Selling My Soul

Hold the press! The kindly people from the JobCentre have revoked their decision to offer me absolutely no money at all while I search diligently for a job and have instead decided to award me the incomprehensible sum of 88p per week.

While it is awfully kind of them to reconsider my economic position in society all the way from their offices in Scotland, this now means that I have to provide proof of my job searching activities and go to the JobCentre every other week to sign on in order to claim my 88p. I'm going to say it again out of sheer disbelief.... 88p.

Please, please keep your money and preferably shove it somewhere unmentionable. Or at least give it to a more useful, less time-wasting cause. This is absolute bureaucracy gone mad and I refuse to participate in it. All it means is that I am now the government's female dog and must adhere to their ridiculous laws in order to get my bone... and a measly old bone it is too.

I have just got back from Berlin, a city that was not so long ago divided by a wall and whose inhabitants (at least in the East) were often forced into conspiring with the secret police in order to get their daily bread. Have I essentially just sold my right to live a free and private life for the price of a loaf of bread? I don't want to get carried away with comparisons here but I'm a historian (or so they told me at university) and so I like to make historical connections between our present day and past occurrences. It was Pasha in Doctor Zhivago who claimed "the private life is dead in Russia". Perhaps the private life here is dying? How many national databases share our private information every day? How many people sell their privacy for 88p?

While I don't have to be a part of this, I refuse to be. Ironic really, considering the fact that I am blogging my life to the world, but at least that is of my own choosing. And plus, I like to think it is my own minute political stand. Better ring the JobCentre now and tell them I choose not to sell my soul for 88p and I really haven't found them the least bit helpful. After all, I am the one who has just secured myself work experience at Time Out Magazine. I can't wait to get some more experience. It may be unpaid but even they are offering me travel expenses and £2 for my lunch each day... I might even be able to afford some sandwich fillings for my bread now.

No Job, No Benefits...No Nothin'

I'm not really sure whether this is positive or negative factor on my life as a whole but I have been refused Job Seeker's Allowance. After putting myself through two rather un-fun trips to sign on at my local Job Centre Plus and diligently noting down the ways in which I had been searching for jobs to prove that I should be allowed the benefit, it has all come to, well, nothing. 

I have to admit it did seem stupid writing down all the jobs I had applied for and going along to the centre like a naughty child who now has to keep a record of all their homework. The lady I showed it to didn't even look at it properly and decided to pick out the one job that I was not proud of applying for.... sales assistant at Victoria's Secret. (I couldn't resist the call of discounted undies). I hadn't even received the letter telling me whether or not they were going to give me the Allowance. Well, they're not, the stingy buggers, because apparently I earn wayyy too much. Now I do see where they are coming from. My waitressing jobs can sometimes earn me around £52 a week, the amount the government claims we need to live, but they don't always. In the off months I can get far less than that. Should I just quit my job and re-claim? That's hardly an honest way to live and plus I know that I would just get bored bored bored without some kind of work distraction. If the government aren't going to help me, I shall just have to keep trying to help myself. And by this I do not mean pickpocketing the wealthy iPad users on the tube.

I did not get the internship I wanted. I got a nice reply from the internship agency saying that the interviewer enjoyed meeting me and said that I would be a great addition to anyone's team, however, they needed someone to work 5 days a week. Huh? I do not recall mentioning I couldn't work full time? What followed was a series of emails to clear up the mistake. The astute interviewer had got me 'confused' with another candidate. Fantastic. So when I thought we were getting on really well and all having a laugh together, actually it turns out he was probably just flirting with his co-worker and getting distracted from the real task at hand. The more I interview, the more enraged I feel  at the way I am treated. Needless to say, I no longer want to work for them anyway. So ha. 

Before I revert completely to my childish self, I will offer some words of hope. I have had work with a wonderful new start-up website over the last few days (earning real money... insane, I know) and made some great contacts in the travel journalism industry. I'm also off to do some travel of my own in Berlin over the next few days so I'll say ta-ra for now, or auf wiedersehen as they say over there, and with any luck I'll return with a head full of inspiration and a belly full of beer and sausages. Here's hoping.   

  

A Delightful Trip to the Local Jobcentre Plus

It seems that life is determined to take me full circle. Having started this blog with a post about the Jobseeker's Allowance, I can now confirm that I have taken the almighty step into my local 'sign on a die a bit' centre. This decision was not taken lightly - after looking for work for around eight months I finally decided that I probably deserved to be earning some kind of governmental benefit purely out of pity. So there we are, I have officially signed on. Well, that is if my application goes through. Because I have been doing part time work I'm not sure if it will - but the rules say that you can claim if you work less than 16 hours a week and are searching for full time work, which I am I am I am!

