AIBU I’ve made myself unemployable?

[Jobdramallama]

Hi all, I’m posting here for traffic and looking for some insight.

I’m currently unemployed and applying for everything and anything. Retail, office, whatever. But absolutely no one is even replying let alone actually turning me down. My employment history is sketchy. I trained to a level 2 working in education and EY but most jobs require level 3 which id need a job to be able to train for. So those jobs don’t want me.
Anything else can see I’ve worked in education so I think turn me down on the basis of it being so different to office/retail/hospitality.
My brief hospitality experience is currently pointless.
I have huge gaps in my history for bouts of MH issues where I just fucked about because I couldn’t get my head together.
I’m in my mid 20s.

I’m so poor, DP is putting (understandably) big pressure on me to get something soon as he’s currently furloughed and his safety net of savings is getting low supporting both of us and multiple pets. I’m so desperate yet no one will take me on.

I’m in the bottom 1%, this is almost a year of unemployment now (since lockdown 1.0). UC are saying if I don’t get something soon they’ll make me work voluntary hours (30 a week, for 290 a month). I feel so worthless and desperate and I don’t know what to do.

Tbf @Gwenhwyfar carers can only be paid more if people (and esp local authorities) are prepared to pay more for care.

@Porcupineintherough

Tbf *@Gwenhwyfar* carers can only be paid more if people (and esp local authorities) are prepared to pay more for care.

Yes, I understand that, and people would have to pay more council tax. But if you are paying peanuts, you can't make it difficult to get into. I know there are people who do it as a vocation and that's very worthy of them, but most people are not going to have a job that doesn't provide a decent living as their first choice.

@Respectabitch I may be wrong here but I thought the Job Centre didn’t allow you to arrange your own volunteer role? I seem to remember a woman in the papers a few years ago; she had a degree in something like geography and had arranged a volunteer position at a museum. Job Centre said she couldn’t do that and receive benefits (it was absolutely clear that it was an unpaid, volunteer post) as she wasn’t “available for work” and instead they tried to force her onto a ‘training scheme’ at a pound shop.

It caused a bit of a furore at the time, a lot of comments similar to here. I had some sympathy, as I do with OP. Working those hours for less than £300 is awful, especially if you’re having to pay fares out of it to get to a voluntary position. In the case of the pound shop woman, she argued that the position she’d arranged for herself was more useful in terms of where she wanted her career to go and the pound shop one would benefit no one, except the pound shop who were getting free labour via the Job Centre.

You're young op so I think you should make up a story to fill your employment gaps. Caring responsibilities (could be a parent, but they don't need to know), travelling, anything. You will need a story because if you get an interview it may come up.

In your shoes if you're going to be forced into volunteer work, I'd start looking for voluntary roles of your own. In fields that are more relevant to you, where you can gain experience and skills that may be more useful than anything they randomly pick out.

I'm looking for work too myself atm, and am waiting for a universal credit claim to complete - fingers crossed I'll get that but I'm still doing all I can to find a job in the meantime. Its not easy, and I've got a 7 year gap in my CV so I'm not feeling too good about myself either, but we have to do our best. If my claim is accepted and I've still not found a job in a couple of months, then I plan to look for a voluntary role myself so I have a bit more to go on my CV and have something to do to keep me occupied. In the past I've got work after volunteering for a charity - I found the role on charityjobs.co.uk but they advertise paid positions too. I've also managed to get full time jobs before by starting off as a temp. Good luck

Have you tried looking at educational institutions' own websites? My place of work is crying out for staff in some areas, and I know that a lot of applicants for certain roles have no experience in the sector and have been interviewing badly. But they don't often advertise elsewhere, just their own jobs section.
Some roles do require a certain level of qualification, mine does, but other jobs in my team require maths and English at a certain level, but nothing else (although experience is a bonus).

@Jobdramallama

I haven’t put anything for the gaps.

I have applied to care jobs, I even get notifications from indeed to say my application was viewed but I get no replies. I always try to add a cover letter.

I really don’t want to do voluntary work as I know my worth and refuse to work for 2.40 an hour through UC. I’m also bubble with a vulnerable adult so I don’t want to do voluntary work I’m not even being paid for to risk their health..

You need to disconnect your personal worth from your employment worth and currently you do not have a CV or cover letter convincing employers of the skills or experience they want.

You have been treading water for a year and nothing has changed, you need to do something different.

Voluntary work sounds like the ideal solution for you to strengthen your CV with experience and references, and would be "worth" it. You need to think long term.

