To think support from the Job Center should be for everyone?

[Frequency]

I had my appointment for contributions-based JSA today. I had a list of questions about support/help that would assist me in getting back into work quicker.

I was pretty much told their services are not for me and other professionals or people who have been previously successful. Their services only cover people who lack basic skills.

None of what I asked about was available to me or anyone else using their services.

I asked for;

Assistance towards paying for driving lessons as we have a lack of jobs available locally and poor public transport. Even this was only a money-off voucher with certain providers or meant having to travel to a government-approved driving school I would have taken the support.

Local or remote training that would lead to a professional certification or government certificate to verify I had the skills covered by the course - I was thinking of things like Cisco/Juniper/Solar Winds etc. They only offer functional skills. They have the government-funded skills courses on top of this but these are not run by the JC and they have no information on them.

Professional CV writing services to make sure I am using the right keywords to get through the AI scanner/past HR. They offer support with CVs but it is basic such as support with SPAG and how to use a word processor.

I understand the budget is limited but surely spending towards some of these things for people on a low-income or looking for employment would reduce the benefits bill in the long-run?

I used to work in Stockton at the prison… so I know the area.

you can get a moped for £1800… sounds a lot, but I’ve also seen that you can get finance with klarna, if that’s available to you? If transport is the only barrier to the jobs, then this could be a solution for you? And hopefully by the time winter comes around, you’ll be able to drive a car!!

FWIW: I agree with your premise, that while the JC isn’t set up to help people with professional quals, maybe in the current climate it SHOULD be.

The obvious question is if you have always lived in an area with such poor public transport, why haven't you learnt to drive earlier?

Frequency

You should have lots of transferable skills that you can use for lots of other jobs.

Secondly, you could have taken the job that required the taxi. Then asked around at work if one if your colleagues would give you a lift for some petrol money. (less than the taxi)

Secondly, you could have asked on Facebook market place if anyone would give you a lift for cheaper than the taxi. Lots of people are looking for extra income due to the higher costs of living.

Have you looked at remote jobs for banks, online companies, etc

To answer this again I didn't need to.

When I was 17 I moved to Manchester where there are trains, trams, buses, and taxis to pretty much anywhere, at any time.

I moved back when I was 22 because I met DH and I didn't need a career. He had an OK job and was invested in a few properties.

When I left him I found a remote job. When I left that remote job, I found another remote job.

It has always been on my to-do list but never a priority over things like paying for courses or decorating or replacing white goods etc.

@KarmaChameleon63213 I'm looking at any remote job not just IT but customer services, admin, data entry, etc, although for the latter I am looking for /night/evening/weekend work as I have the software course during the day which starts on the 2nd and is 8 am 6 pm, Mon to Fri for 13 weeks, so if I don't get a job which is a career, I'd be looking for something to do alongside that while I work towards a career in software development.

Most IT support jobs will have their own techy interview bit (this is usually the bit I fail on) - they won't care about your certifications or anything if you can't answer their questions (mind you, I did amaze myself recently in an interview by being able to talk about the difference between UDP and TCP. Just couldn't do the same on some other questions. In a day to day situation, everyone uses the man pages and Google when they can't remember.

You're in a strong position in that being a woman, you may get an interview where an equivalent man won't, so that someone in the hiring process will have some diversity boxes to tick, and it's a male-dominated sector. But you will then need to deliver at the interview. It might get you an interview, but it won't get you a job.

I have been looking (not very hard) for just over a year (Unix sys admin more than networks) - there are jobs out there, including networking ones (I was interviewed for one which was more networks than Unix, going by their questions.) I've come a close second in a couple of interviews, but second isn't a job offer.

But - I've also been invited to a couple of events for women wanting to work in tech, with organisations like AWS. This was through LinkedIn, so make sure you're using it well enough.