The centre itself was somewhat like a book. Do NOT judge it by it's cover. I have to say I was a bit nervous about the whole deal. Strangely, what popped into my head first was what to wear. How do I appear not so bedraggled that I am mistaken for one of the drunks who regularly collects their dole, yet not so smart that I seem well-off and get robbed on my way out? Decisions. In the end I went for a jeans and pumps option which seemed to do nicely as I'm still very much alive and the security guard didn't throw me out.

Once I'd passed an angry looking drunk man smoking a strangely pungent roll-up on my way in I suddenly realised that I wasn't actually in a hell hole. Quite the opposite in fact. The room looked new and clean and it was quiet yet weirdly, very weirdly, friendly. I signed in and plonked myself down on a comfy sofa, feeling rather better than I had ten minutes ago. The butterflies flew off and I waited calmly to be seen.

While sitting and waiting for twenty minutes however, the cracks began to appear. Firstly, the over-abundance of security guards became a bit of an alarm bell. In a room about twenty by eight  metres big, there were at least ten guards. They were all very friendly looking but I couldn't help wondering why quite so many of them were needed. Then, as I was ushered into a small office room to meet my advisor I was faced by a one inch thick pane of what I can only presume was bullet-proof glass. As I passed my documents through the tiny slit in the window and signed a million forms I imagined how many angry jobseekers there were. I felt like I was in a prison at visiting hours. Angry as I was, I wasn't about to shoot 'em up.

Finally, when asked what kind of jobs I was looking for I have to admit I felt darned stupid answering 'editorial assistant roles in journalism or publishing'. Apparently, that job spec isn't even on the national Jobseekers Plus computer system. Timidly I added, 'or PA/secretarial roles' to downplay the 'I'm a posh twat with a degree' side of my application. After being handed a flyer about a local job fair where I was told I could apply for roles at Greg's the bakery, I left the centre as hurriedly as possible with some sense of my pride intact. Not that I mind working in a shop, I just applied to a job in the new Westfield, only, I could have found out that gem of a work opportunity on my own thanks.

So I haven't moved far from square one... it's all snakes and ladders really and I was never much good at that game. I am waiting for hear back from an interview I had with a small publishing company for an internship. It would be amazing, nay spectacularly amazing if I got the job. I'll keep you posted.

Am I Just A Number?

I really don't want to be done for libel but I'm about ready to turn an unfamiliar shade of puce and start yelling awful things on the streets of London about a particular company we shan't name here. It seems to me that not only do jobseekers have to contend with a worsening job market, fewer jobs, redundancies, never-ending applications and inevitable rejections, alongside all of this, we are treated in an almost inhumane way.

HR, headhunters - we are all just numbers to them.

I recently did an interview for the role of Publishing Assistant with a certain magazine. It went surprisingly well considering it was the first interview I've ever had for a job that I actually really want. I wasn't a shaking ball of nerves, I actually remembered everything I had read about the company on their website and, after I left, the recruitment company rang me to say that the interviewers really liked the way I had answered the questions and that I had a second interview.

The next week was spent diligently practising my practical skills. I printed off proofreading tests and even watched every single video on YouTube narrated by a geeky American middle-aged man about how to use Adobe InDesign. Needless to say this all took hours and I turned down shifts at work in order to be at my best as well as turning down another work experience placement at the Daily Mail.

It's Thursday evening, the night before my interview and I'm in Tesco buying aubergines or something, when my phone rings. In two minutes my soul was shattered. The guy from the recruitment agency tells me that the company decided to go with someone else.... before even giving me my second interview. Cue me wandering forlornly through Tescos with my aubergines and wondering whether I should just take a job there instead.

I just don't understand. Why tell me this the night before my interview? In my eyes, I am not only down one job interview, I am also down at least £40 worth of work and a weeks worth of experience. If they thought someone was better than me, why did they ask me to do a second interview? I thought they were really great people when I met them but now I'm glad that I'm not working there if they treat people like this. I got from over 300 applicants down to the last 5 and I was still just a number to them.

In my eyes, all job applications should receive a letter/email of  recognition, followed by one saying whether or not you have made it to the next stage. The number of applications I've spent hours on to receive absolutely zilch back from is countless. Even an automated email would be something. So far I feel like the people in charge of actually giving us jobs are cold-hearted machines. I don't know whether it's their fault or that of the economy/job market but it's still not acceptable.

Perhaps I should go into HR myself and revolutionise the way job applications are processed. None of this computerised CV sorting. We need real jobs for real people. 

And The Winner Is

If there was a competition, or better still, a job application which called for the best and busiest Christmas ever, my family would definitely have it in the bag. 100%. The advertisement might say something along the lines of:

Applicants must have at least twenty people over for Christmas Day lunch and Boxing Day. (Score - we had 23, not to mention those who dropped in for a while for a bit of bubbly. Hence every chair in the house being used, plus step ladders and the inability to move from the table, even if quite desperate for the loo).

