Working Girl
I have really dropped the ball on writing about my job search escapades. Probably because there really wasn’t much that I could say. My days were filled with networking meetings, trolling job boards, employment agency boards, company boards, Craigslist, everywhere I could think of reading through job posting after job posting and I don’t think there was any way I could make that interesting to read. Can you imagine reading that post? Hey, I applied for another job today. The end.
Yeah, that would not have been good.
So I spent my days wading through job postings, stressing over making my cover letter as interesting and unique as possible, searching LinkedIn to try to find who would be receiving my application (you know, to personalize my cover letter. Yes, I’m thorough) and logging in my results on my handy dandy worksheet. I was called by an employment agency who raved about my work history and told me how they were looking for more people who had that kind of experience and right as I was about to reach the peak of my excitement, they asked if I was interested in Executive Assistant positions. My entire body deflated in a matter of seconds as I politely declined.
And here’s the thing with that. I know it seems stupid to decline an opportunity to work, especially since I was going on my second year of unemployment and was facing losing my unemployment benefits since I was exhausting them as I crept towards becoming a ‘99er.’ I really wanted to find a job but I wanted it to be the right job, something that would help jumpstart my Marketing career and honestly, an Executive Assistant type position was not going to accomplish that. I have been incredibly blessed to have the luxury to be so picky and yes, I did take advantage of my position but you know, I took a necessary risk.
Looking for work has not been the easiest thing ever. I placed a lot of pressure on myself to find a job and I broke from the stress a few times but I knew I couldn’t give up, even when I had several people telling me to just find something, anything to tide me over in the mean time. Part of me didn’t want to give in because I knew I would just stay there and be stuck in a less than ideal situation (it is not easy for me to up and quit jobs) but another part questioned whether this stubbornness was the right way to go.
Competition for work is fierce. I know for two of the jobs I applied to received over 700 applications and the other over 200 before they turned off the posting. Isn’t that crazy? I applied for 122 jobs in the past year, though it’s probably more since I didn’t consistently keep tabs until July when I was required to record my job search efforts, and out of those I only received two interviews. Demoralizing? Yeah, it kind of was, but I had to push past the overwhelming feelings of defeat and inadequacy and remember that it didn’t matter how many times I was turned down, I just needed to find that one person who’d say yes. And you know what? I found the yes!
I’m so excited about my new job. It’s the perfect job to get me started in my career and I get to learn more about Interactive/Online Marketing, which is what I really want to do. It’s the perfect situation for me, since they’ll be training me in online marketing and everything. I can really grow into this position and more. I was so serious about landing this job that when they invited me to the first interview, I spent the weekend cramming for it, reading everything I could about SEO and online marketing (many, many thanks to the bf for helping curate resources to read!) and spent another week cramming for the second interview. I hadn’t studied like that since high school.
Sidebar: Funny thing happened on the way to the second interview. There was a really bad accident on the freeway so it ended up taking an hour and a half to get to the BART station and I was cutting it really close to making it to the interview on time. I ended up running three blocks in heels to get to the office and then had to coax a janitor to let me in since I couldn’t wait for someone to buzz me in. I ended up being a couple of minutes late a little frazzled and noticeably flushed but thankfully I still got the job!
It has been such a relief to finally have a job so I can get on with life and earn a paycheck again. Everything worked out and I thank God that it has. People, I’m going back to work!
And I already know what I’m wearing the first day.
Yeah, I’m a little eager.