I won't be signing on until it's an absolute economic necessity - I just found it so annoying last time I did (which was some years ago.) I almost asked if I could have a job there, as I could see so many ways they could do things more efficiently. But they also clearly had no idea what job hunting looked like for anyone with qualifications. But if I get to the point I do need to sign on because I need to claim benefits - well, I hope I will have found myself a less-than-ideal-for-me job first. I guess the process works in that I will do what I can to avoid signing on.

Bloody hell, op!
Maybe go the whole hog and demand a chauffeur driven limousine.

Driving lessons! 😂😂

@Frequency ok i meant you lost me at "met DH at 22 and didn't need a career". As you are finding out, an expensive mistake.

If you intend on staying where you are, you really need to learn to drive.

But - I've also been invited to a couple of events for women wanting to work in tech, with organisations like AWS. This was through LinkedIn, so make sure you're using it well enough

I'm finding this. I've just been invited to one for Solar Winds, which I have signed up for. Cisco is good for this too. And as I said, I have the software course starting on the 2nd.

I'm not getting interviews, although, in fairness, I've only been applying for positions for a month or so. I'm just not used to applying and not hearing back, Usually when I want a new job I apply to a handful, get 2-3 interviews, and have 1-2 jobs to pick from. In the interviews I have had the feedback is I am overqualified and would get bored/they feel I'd be using the position as a stop-gap until I find something better or they don't think I can reliably commute and have hired someone who lives closer/can drive.

There's not even that much I can apply to, atm. Even looking at retail etc there is nothing about locally.

@Ginmonkeyagain I am learning to drive as I've said several times throughout the thread. I am also willing to relocate if I find a job that would make relocation financially viable.

Honestly just apply for a remote job in the civil service. There's quite a few of them, you might have to occasionally visit a city but they'll pay expenses etc. There are virtually no jobs in the North East, that aren't public sector at least. There's just no economy up there as no businesses base themselves there and all the money people earn there gets funnelled straight back down south when they pay for stuff from big businesses etc.

I've been looking at CS jobs but I thought there was amove back towards having days in the office?

I dont live near a major city (or I would have applied for the coventry/ exam based ones) so a truly wfh job would make more available to me.

If the job doesn’t say it’s wfh then it’s not. Most depts are in 2 or 3 days a week. I wouldn’t risk taking a job that would be a crazy commute because I only see it going up.

I have a job offer.

It's a lot less money than I was on but it is in town after the two weeks' initial training.

I can still do the part-time software course and work toward that for the long term.

I interviewed for it last week but had not expected to hear anything because the job interview was 3 minutes long and consisted of asking me if I could drive and telling me I would need to drive a van if I passed my test. I'm not sure how I feel about driving a van given that I feel like death is imminent when driving a small car but I am determined I will not let driving beat me.

It also gives me enough evening/weekend time to pick up some extra hours in my friend's shop to top up my wage if needed.

It's only a temporary contract but it gives me some breathing space at least. And it is for the NHS so getting my foot in the door can only be a good thing.

@ButterflyTulips Try LinkedIn for remote work. They advertise quite a lot of remote admin/customer service roles but the competition for them is ridiculous.

Well, obviously the government should be providing adequate public transport and measures to cut private car use, but considering they're doing the opposite then yes, they do have a duty to provide alternatives to the transport services they've taken away, especially if they want people to be able to travel to jobs!

As others have pointed out, Jobcentres aren't there to support people: they're there to punish and scare people.

I remember reading, back in the 2008 crisis, with astonishment and then bemusement, all those interviews in the Guardian and Independent with well-off, middle class people who'd been made redundant and were outraged at being treated like criminals by the DWP. It was news, to them, that the Jobcentre wasn't a friendly support service.

I knew the benefits system was archaic and unfair but, like the people in 2008, I genuinely believed the job center itself was there to support people and help them find work.

I'm not sure how I feel about driving a van given that I feel like death is imminent when driving a small car but I am determined I will not let driving beat me.

I feel safer in a van - it's higher up, so more visibility, and they're usually a better spec than my small car. Not that I've driven one in ages, but I have hired one a handful of times in the past for various reasons.