If you want to get into EY learning again to get your level 3 look for voluntary jobs in this area now ask UC if they have contacts, before UC find you something you are not interested in.

What voluntary work is on offer? Potentially this could be a positive foot in the door

I haven’t read the full thread so not sure if been said but get your cv looking brilliant.
Go online as plenty of templates / a lot of agencies will look at it too.
Check spelling / grammar or ask someone you know to look it over and offer tips.
Also I do kinda agree about the voluntary work , my advice find your own volunteer work .
They need volunteers at vaccine centres at least you can do the odd day and put it on your cv . I knew someone who was encouraged to do some volunteer work to get back into work and it was at pound land , not problem with working there but you should be getting paid a wage not doing it for nothing . I feel some places take these staff on just for free labour .
So yes volunteer but find own volunteer work .
Vaccine centre
Animal shelters etc .
Good luck with and be positive remember sell yourself.

Gwenhwyfar I'm the manager not the owner so I don't set the pay rate. However, we pay over what many care homes pay, provide meals for staff and treat them very well. We have brilliant staff who are happy and a very low staff turnover.

Also it's worth bearing in mind the local authority does not pay enough for the residents and care homes have a high number of local authority funded residents often go under. When minimum wage went up by 6% they increased what they pay by 2%.

if you are paying peanuts, you can't make it difficult to get into as in my post above, we pay above what many care homes pay staff. I don't make it difficult to get into at all, I only employ staff who genuinely care. Generally residents come to care homes in the last years of their life. They should be respected, treated with dignity and receive excellent care. That's the bare minimum imo. I wouldn't want a loved one to be cared for by people who don't care so I wouldn't enforce that on the residents.

"Generally residents come to care homes in the last years of their life. They should be respected, treated with dignity and receive excellent care. "

And the staff should be paid adequately. I was obviously talking in general, not about your specific case.

[quote ChrissyPlummer]@Respectabitch I may be wrong here but I thought the Job Centre didn’t allow you to arrange your own volunteer role? I seem to remember a woman in the papers a few years ago; she had a degree in something like geography and had arranged a volunteer position at a museum. Job Centre said she couldn’t do that and receive benefits (it was absolutely clear that it was an unpaid, volunteer post) as she wasn’t “available for work” and instead they tried to force her onto a ‘training scheme’ at a pound shop.

It caused a bit of a furore at the time, a lot of comments similar to here. I had some sympathy, as I do with OP. Working those hours for less than £300 is awful, especially if you’re having to pay fares out of it to get to a voluntary position. In the case of the pound shop woman, she argued that the position she’d arranged for herself was more useful in terms of where she wanted her career to go and the pound shop one would benefit no one, except the pound shop who were getting free labour via the Job Centre.[/quote]
I remember this as well. I was encouraged to look for volunteering work if I was unemployed for longer than 3 months (didn't happen, fortunately) but I was on old style JSA where they just make you show that you are looking for work as opposed to Universal Credit where you're supposed to spend hours and hours on it every day.

And the staff should be paid adequately. I was obviously talking in general, not about your specific case. Ok it just seemed like you were addressing me when you told me to pay my staff more.

It is difficult for many care homes to pay their staff more unless they are big companies who charge a very high rate. Local authorities who need to pay care homes more first.

@Respectabitch I may be wrong here but I thought the Job Centre didn’t allow you to arrange your own volunteer role?

You may well be right, I don't have experience with the process.

That is a shame if so. The process often does seem punitive and unnecessarily controlling to me from outside. Fine match people up with volunteer opportunities if they haven't a clue, but if they can find their own surely that's so much the better all round.

If you’re on UC you have to commit to looking for work for 35 hours a week. Some of that work can be voluntary, but you are not encouraged to seek your own voluntary role.

Added to which volunteering is no longer the easy ride into the job market it used to be. I’ve applied for a number of volunteer roles over the past few months, and most have involved exactly the same process as applying for a full-time paid job. Cover letters, CV’s, references, and in one instance even a full-blown interview with a panel of 3 people, where they didn’t give an answer straight away but came back several days later.

Walking into a voluntary role is a thing of the past. And if someone is already struggling because they are being rejected for paid roles, then being rejected for voluntary roles is doubly hard.

I was a volunteer manager for the last 7 years and the idea of someone being forced to volunteer for 30 hrs a week makes me feel sick.

Volunteering is a fantastic way to build up confidence and develop skill but being forced is not volunteering and for 30hrs a week would be absolutely sole destroying.

