The job hunting support thread

[Puddy_Tat]

Well sales mainly, I could normally do many things, but due to my leg I would be up for anything
I am a member of Evenbreak they look really good I just need to put myself out there more
just not have the real confidence even doing a new CV explaining I have not worked for 10 years looks
daunting to me, as I live on my own and have no one to really help, like that, the cv and being
dyslexic a lot of these working from home jobs require A level English. Thanks Cloo for your input.

i may of course be stating the obvious / be meowing up the wrong tree with some of this, but

is there some sort of local volunteer work you might be able to do in the shortish term?

although if you're getting any benefits at the moment, you'd need to see if doing that would bugger your benefits up, though, either in terms of not being 'available for work' or if you're current on disability type things, would they take that as proving you're fit for work? i'm too out of touch with the benefits system to be sure either way.

most towns / boroughs have some sort of volunteer centre that tries to put potential volunteers in touch with organisations looking for volunteers.

in theory, the skills / experience from voluntary work (even just showing that you can be relied on to turn up at the right time on the right day/s) can be a stepping stone to getting back in to paid employment after a while out for whatever reason and looks better on an application than just 'unemployed' - and it's a source of a reference.

having said that, some volunteer organisations / roles, they don't really want people who are just doing it as a short term thing while they look for a 'real' job. depends how much time they are going to need to invest in training in whatever role it is - local citizens advice here used to take this approach, certainly as far as full on adviser roles were concerned (i did consider it while i wasn't in regular work some years back, but wasn't at the stage of accepting semi-retirement.)

may also be worth looking in to local courses (library service, adult education?) in computery stuff - just to get something to say you know what you're doing with the current incarnations of the basic office software and so on. potential employers tend to assume (unless proven otherwise) than anyone over 40 and / or who's been out of work a while won't be able to do anything with current IT.

there may be some sort of job support organisation near you - this one's near me for example. they help with things like putting a CV together.

also, there's the national careers service which may be worth a look - they are open to people of all ages which i suspect many people don't realise - when i left school, the 'careers service' then (i think it was part of the education authority) was specifically for 16+ year olds, i can't remember what the upper age limit was, but think there was one then.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

in news here -

risk of redundancy has backed off a bit, but i don't want to make any long term plans around the current job, and don't really want just to sit and wait for it to happen (if i'd been in the same place 20+ years and would get a good pay-off it might be different.)

job in oxford (that i thought about applying for round xmas) has been re-advertised which implies they didn't get anyone. hmm.

have seen something with a south london council, which is fairly generalist, but the job requirements suggest they are really looking for people who have done the exact job before (maybe a way of getting current / recent agency workers to go permanent) and there's suggestions that council is about to have to make big cuts. i'm not sure i can be bothered.

and i'm (only just) within the pay grades where i'm on 3 months' notice either way, which won't appeal to most employers.

anyone know what the chances are of getting some sort of work if i did quit, move to london, and then start looking? would pretty much have to be admin sort of thing - i'm not up to doing anything too physically demanding.

the finances mean it's just about possible, but i'd be in difficulty after a month or two of not working, and in trouble if it became several months.

and of course i'd end up moving to somewhere then see a job somewhere that would be a pain in the tail to get to.

i'm at the point of accepting i've either got to give up on moving back to london, or give up on working in my sort of line (i don't want to go in to detail but it's different in london) - i could cope with an admin level sort of job, but they don't seem to exist much any more. councils mostly only seem to recruit managers or specialists, which needs experience and qualifications i haven't got.

the supermarkets seem to have loads of manager vacancies and nothing for shop floor staff.

but i'm also likely to be seen as 'overqualified' for anything that's not in my line.

do councils and the like still have admin level staff? or is that all done by agency staff now? and if so, how do you get in? the agency jobs i have seen always seem to want people with recent / current experience of doing the exact job which would rule me out.