But op don’t you see you’ve proven everyone’s point? You’ve got a job with 0 extra cost to tax payer. Driving lessons professional cv writing etc would have been wasted on you.

I only finished my last job 9 days ago and only applied for JSA yesterday so I don't think I would have gotten far enough along in the process to get any taxpayer money if it was an option.

I see your point but I was both lucky and willing to take a massive pay cut to avoid being unemployed. I had bonus points for being female as a pp said and H was working there when he passed away suddenly so if they recognised my name from him that would also have worked in my favour. A 50+ white male would not have had the same luck but would still deserve support in finding something.

But that's correct. They are there to help people find work. Any work. Not just work that meets their very high standards which, in your case, is fully remote.

Seriously OP you're not unemployable. And you already have an offer. The skillset for your job is usually 'traditional' companies that have significant on-prem infrastructure, these also tend to be hybrid rather than remote. Even for those 'remote', the market is bad, many are cutting back and returning to hybrid.

Don't waste your time on software courses - it's not required. Certifications could help but in your case, the problem is simply your target jobs.
Do you have any experience with DevOps, public cloud or containerisation at all? There are more of these remote jobs. Your current skillset seems old-school sysadmin. An AWS or Kubernetes certification would allow you to pivot.

Happy to share more information if you DM me. Always pleased to meet another woman in a very technical role. There are very few of us especially in infrastructure.

@EBearhug Personally I found those 'women in tech' events crap. 90% of the attendees were others looking to 'break in'. The ones there from the company just give generic advice, they don't give you an in.
I also signed up to one of those 'mentorship' programs, specified wanting help with technical leadership, a technical career path and they gave me... a saleswoman who had no idea what Linux or a command line even was.

If they really wanted to help me they'd have given me a principal engineer, of whatever gender, to advise.

An AWS or Kubernetes certification would allow you to pivot.

@imansre I will look into getting one of these in case this happens again. Thank you.

Re: CCNA, can I pick your brain? I've been told it's not needed as it is entry-level and I have networking experience but my former employer wanted me to study towards it. I need to practice/speed up on the subnetting questions but apart from that I was ready to do the exam. Would that be worth paying for or not since I already have experience?

The software course is as much for interest as anything else. I would love to work in software but I also just really enjoy it as a hobby. I know you don't need certifications, only a portfolio but I don't feel like I'm ready to start applying to jobs yet. I am almost ready but not quite there. The structured learning of an actual course vs the self-teaching I have been doing would help prepare me quicker.

I agree with your background you don’t need a software certification. I think you need it for being a sysadmin, not a software developer. You need to think about DevOps type automation. I work as a developer but I know my SA colleagues use CI/CD and IoC to build on premise VMs. We are hybrid on premise and public cloud. We have kubernetes cluster on premise installed on Linux VM. We are also on AWS. There is definitely a demand for good sysadmin to do DevOps. I would imagine you can use that background to gain a foothold in?

For application development, you also need very solid kubernetes and AWS knowledge nowadays. We write all our infrastructure using either terraform or CDK. If your application doesn’t work, the SA team won’t help unless we can demonstrate it is an infrastructure problem. Maybe other places hire from bootcamps. But our hires are either experienced developers or graduates. We have had degree apprentices but I have only worked with one and it’s very rare.

I mean software skills as a sysadmin no certification.

Thanks @SpringBunnies

Web Dev or application development is more what I am interested in rather than network automation or Dev Ops but an in is an in and getting a role in Dev Ops would be a step closer.

AWS and Kubernetes certs are now top of my list, alongside the software course. Maybe I will do CCNA after those if I still have not got any closer to where I want to be.

Idk why so many people are laughing about the driving lessons. I was unemployed 30 years ago and they certainly did offer driving courses then in my area ( And HGV courses - if you pass a HGV test you don't need to take a separate car test).

If you've not encountered the job centre recently I can see how you'd be perplexed, they have deliberately made things harder for people in recent years.