On the difficulties finding work in today's economy: Two perspectives

In his personal finance column a couple of weeks ago, Globe and Mail columnist Rob Carrick referenced a letter he published about a year ago. The letter was from a 29-year-old who had a lot to say about his generation’s difficulty finding work — especially meaningful and/or well-paying work. I didn’t see that letter when it was published last year, but Rob’s column this week made me want to seek it out.

The letter stirs up mixed feelings in me. Here’s an excerpt:

What makes me extremely bitter is how poorly people of my age and younger have been treated by potential employers…

About a month from now, I’ll likely randomly get an email … telling me that while they really liked me, I wasn’t the right person for the role and they hired someone else. That’s it. The kicker? They likely didn’t hire anyone at all and wasted everyone’s time…

Being willing to work is absolutely USELESS if you can’t get a foot in the door. The economy is only part of the problem.

I have to say, this gets my hackles up — for a couple of reasons. First, I can relate. After all, I’m only five years older than the letter writer. Yes, five years can make a big difference in the economic landscape. But things were not easy when I graduated either. (My first job after graduating from university was working for slightly more than minimum wage at a book store.) I understand that things are hard(er) now — but sometimes you really do have to work for less than you think you’re worth so you can build skills and contacts, which make you worth much more.

But what really irks me is his view of the hiring process — because I’ve been a hiring manager, and I can tell you that I find it hard to believe companies are intentionally wasting their own employees’ time interviewing people for jobs that don’t exist. Hiring is a huge expense for a company, and it takes an almost unbelievable amount of time. At one company I worked for, I think I interviewed pretty much every young writer in Vancouver. Clearly, most of them did not get the job. Maybe they thought I was evil and that we never hired anyone. But here’s the thing: Many of them just had not developed their skills to the point of being hireable — yet. I once hired a writer with very little paid experience because she had an excellent blog that showed she could write. When I asked for samples from more experienced writers and they either didn’t have any, or they were badly written, or they spelled my name or the name of the company wrong in the e-mail they sent them in, well, they didn’t get hired. Sometimes I did a round of hiring and didn’t hire anyone — not because there was no job to fill, but because it would have been way too expensive for the company to bring on a new employee that everyone knew was not going to work out.

For the letter writer, I don’t know what the answer is. I know it’s tough out there. I know it can seem bleak, if not impossible. You’re right that by sheer virtue of the time you were born and graduated, you face a tougher road than those 20, 10, or even 5 years older than you. I would just urge you to keep going. And don’t believe the system is out to get you. Make what you can out of the opportunities you’re given. And hope for a little (or a lot) of luck along the way.

For another perspective, here’s another letter from a 29-year-old “job-haver” who wrote Rob to respond to the first letter. As I read it, I kept saying, right out loud, “YES!” A couple of his excerpts:

Applying for hundreds of jobs, over the Internet, in a wide variety of fields… is the shotgun approach, and it is a big mistake…

This is hard to swallow, but the people who will get their dream jobs are already doing their dream jobs before they get hired. You wanna be an accountant? Start doing your friends’ taxes. You wanna work in an ad agency? Make spec ads for your friends’ and family’s small businesses. Wanna be a journalist? Start making YouTube videos. Mechanic? Fix some cars. Teacher? Tutor poor kids. Yeah, you gotta make money. So sling coffee. And be darn well passionate about it. Find a coffee shop you love and pitch yourself to them, so you can make a few bucks an hour to support your weekends of doing your dream job for free. That’s how economies work. People do things. Real things in the real world with grease and sweat and moving parts and grit. Your credentials are theory.

I could not agree more.

W Network Show Looking for Canadian Boomerang Family that Needs Help

Force Four Entertainment, W Network, and The Audience are looking for families or individuals that are faced with a dilemma, are having a difficult time with the decision, are looking for some advice, and would like to share their journey.

Specifically, they are looking for a family with a boomerang kid living at home faced with the dilemma of moving on.