 

[Cloo]

Interview tomorrow for research role - I would really like it although I'll need to establish what depth of excel analysis it requires and I'm not sure how they'll frame that and therefore how I will need to respond. I think I may just have to assess myself as 'rusty, but can do it when I'm doing it'. The spec asks for 'strong excel' skills, but not 'expert', which is something I think I could get to quickly if in practice. It helped this evening running through some things with gsv as I realised I did grasp more than I thought and that if I stop being scared of it, and just check I'm doing what I'm being asked to do with it, I'm probably OK.

I have practised my spiel about current issues in office real estate in terms of occupiers and investors and I think I sound fairly convincing, and done some looking into on the business, which is obviously very led by research and very proud of it and watched its corporate videos about values etc, which are a good way to pick up their buzzwords.

If they take me forward and there is a reasonable amount of excel involved, I kind of hope there's some sort of test to be done at home so that I might a) be able to take a measure of whether I can do it and b) complete it by referring to notes on what I need to do if necessary (which is fair enough as I'd probably need to do that anyway). If they want to do some sort of under test conditions thing at their offices I may have to make the call on risking doing it and being embarrassingly shit, or withdrawing my application. The scariest thing might be if there isn't a test and they just assume I can do it

 

[Silas Loom]

Interview tomorrow for research role - I would really like it although I'll need to establish what depth of excel analysis it requires and I'm not sure how they'll frame that and therefore how I will need to respond. The spec asks for 'strong excel' skills, but not 'expert', which is something I think I could get to quickly if in practice. It helped this evening running through some things with gsv as I realised I did grasp more than I thought and that if I stop being scared of it, and just check I'm doing what I'm being asked to do with it, I'm probably OK.

I have practised my spiel about current issues in office real estate in terms of occupiers and investors and I think I sound fairly convincing, and done some looking into on the business, which is obviously very led by research and very proud of it and watched its corporate videos about values etc, which are a good way to pick up their buzzwords.

If they take me forward and there is a reasonable amount of excel involved, I kind of hope there's some sort of test to be done at home so that I might a) be able to take a measure of whether I can do it and b) complete it by referring to notes on what I need to do if necessary (which is fair enough as I'd probably need to do that anyway). If they want to do some sort of under test conditions thing at their offices I may have to make the call on risking doing it and being embarrassingly shit, or withdrawing my application. The scariest thing might be if there isn't a test and they just assume I can do it

I’ve managed a few market intelligence teams and recruited a lot of research analysts. Excel skills have always been tertiary for me when assessing people, well behind market understanding and the ability to communicate insight. That even goes for some very data-centric businesses where the forecasts and numbers were sacred.

You basically only need one person in the team who is stellar at Excel, and everyone else can borrow their models and get them to tweak as required. Excel geeks love to do this, for some reason.

So your prepared spiel and your views on office real estate trends will be what swings it. Probably best not to use up too much valuable face time getting into the weeds about whether the Excel culture is macros or pivot tables. The odds are that a service lead who is interviewing you was never the Excel geek. But all analysts need to sound reassuringly informed in front of stakeholders, and that’s what interviews expose.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

If they want to do some sort of under test conditions thing at their offices I may have to make the call on risking doing it and being embarrassingly shit, or withdrawing my application. The scariest thing might be if there isn't a test and they just assume I can do it

some years ago, i had to do an excel test in an office (this is before interviews on teams were a thing) and they had just moved on to the current style of excel with the ribbon style - which at that time i'd not seen before.

one of the questions was to do a sparkline.

i don't think i've ever even bothered to find out just wtf a sparkline is.

You basically only need one person in the team who is stellar at Excel, and everyone else can borrow their models and get them to tweak as required. Excel geeks love to do this, for some reason.

yes - in previous job, there was someone who liked being given a big steaming pile of data and doing fancy graphs, charts, heat maps and all sorts of bollocks like that with it. i was quite happy to let them get on with it.

 

[Cloo]

Thanks, that's helpful and reassuring! I luckily had a chat this week with one of our heads of research and he was very helpful, he was saying it's a lot about curiosity and storytelling, and that it is a team effort, I guess meaning you can lean on someone else's expertise.