As an charity who depends on volunteering i would have not have any part of a scheme like this and i do not know any reputable volunteering organisation who would.

I really don’t want to do voluntary work as I know my worth and refuse to work for 2.40 an hour through UC

But what is your worth in the jobs market (not as a person, that's entirely separate) when you don't have any experience to put on your CV?

If you want to get a job, you have to show you're capable of doing a job - arriving on time, learning the skills you need to do that job, dealing with tricky situations. And you're in a position where the JCP can make that possible for you, even during lockdown when everybody is finding things difficult.

When I was thinking about going back to work after 7 years out, I knew I wouldn't stand a chance compared to other people who had recent experience. So I did things - I volunteered in things I was interested in, I got additional qualifications, I had a whole bunch of things that were useful/interesting to somebody looking at an application. And people who could act as referees.

I applied for two jobs, interviewed for both, took the second. Been employed ever since. And the employer concerned said that what did it for them was, although I didn't have identical experience, I'd worked previously and, most importantly, I'd done other things during that time not working which led to them choosing to offer it to me rather than the candidate with direct experience in the same post or the one with absolutely no references/experience in anything.

I really don’t want to do voluntary work as I know my worth and refuse to work for 2.40 an hour through UC

But unfortunately it's currently zero to the job market. Don't confuse personal worth to worth in relation to the job market.

[quote ChrissyPlummer]@Respectabitch I may be wrong here but I thought the Job Centre didn’t allow you to arrange your own volunteer role? I seem to remember a woman in the papers a few years ago; she had a degree in something like geography and had arranged a volunteer position at a museum. Job Centre said she couldn’t do that and receive benefits (it was absolutely clear that it was an unpaid, volunteer post) as she wasn’t “available for work” and instead they tried to force her onto a ‘training scheme’ at a pound shop.

It caused a bit of a furore at the time, a lot of comments similar to here. I had some sympathy, as I do with OP. Working those hours for less than £300 is awful, especially if you’re having to pay fares out of it to get to a voluntary position. In the case of the pound shop woman, she argued that the position she’d arranged for herself was more useful in terms of where she wanted her career to go and the pound shop one would benefit no one, except the pound shop who were getting free labour via the Job Centre.[/quote]
Yes and she sued the government and won.

What was especially disgusting about this was the forced labour was for a corporate entity which meant they were literally profiting from slave labour. If they had positions available they should have just employed her.

What was also gross about this was that the government tried to smear her by claiming she thought as a graduate she was too good for retail work. This wasn’t the case at all – she later secured a role in a supermarket – she simply wanted to be paid minimum wage for her work (or otherwise volunteer for a relevant charity).

"But unfortunately it's currently zero to the job market. Don't confuse personal worth to worth in relation to the job market."

I disagree with this. Everyone should have self-respect and not let themselves be exploited.

@Gwenhwyfar

"But unfortunately it's currently zero to the job market. Don't confuse personal worth to worth in relation to the job market."

I disagree with this. Everyone should have self-respect and not let themselves be exploited.

I agree that the volunteer work for profit-making employers is poor.

However, if you're in your mid-20s, with a patchy job history and without the training that employers need, not having tried ANY volunteer work in a year of unemployment suggests that actually the OP is the one exploiting the rest of us as taxpayers. I've got sympathy for how hard it is to find jobs right now, I'm looking too, but she's got to get sorted soon and try new approaches if the current ones aren't working, as it will only get harder as she gets older.

Cover letter is key. If you’re applying to any and every sector, you run the risk of submitting generic applications that aren’t tailored to the role or organisation at hand. What’s more beneficial is researching the organisation, integrating its objectives with your personal and professional history, crafting a narrative that you may have done other things in the past, but this is where you are poised to make an impact. It’s tiring and boring to invest that amount of effort into each application - and fake alignment, where it doesn’t exist- but can be very effective.

If you have basic GCSE's, Maths & English at least, take a look at Civil Service vacancies, they often take on temps for periods up to a year.

Could you advertise to do dog walking? You could go self empoyed and probably walk 2 dogs at once. You would ptobably need a car to collect them and take to park then walk in park then put in car to.take back home.

SweetLove ofCod , that's right. She was very brave to take on the job Centre as they were really forcing people to work full time in shops and so on for their benefits and threatening people with being totally cut off. The case was at my local Job Centre and I can tell you the attitude is very different now and they now (or did pre-Covid) encourage any volunteer work you can find.