Here’s some information about the show from the producers:

The Audience is a transformative, caring and compassionate social series. Each one-hour episode focuses on an individual or family who is struggling with a life-changing decision and is at a crossroads in their life. For one week, the individual is followed by “The Audience” 50 insightful people from diverse backgrounds. “The Audience” puts their heads together, debates the dilemma, and comes up with the best possible solution… the wisdom of the crowd. At the end of the week, “The Audience” presents its considered, collective, and thoughtful advice to the individual.

For more information about the show, or if your family wants to get involved, you can get in touch with the producers directly by email at theaudience@forcefour.com or on facebook.

Infographic: Delayed path to adulthood

Check out this great infographic from CBC’s Doc Zone to go with their documentary Generation Jobless. It shows some of the challenges young people face today as they make their way through university and try to find a job — key steps to getting them out of the parental home. You can find an interactive version that shows the costs of everyday items in 1980 versus 2012 at http://www.cbc.ca/doczone/episode/generation-jobless.html

Infographic: American saving and spending habits

I wanted to share this excellent infographic from BillShrink.com. It provides a great look at Americans’ spending and saving habits, along with some thoughts on why it’s become so easy to spend and so hard to save. Some of these reasons (lifestyle maintenance, instant gratification, using plastic instead of real money, avoiding the truth, and keeping up with the Joneses) often combine to leave young adults in a bit of a financial mess… which is one reason why they may end up back on their parents’ doorstep. Some great food for thought here, and some potential topics to discuss with your adult kids as part of your budgeting process for their stay at home.

Airing Tonight on CBC: Generation Jobless

In 2011, I appeared in the documentary Generation Boomerang about, well, the boomerang generation. Tonight, the makers of that film are premiering their new documentary — Generation Jobless — on CBC’s DocZone at 9 p.m. PT/ET. I know I’ll be watching, and if you’re in Canada, I’d suggest you watch, too, especially if your adult kids are struggling with unemployment or underemployment. Here’s some information about the new documentary from the filmmakers’ press release.

UPDATE: Generation Jobless is now viewable online within Canada at http://www.cbc.ca/player/Shows/ID/2330990900/

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Today, the unemployment rate for Canada’s twenty-somethings hovers just under 15%, which is nearly double the national average. Why are so many of today’s college and university graduates unable to forge their way into the job market? The new CBC documentary Generation Jobless takes a critical look at the growing problem and the serious ramifications it will have on the lives of every Canadian regardless of age, gender, education or income. Can we fix a broken system or are we destined to betray an entire generation?

Generation Jobless explores the harsh realities Canada’s twenty-somethings face when they try to gain a toehold in the workplace: unprecedented competition from their parents’ generation, and an economy that is being transformed by globalization and automation. Generation Jobless also looks to Switzerland for a solution, where youth unemployment is 2.8% — the lowest in the developed world. In this country, a strategic alliance between government, educators and employers ensures that almost all young people find their place in the job market. If Switzerland can achieve this, why can’t Canada?
Several experts weigh in on what many are calling the most important social issue of our time.
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You can watch the trailer for Generation Jobless below.

Disturbing facts about parents meddling in the job search

Recently, I’ve seen some disturbing survey findings about what adult children and their parents think is appropriate in terms of parental help in the job hunt.

From research done by Gary Insch, Joyce Heames and Nancy McIntyre at the College of Business and Economics at West Virginia University:

Nearly 70% of students found it “somewhat” or “very appropriate” to receive help from their parents when writing a resume or a cover letter.

20% thought it was fine to have their parents contact a prospective employer.

And according to a poll of employers by Michigan State University (this one is a bit dated, as it comes from 2007, but I suspect the trend is for parental involvement to be increasing rather than decreasing):

40% of employers had dealt with parents contacting the company to obtain information

31% had dealt with parents submitting resumes on behalf of their children

15% had dealt with parents complaining if the company did not hire their child

12% had dealt with parents trying to negotiate their children’s salary and benefits

4% had seen parents attend their children’s job interviews!