My manager has done these roles before and is confident I could do it, which also helps.

It was interesting discussing excel with my other half - he is a programmer and a general maths/science person, and we realised as we talked about it, he approaches it as a mathematician and I approach it as an app user - I actually suggested a way of doing something that he wouldn't think of doing it because he goes straight to the maths.

I also applied for two external roles with the same firm today as they're both suitable and it was very quick through the LinkedIn form; the more senior one says at the top it's part time but then doesn't mention it anywhere else, which makes me wonder if it's a mistake, but worth finding out more.

 

[RubyToogood]

Neither Best Work Buddy nor I have heard back after our second interviews. Onwards to the civil service job.

 

[Cloo]

Neither Best Work Buddy nor I have heard back after our second interviews. Onwards to the civil service job.

Good luck with that.... be warned civil service can take literally months and months to get back, as you may know.

gsv once applied for a civil service contract, didn't hear anything, did a 6 month contract somewhere else and then heard back they were ready to start the civil service one and went straight on to doing that.

I have a civil service application out at the moment, it gave a timeline of interviews starting next week but I'm not necessarily expecting that to mean anything, although I don't expect to get an interview either but you never know.

 

[Elpenor]

I would say strong excel skills would include being comfortable using pivot tables and nested ifs. Intermediate skills would be comfortable using lookups. Advanced skills is writing / tweaking macros. Based on how I use excel anyway which is probably quite narrow and related to my work needs.

But the main thing is really being able to look at an existing formula in a sheet, or finding a formulas on an excel forum, understand what it’s doing, and then adapting it for your needs

So to some extent being able to use google is just as important!

You basically only need one person in the team who is stellar at Excel, and everyone else can borrow their models and get them to tweak as required. Excel geeks love to do this, for some reason.

Where I work most of the excel templates were set up by someone else, but I’ve spent some time refining them as a kind of pet project.

 

[cesare]

Good luck tomorrow Cloo

 

[Elpenor]

Oh sorry, forgot to say good luck tomorrow Cloo

 

[Puddy_Tat]

Interview tomorrow for research role

and of course i missed that bit

hope it goes well

 

[passenger]

Thanks for the advice Puddy_Tat there is a lot to take in, your bang-on about the benefits
I've been feeling really low at the moment and don't know where to start it's difficult living
on your own, but when I come on urban I feel like I'm not, so I need to cheer up and take in
all the advice you lot have given me,.I so miss living in London I only meet a few urbs's there might
be a few in the Crawley area would be nice to meet up with some down this way maybe I should start an urban 75 meet up ? down this way or just meet anyone.

p.s good luck Cloo

 

[Orang Utan]

Best of luck, Cloo !

 

[Cloo]

Just had the interview, it was OK but I don't think I really convinced and my lack of data experience was clear. They probably wouldn't be speaking to me but for the recommendation from my manager (who knows one of them), but at least the data thing will give them an objective reason to turn me down and avoid awkwardness on that front! It's a shame as this probably precludes me getting into research roles which I'd like to do but if you haven't done it from the start it's hard to get into.

But it was good to have some practise at the whole interview thing again at least.

 

[Cloo]

OTOH, spoke to my manager, she spoke to her mate who thought it went well - she'd be happy to take me forward but will depend what her colleague thought and on who else they see, which is totally fair. So maybe better than I'd thought.

In meantime, have applied for a role with a competitor similar to a few internal ones I've applied for that are in the bid-writing/project management side. I don't know how much luck I'll have coming in from another place as an unknown quantity, but it's a mat cover so it could be a good way for me to dip my toes in the water and if that works out I could apply back to where I am now for a similar one as quite a lot of them come up because there are so many business units chasing contracts. There weren't any more jobs on the internal system today (it's updated on Fridays), but will look again next week

 

[newme]

Well I just found my rejection email, sent oddly at 7pm on a Friday but whatever. I literally did this job last year for 6 months starting in January, in the same team, had two different managers who gave me good reviews at the time. Assuming its an internal candidate since its council and this came up continually when I worked in other ones. I get they have to advertise but it just fucks with other peoples lives when they see an opening and its effectively filled already.

