The "anything is possible" brigade

[Arkarians]

Anything is possible with enough hard work! Does anyone else find this phrase annoying as fuck?

You can become a billionaire like Elon Musk apparently, if you just simply work as hard as him.

Anyones child can excel in school, get top marks on all of their GCSEs and get into Oxbridge, if they bothered to work hard enough.

Anyone can achieve a high-flying career as a lawyer or doctor, if they just work hard enough.

The implication is that people who aren't massively successful lawyers, doctors, business owners, CEOs, etc are lazy fucks who couldn't be bothered to put the effort in? Not to mention how your background and/or current circumstances are a massive factor in success too.

Surely it doesn't matter how 'hard' you work, you could work 12 hours a day until the day you die and still never achieve Elon Musk level success. If you don't have the creativity, the right ideas, the luck and all the physical capacities for it, it will never happen.

Is there something Un-PC about acknowledging that people have different abilities, circumstances, levels of intelligence, etc, and not everyone is built for huge success?

YANBU

False Consciousness, innit.

"Anyone can do it

Not everyone wants to"

I can see you are never going to get it as what I am talking about is beyond your experience.

Your original comment was pretty clear

You think because you're struggling to find someone to fill this care role it means not everyone can do it

That's simply false

It means people don't want to do it

Not that they can't do it

I can mop a floor, doesn't mean I'll take a £80k a year drop in salary to become a cleaner does it.

I didn't say no one had applied. I said there was no one suitable.

And you don't sound like you would be suitable and have the required skills.

Required skills is based on you being a parent to a child who requires care

Anyone could do it

If they had to

It's not a skilled profession

Many parents manage to do it with no training themselves

FFS @Annieisalright
I'm not sure whether you purposefully misunderstanding or whether you are just thick - but @Underhisi has explained the skills needed to do the support worker role - it is not a case of anyone can do it if the price is right - some people, in fact a lot of people, completely lack the patience and empathy needed to do this role .

It is a real problem that so many people think care worker = unskilled = anyone can do it and this results in people being pushed into applying for these kind of jobs which they are totally unsuited to.

You seem to not be able to grasp people can care for others without a special skill set

Whether everyone would do it well is another question

But anyone can care for someone else if they had to

Hence it's unskilled work

Carers are even officially bloody categorised as unskilled workers

"You seem to not be able to grasp people can care for others without a special skill set"

If I was unable to look after my son because of illness,he would need to go into specialist residential care. He couldn't go to a foster carer even as the only child there - because his needs are too great.

No, not everyone can care well for others with complex needs. That's why we NEED carers.

I would not want 'just anyone' caring for my elderly and disabled relatives (and due to my own disabilities, I couldn't do it myself unaided) or for me.

Just because it's underpaid and treated as unskilled, doesn't mean that it's a simple job.

@ddl1

Again, no one said it's easy or simple

Just that anyone could do it

As you don't need particular skills, experience, qualifications or levels of intelligence to do it

It's classified as unskilled work

Those are facts

Mmm it’s an interesting one. I was talking to DP about this yesterday as I consider us extremely lucky. He said it’s not luck and we have worked for all of this and made numerous sacrifices others our age haven’t (moved to rubbish area, taken minimum wage jobs so we have the energy to build a business all the other hours of the day, not taken holidays, pumped everything into our mortgage). He’s right we did but that wouldn’t have been possible if we had been unlucky. Ie. Had health issues, disability or even been hit by a bus.

So I suppose on top of all the other more obvious variables; for me I think it boils down to what you consider luck. For me luck is just not being unlucky - and I think the luckier people are the less they realise it. Because to be unlucky is just not something in their sphere IYSWIM.

Yeah and care is in no way unskilled. There’s a lot of jobs I would happily class as unskilled but care work is absolutely not one of them. It’s criminal how underpaid it is.

Nice to know that carers are seen to be unskilled workers. Some of us know we are not.

Agree.

Care work is unskilled, often, in the sense that there isn't really any special education people need to do it.

