Isn't there a Walmart, Giant Eagle, Barnes & Noble, etc.? I can't imagine none of the retailers are hiring.

[Hopes]

Originally Posted by SorryIMovedBack

A midlife crisis, Hopes? Seriously? Because he's trying NURSING as a possible career change? What an insult!! How many freakin' times have the regulars in this forum said that the jobs in Pittsburgh are ed and med. Repeat: Ed and med. How many times has a case manager at PA CareerLink said to a displaced worker or a trailing spouse "Nurses are in demand here. It's a demand occupation in PA, especially in the more rural areas." How many times do you read / see / hear that there is a strong demand for MALE nurses, in particular, because their presence settles the unruly patients a little better, because most of them can more easily lift today's 300#-400# obese patients, because, because, because. 2-5 years ago, new-grad male nurses were shoe-ins for immediate employment, and were having no problems getting hired when new-grad women were getting no offers whatsoever because there's still a glut of female nurses in that women's profession, somehow.

OMG. Calm down. I encouraged the OP's husband to study nursing last year. My BIL made a complete career change to nursing in his 40s. It's was a great decision for him. My other BIL has been a nurse for 30 years. However, the OP's husband IS having a midlife crisis. It happens. People have them. It's more insulting that you act like midlife crisis doesn't exist or that it needs to be swept under the rug.

Originally Posted by SorryIMovedBack

I had some idiot at a CareerLink up here tell me to take nursing school off my resume. I was like "ARE YOU KIDDING? That is valuable experience to any industrial employer because it's directly relevant to emergency squad." He told me that my 20+ years of employment in the ____ industry, then I "suddenly went to nursing school" made him think that I'd "gotten totally disgusted with the ___ industry, and must have REALLY HATED IT, because I left and went to nursing school." !!!! What an azz that guy is! What an azz that guy is! Obviously the dope had no clue what my industry was like, that the trends had been massive plant closures and offshoring for at least 12 years, and that there was absolutely nothing voluntary about my leaving that industry. I was Rif'd because the company I had that successful career with was bought by a competitor who shut it down.

You're bringing your own personal baggage into the OP's situation. Read her old posts. Her husband hated his old career. It's just a fact. That's why he tried nursing. He has now dropped out of the nursing program. Get a grip. Not everyone has the same life, feelings and experiences you have. The OP's original industry is thriving. Now that he has decided to return to it, he'll have no problem finding a job. I gave solid advice about downplaying his brief encounter with nursing school.

[Sealtite]

Originally Posted by zman63

Where is copanut? He said this region has so many jobs and finding work is easy……

He's a 61 year old baby boomer. Of course he's gonna say that.

[Hopes]

Originally Posted by zman63

Where is copanut? He said this region has so many jobs and finding work is easy……

Originally Posted by Sealtite

He's a 61 year old baby boomer. Of course he's gonna say that.

Now, children. Calm down. Your day will come. You have to pay your dues--just like the 61 year old baby boomers did.