I never thought I’d find any fulfillment working at a job in Kentucky. Call it being young or naive, but I fought this idea for the greater part of my life.
I am lucky that life threw me into a difficult situation that forced me to take a job in Kentucky for a while. As I mention over and over again (stop nodding your head) I am amazed by the extraordinary lessons I have learned so far and the resources that have opened up to me.
I have not become complacent like most people around me think. In fact, I spend a lot of time planning for the future and the next chapter of my life. Although I am in Kentucky for this year, I am seeing big changes and much different places on my horizon.
It’s a great feeling.
I was lucky to have people in my life this summer who acted as mentors during my initial post-graduate job search. Every day I would obsessively ask for advice from those around me who actually had meaningful jobs. In particular, my friend Jen who works for a well-known financial advisor. I know I would not have made the “right” decision if it wasn’t for guidance like hers and several others who patiently listened to my obnoxious indecisiveness and whining.
I feel that I have a lot to give back to my generation after experiencing a mind-numbing job search. In fact, I recently had to talk a close friend of mine down from a metaphorical ledge as she dealt with a similar situation. She now has a new job that she loves and looks forward to going to every day. It may not be the “dream job”, but it has become a stepping stone towards her future goals.
My generation is not lazy. We are very intelligent and talented in so many ways. We have a high standard set before us for this reason. We are expected to know how to fully utilize technology and be up to date on things like twitter, facebook and blogging simply because of our age. When in fact, most people our age do not have the first idea how to use these sites, especially to their advantage in the job search.
Even though I don’t think we are lazy, I think we are underedcuated on how to actually go about finding a job as well as how to approach the career world. After having most things handed to us our whole lives we feel that the first job out of college should follow suite. I know I did. I fought hard on a daily basis with those who told me I needed to just find something to start out with and work my way from there.
Had I not been thrown into the situation I am currently in I’d probably still be sitting in my room expecting the dream job to just fall into my lap.
I think we have to be willing to have some sort of job while searching for the next one. We have to use our time wisely and be open to learning from our new experiences. We have to not only learn to use social networking sites as the world is now found online, but we also have to learn to be proactive and pick up the phone or go to the office. We can’t just send an email with our resume/cover letter anymore and expect a reply back. That’s not the world we live in. Employers needs to see that we are willing to show some initiative and even work at the “low level” for a while in order to move up.
I hope that my generation can take their discouragement from the job search and learn something from it every day. I also hope that the amazing talent and intelligence I see in my peers does not go wasted and/or underutilized. I also hope that universities do a better job of preparing students for the job search in the future. Continue to tell students to shoot for the stars, but convey the process it takes to get there.