Oh and the car is fucked, thats five hundred quid gone and I am scrabbling like fuck to cover. Hoping I can land some agency stuff so its weekly pay, my work chair is broken, the bed is broken (I can fix this if I can get a clear day to get the tools out tho as I need to make a few pieces).

 

[cesare]

Sorry to hear that newme

 

[newme]

Sorry to hear that newme

Thanks got to say its about the most stressed I have been since the last kid. Sole earner unless SO gets DLA or whatever it is now sorted in a hurry, financially anyway. Used to being at company's 5 years not a year or less. Independent/private is a pain. This role would have been enough and stable don't care about anything else work wise.

 

[muscovyduck]

Feeling like I'm being funnelled into a new job which would solve a lot of my problems, but also it's going to be gutting if after this I don't get it.

 

[newme]

Feeling like I'm being funnelled into a new job which would solve a lot of my problems, but also it's going to be gutting if after this I don't get it.

I had that twice and it helped a lot moving on after. If you are internal and funneled towards it I'd hope you get it despite my complaints about this lol. Hiring internally often makes a lot of sense.

 

[Cloo]

I have at least identified 5 quite plausible jobs to apply to - moving to my current job was worth it in terms of significantly extending the realm of jobs I can be a realistic applicant for. They're content/editorial for law, finance or data related businesses. I've done some of the tedious work to get a set of 'base CVs' ready - content/comms, real estate content/comms, research - so those can be adapted slightly for most scenarios and might apply for a couple tomorrow. The next fortnight I may have to concentrate more on wrapping up my current role than applying for jobs so I should get some out the door.

A lot of job applications now seem to be just CV and maybe a short form, no covering letter, and that makes me suspect they are prioritised by algorithm so should probably check each one has key words in it.

Also, having applied for a bid writing role with a competitor of current employer, my job ads are starting to show me various bid writing roles which gives me an idea of what that pathway could open up. One contact at work last week suggested it's an area you can go freelance in as well, which is not the plan but could become useful if I get experience but find myself between jobs again.

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

Hi all. I work in the television industry and basically it has taken a massive nosedive recently. There is very little work about. I just did my January tax for 2022-2023 and it was about half my usual earnings. 2023-2024 probably is going to be half that again. I haven't had a job since last summer and have started applying for real long term paye jobs (so far unsuccessfully) . . . . So my question is, when do I stop saying I'm freelance and actually become unemployed? Are there benefits? Drawbacks? My wife works so I probably wouldn't get any money.

Obviously I'd much rather have a job.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

So my question is, when do I stop saying I'm freelance and actually become unemployed? Are there benefits? Drawbacks? My wife works so I probably wouldn't get any money.

i'm too long out of the benefits system to be sure, but -

generally speaking, if you sign on for job seekers allowance, you can get 6 months of it based on your individual national insurance contributions, and any partner's income, and any 'capital' (i.e. savings) the two of you have aren't take in to account.

after 6 months, you have to claim as a household, so partner's income, and any savings you have between you, will come in to it. it's not always an 'all or nothing' so there can be circumstances where you are entitled to benefits even if someone is working. in theory, it's supposed to be able to cope with people whose income varies due to casual / irregular / irregular hours work, but i'm not sure how well that works in practice.

entitledto has a page on contributions based JSA here. (the site also has a calculator for working out possible entitlement to means tested benefits - it's anonymous and independent of DWP and councils, but you obviously need to put real numbers in to it for income etc.)

the thing i'm less sure about is what sort of NI contributions you've been paying as and whether they will count - I have an idea that self employed contributions didn't count the same way at one time in the past, but i'm even less expert here. the page i've linked to has a bit more, but from where i'm sitting it doesn't make all that much sense at first attempt.

you also have to jump through whatever hoops they ask you to - the 'actively seeking work' / 'being available for work' stuff, and it's been officially denied that they are on targets to 'sanction' people (i.e. cut them off benefit by any means possible.)

it's also worth being aware that the DWP is now more about being a benefits denial system than a system that actually sets out to help people in any way.

general approach is if in doubt, claim.

a tangent - but one that may be worth looking in to - if you're now at a point where you're not earning enough to pay income tax, wife may be able to use some of your personal allowance off her income tax. more here.

