Desperately want to work but feel so stupid - have no idea where to start!

[Workyquirky]

NC'ed because I feel so stupid not knowing how to get a job! Basically I've been out of ft work for about 6 years, in the meantime I've been doing a degree, doing volunteer work, running my own (very small) business and doing very occasional work, but feel completely out of the normal job world.

My degree isn't one that leads to a set job iyswim so it's not particularly 'worth' a lot but would help for one sector of jobs I've seen vacancies for. Going for this sort of job would get me started on the career I'd really love and would pay about £17k-£20k, which would really help our finances. Problem is I only have a tiny bit of experience in that field, built up while I was doing my degree, and no actual paid working experience so I'm scared I won't even get an interview for any of those jobs.

The other option is to go for shop/office jobs, which would have no relation at all to my chosen career so I'd never be able to progress into my chosen career from there, but I'd have more of a chance of getting one of those jobs and they'd pay around £14k, which would still be enough to pay the bills.

I want to be earning and get off benefits but I don't know if I stand a chance for the higher earning jobs or would hurt my career chances if I went for shop work. Don't know whether to try registering with agencies for work either, have no experience there. Should I apply for the 'better' jobs and give it a set time before applying for anything I can get or just apply for everything - with Christmas coming up the jobs might be gone soon. Don't know how to approach getting back into work!

Hi
I have experience of helping people get into work, and although you have started to do this a bit already, there are two things I would suggest , firstly make an honest list of your strengths, weakness, and values, ie what is important to you when looking for work. I know this cannot always be the priority for people, but we work for a long time..... Get someone to help you with this, if you need. When you have done this, and drawn up a list of things you may like to do, take a critical look at the list, and see if anything jumps out at you, and what action, you need to take this further, I.e what can you do, to get further experience un the field mentioned in your post, can / do you want to grow your bussiness ?

Another exercise to try is to identify,your worries,/ lack of confidence, and list what is causing this, and imagine the worst that can happen. The next stage, is to make another list, on the other side of the paper, identifying what can help build your confidence back up, and any resources/ help you may need to do this, and from who.

When preparing for interviews it will be worth, approaching your local Job Centre or careers service to have a practice interview. When answering questions, you can apply the S.T.A.R technique to provide examples: situation: what situation were you in Task: what were your tasks, Action:!what Action did you take ? R: Result, what was the result.

Another good resources is www. mind tools.com

Good luck

I would definitely go hard for the jobs in the direction you really want to go in. If you think that you don´t have the experience you need to be able to get those jobs, brainstorm about how you could get that experience. I think it depends a bit on what kind of industry it is - if it´s a small niche profession where everyone knows everyone, I wouldn´t start making "impossible" applications for jobs you know are way above your level. In that case I would start contacting companies or professionals working in the area, see if you could job-shadow them, ask if they´d be willing to talk to you about their work, give you tips as to how to get into the field. You might be able to get good advice and with a bit of attention to keeping up your contacts, you might end up with friends in the right places. Then I´d go for any kind of work experience you can - as you say, ideally paid, but just try every avenue to get your foot in the door.
If it´s a bigger industry where not everyone knows each other - at least at lower levels - I would do the same as well as going for some of the vacancies you are seeing.
But I would then also make a list of maybe five places you would like to work and put them in order - your favourite first, second favourite second and so on. I would research the companies as well as I ever possibly could. Then I would start at the bottom of the list (your least favourites!) and make a few applications - ideally responding to job advertisements but just sending them an application on spec otherwise. Like this you can get a bit of practice applying in your chosen field (and testing the water) before you put in your prime applications to the firms which would be your number one and number two choice - hopefully using contacts and work experience you´ve been building up. Otherwise, you might learn through your first applications more about other requirements you will need to be able to get into your industry - is it that they will all require x qualification or that you first need y work placement.

Obviously, all of this is time consuming and can take a while and you´ll have to work on how you can pay your bills while you´re applying - maybe put in applications for shop work that you could be doing part-time while your "main job" is applying in your "real field". I know from experience that it is almost impossible to stop the shop work taking over and stopping you devote enough time to building up your portfolio of skills/experience you need for your real job. So if you can possibly afford it, I´d leave the shop work for now and REALLY GO FOR IT in the field that you really want to work in!
I found it quite useful to say to myself: in 10 years I am going to be working as a ...

• and keep reminding myself of that - and be creative with finding ways in.

Good luck!