But it does require a certain kind of temperament, to be good at it. Patience, high emotional intelligence, diligence.

I think there would be a lot more people though who could be good at it, if only the pay was better.

You are missing the point. You are judging success with more money.

Of course those from wealthier backgrounds have more opportunities and it's easier

I used to work with homeless people. (I still volunteer in a reduced capacity)

So many of them have turned their lives around and are successful. If they had been told they had to accept their lot they would not now have families and decent Careers

But they are far rarer and in much more specialised roles.

No one wants to do the role. That's not the same as someone can't do it.

I'm a cleaner . The best job I've ever had . No stress . No one in my back . Just do it go home and switch off . Brilliant for my mental health. Couldn't be happier. Wish I had done this years ago instead of tying myself up in knots trying to achieve the impossible.

its this the key point people are missing. You are being your best and doing a job you love. That's what work hard means to me. It does mean being the CEO it means achieving your best in a field you enjoy.

This may be working in Asda or McDonalds, it may be being a TA, a plasterer, a beautician, a nurse, engineer, doctor or owning a company.

Your intelligence does play a part. There might be some people where serving in a shop is something that makes the whole family proud because that child had needs/ circumstances where maybe independence or ok aid employment in adulthood was in doubt. That person exceeded expectations.

The point is when people don't work at all, or don't train harder/ take opportunities that are there, then complain they dont have money/ enjoy their job are often the ones criticised.
That's when working harder maybe true. It's not about everyone having to be top of the ladder.

Being anything you want to be doesn't mean everyone wants to be rich/ famous/ career successful.

"No one wants to do the role. That's not the same as someone can't do it."

People did apply for the role. They didn't get it because they didn't have experience and you cannot have a teenager with this level of need being looked after by someone without experience and without a certain type of training. It isn't safe and puts both parties at risk.

It was said earlier that parents manage. Some of them don't. Those that do have gained experience over the years and have developed the skills to manage. Someone coming into the role hasn't had those years of experience.

This attitude also enrages me. It's such a prevelent attitude in education at the moment (Growth Mindset, and the 'Yet' stuff as in 'I can't do it, yet'). I think it's so dangerous. We need to accept there is some stuff we can't do. Or, if we decided that something specific was our goal we'd have to focus on that and everything else would suffer.

Yes to high expectations, yes to supporting children to be the best they can be, yes to celebrating achievement. But also a healthy dose of reality that were actually not all capable of achieving the same things due to a huge variety of factors.

Yes to all of this. Being your best and the best are not always going to be the same thing!

I think there are different variables an employer can vary 1) requirements (eg qualifications, cv, right attitude), 2) pay/conditions to fill a vacancy.

the exact amounts of these required to fill a vacancy depend on the prevailing economic conditions - if there is a high unemployment rate, the pay can stay low OR you can raise the requirements. Currently we have a labour shortage, so you can raise the pay OR lower the ‘requirements’ OR leave the job empty. Unfortunately the employers of carers don’t have much money at their disposal (as the govt don’t provide much funding for social care). So many posts are unfilled or filled with people who may not be suitable. Instead relatives may need to fill the role unpaid and people don’t get the care society has said they should be entitled to.

I’m pretty sure a carer for the queen or Rupert murdoch won’t be paid minimum wage. It’s a societal discussion we have to have - care is much more expensive than current and previous taxes paid for.

Yes to high expectations

Having a Growth Mindset is about having high expectations - and it's been around for years, it isn't new. It's suggesting that aspiration and trying things out is a good thing.

don't let's throw the baby out with the bath water!

There's surely no harm in trying things out even if it means not getting it 100% perfect or by accepting 'that's not for me'. Nothing ventured nothing gained.

What we need is a no blame, no finger-pointing culture so people aren't branded a failure. That's one aspect of US culture I admire - they're by no means perfect, but their attitude to failed businesses is to keep trying, don't be defeated - we're appalling about building people up then knocking them down, esp in the media.