(i've intentionally worded this as if-then rather than asking questions that i wouldn't expect you to answer on a thread, especially as this one's in 'general')

hope things get better for you soon

 

[Puddy_Tat]

i didn't want to roll it in to the previous post, but anyone else wonder if this thread would be better in a more restricted bit of urban rather than one that's in general and can be read without a login?

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

i didn't want to roll it in to the previous post, but anyone else wonder if this thread would be better in a more restricted bit of urban rather than one that's in general and can be read without a login?

Ah yeah, that does sound good actually.

 

[Cloo]

That sounds tough ATOMIC SUPLEX , it must be tricky to manage how you make that path from freelance > unemployed > employed (soon one hopes)

Rollercoaster continues here - I got a message yesterday morning asking for a time to call about feedback re: my interview for the research job, so I assumed that meant it was a no and the interviewer was giving me feedback as a favour seeing as she's a friend of my manager, but turned out it was just the HR lady asking me a how it went and would I be interested if they offered me second interview, and letting me know they were speaking to the last people today and would make a decision about next stage on Wednesday afternoon. I must say, it speaks well of the business that they keep people informed, most places are shit at that. So I'm still potentially in the game for that one - I have emailed her to ask what format the next stage is in - I'm wondering if it might be doing a presentation, which would make sense for the role.

I haven't been able to move my interview forward for the internal role I was approached about, but I am having an initial informal convo about a different internal one I applied for, which is 'Assistant Bid Manager' - I think it's the right level for me and the money I'm looking for but will be helpful to clarify tomorrow in case it isn't.

Got an email to say my CV is being reviewed for comms role with a competitor of current employer - I think I ought to get to interview for that one, as it's basically a step up from my current role and has a lot in common. I'm less interested in it than the bidding or research roles, though.

Going to have a session to look at my CV with one of the HR team here later this morning, hope it's useful; my CV doesn't feel quite right somehow, but can't put my finger on it, so hoping she has some useful input.

 

[Cloo]

Didn't get the research role - kind of relieved in a way as I have two discussions about internal roles in the next week, and although I know that doesn't mean I'm a shoo-in, the fact is it would awkward if I had an internal offer on the table, and a 2nd interview for the research role, which I'd really like but wouldn't be definite, and I wouldn't know how to play that.

Preparing for informal chat this afternoon about internal role - I will ask them when they want someone to start because if it's ASAP, I'll tell them I could start next Friday! I'm going to see if I can push to speak to recruiting manager before the end of the week so that if it's positive we might get an offer in writing in first half of next week. Obviously, I won't be only person going for role, there could be people already on that track, albeit I may be the only one available to start pretty much immediately - that's probably my main selling point at the moment.

 

[newme]

Call from recruiter, short contract role through another company to run a few procurements for NHS, its only 10 weeks but likely to extend. Rather confused as its all through frameworks which are not exactly complicated and I imagine most of the NHS is rather regimented having spoken to people who worked in similar roles before in the past. So a great deal of it writes itself, just not sure why they would suddenly want to pay me considerable amounts for doing so. I get contracting is short term etc so this is a way to attract that since uncertainty and frankly I am probably only getting 50% at best of what they are paying out but still, seems like it shouldn't be all that complex for someone to pick up internally, especially as they aren't even advertising for more staff on the trusts website.

Now wondering what the hell I have missed?

 

[Sapphireblue]

different pots of money for employees / contractors i'm guessing