The noise within in the house must be well above average. (Point for us again - There were certain moments, especially when crammed into the front room attempting to open presents all at once, when even shouting was futile. In fact, I'm sure the neighbours thought we were having some kind of raucous party instead of simply opening pressies by the tree).

The amount of food made and consumed must be ridiculous. (Win - My mum and I made so much food for boxing day that we didn't even begin to touch two of the dishes. There were seconds, and thirds, and even fourths for some but still we have a fridge and freezer full of amazing food waiting to be eaten. We had 23 people round but we must have literally made enough food for over 50).

Every room in the house must be decorated. (Right now, my house is a Christmas wonderland. Complete with a colour coordinated green and silver Christmas tree, flashing lights all the way down the hallway, a mirror ball in the dining room and hanging gingerbread men in the kitchen, it is a magical party house.)

Added to these points in my covering letter, I might state the fact that we were so busy cooking, eating and generally attempting to move around the house that we didn't get to watch any Christmas television at all. Similarly, to add an essence of cuteness, I might mention that we have an amazingly adorable, soft, happy little baby boy in the family now, who is only two months old and totally stole the spotlight. I think that might buy me a few brownie points from the recruiter! And lastly I would probably highlight the number of gifts exchanged, so many in fact, that some got lost. Whether in the piles of torn up wrapping paper or under a sofa somewhere, they are doomed never to be found again...a present lost in the Christmas Cosmos that is my family's festive season.

I love them all dearly and I wouldn't change a thing. If only we really could get some recognition for the hard work we all put into making our Christmas the best, busiest, loudest Christmas every year. I hope you all had a nice peaceful one just to keep things in balance.

Job Seekers Allowance

It was a proud day when I strode across the ridiculously long ceremonial stage to receive a piece of white card which was the culmination of three years (well, two years, the first year of university never really counts does it?) hard graft and many thousands of pounds of debt. Was it all worth it? If not then thank God I got my degree before the Tories got their hands on our tuition fees. And that liar Clegg...the first and last time I ever vote Lib Dem.

Unfortunately, I, like so many other graduates,  am stuck in real-world limbo. In  need of money in order to still be able to pay my phone bill and maintain some semblance of a social life, therefore, in need of a job. Simples? No no! One must first gain experience in order to gain a job title which is not bar tender, retail assistant or waitress (all things I did when I did NOT have a degree). Today I perused the Guardian jobs website for the nth time and, while I should know what to expect by now, was still shocked by the amount of experience jobs advertised as graduate roles expect us to have. Unless I wanted to be a 'money hungry head hunter' (their words), a media sales trainee earning 'big bucks', or sell my soul to an HR training scheme then I had to have 'at least' one years experience in the role that I was applying for. How do you get experience if they won't give it to you? Plus, a girl's gotta live you know...so unpaid work experience placements just don't seem to cut it. Still...I'm going to have to do them.

I should probably mention here that I am looking at journalism or publishing roles. Though I expect I shall soon have to downgrade my searches to babysitter and revert to my sixteen year old pre-degree self. I am at least, living at home, and while the endless family dinners, generally culminating in a row of some sort, are a slight stress, I fully appreciate the fact that while I'm unemployed and broke, I am not yet homeless. This might change of course if I continue to have to scrounge off my family who, love me as they do, wish quite rightly to cut me off very very soon.

I never thought that I would have to, but at the moment, Job Seekers Allowance seems to be the only way forward, at least for a little bit. While some people may look down on people on benefits, it seems to me that this particular benefit was made just for people like me....those seeking a job! I am still undecided on whether to actually drag myself to the dreary local Job Centre in case it ends up making me feel more depressed, but, we shall see. Desperate times.

There is, however, always hope  and as it's always nice to end on a happy note, for everyone's sanity, I can say that I have managed to secure some very good, unpaid of course, work experience. I spent five days at BBC Television Centre with HARDtalk, a one-on-one interview programme which has had many a great name grace it's hot seat. It was a shame the placement was only five days, especially considering I worked on my application for over a week and wrote a mini essay for it but it was undoubtedly a fantastic one-off experience. I helped create programme briefs for the producers and input ideas as to who they might interview next. 'Plan B anyone?' I suggested thinking they might laugh me off or do an awkward shuffle in their seats, but they jumped at it and I got emailing publicists and agents which was all very exciting.
I guess the worst thing about work experience these days, is that it rarely, if ever, leads to a job. There are no jobs for it to lead to!

Anyway, I think I'm forgetting that I am Gutsy Grad and even with only £20 in my pocket, thousands of pounds of debt around my neck and a growing sense of worthlessness, I WILL find a job!