As part of the survey, one employer even felt compelled to offer the following advice to parents: “Please tell your student that you have submitted a resume to a company. We have called a student from our resume pool only to find they did not know anything about our company and were not interested in a position with us.”

A note from the report to those parents who think they are helping by being directly involved in their adult children’s job search: “Many [employers] responded that they take parental presence in the job search as a negative and would like to see less parental ‘interference.’”

If you’re looking for legitimately helpful ways to assist your adult children in the job hunt, check out my tips in the article How to Help Adult Children Living at Home Find a Job.

Mom: The laundry is not your job.

Tide has a new commercial showing the parents of adult triplets — who have all moved back home — doing those triplets’ laundry. I understand that Tide thought this was a cute play on their previous commercial that showed parents of baby triplets struggling to keep up with all the laundry they produced. But yikes! I have heard far too many times about parents (usually mothers, if we’re being honest) who start doing their children’s laundry when the kids move back in as adults. This is such a bad idea. Adult children living at home are adults and need to deal with basic adult functions like doing their own laundry. So, go ahead, watch the commercial below and chuckle (or cringe). But whatever you do, don’t take it as parenting advice!

The New Normal?

I do a lot of reading about adult children living at home. In the last little while, I’ve seen more and more journalists referring to the phenomenon of adult kids living at home in their twenties and even early thirties as the “new normal.” Is it the new normal? This doesn’t quite site right with me for a couple of reasons.

First, while the numbers of adult children living at home are increasing, for all age groups over 25, they are still in the minority. Adult children over age 25 are living at home in increasing numbers, but that number is firmly in the minority category. Even for the 18- to 24-year-old age group, the number just squeaks into majority territory (52.8% of 18 to 24-year-olds live with their parents according to researchers at Columbia University in New York based on data from the U.S. Current Population Survey). Fifty-two percent is not a large enough number to say “everybody’s doing it.” In fact, it’s only just over half. Is this the new normal?

Second, when things become “normal,” that generally means we know how to deal with them as a society. But the trend of young adults moving back in with their parents is not yet something we are equipped to deal with in North American society. The rules about financial support are especially unclear. In societies where it really is normal (and expected) for adult children to live at home, there is also an expectation of reciprocal support. Adult children live with their parents and may receive financial support, but they have defined roles within the household that may include looking after younger siblings or cousins, or contributing to the household work and cooking. When parents are elderly, their children are expected to return the favor through financial and emotional support. It’s a balanced system that is not currently in place in the broader North American society.

And third, calling adult kids living at home the new normal minimizes the emotional and financial impact it can have on parents, both of which are very real — and very challenging.

Adult children living at home may be a growing trend, but it is not (yet) the new normal. Both parents and adult kids living in this situation need to plan for the emotional and financial challenges and work hard to make the situation function well for both generations.

Emotional Challenges when Adult Kids Live at Home

There’s something important going on in the homes where adult children live at home, and it’s something parents often don’t want to talk about. It’s the conflicted feelings many parents feel about having their kids at home, what it says about their success as parents (why is the adult child not able to live independently), and their emotional connection to their kids. These are all very real and important concerns, and it’s okay for parents to share these thoughts out loud.

Elizabeth Meakins, writing in The Independent, shares some of these thoughts in the context of her experience with her own two twenty-something sons, both living at home. She starts her piece by describing a dream, in which she initially feels she is being crowded out of her own home by the boys and their friends.

For any parents feeling emotionally unsure about having their kids move back in, or who are struggling after they’re already home, it’s an important read. You can find Meakins’s piece on The Independent’s website.

Voices of young people struggling to find meaningful employment

Several weeks ago, The Globe and Mail ran an excellent piece about the challenges Canadian young people are facing as they try to get established in the careers. As part of that story, they created an “audio slideshow” in which six young adults between the ages of 22 and 29 describe the difficulties they have experiences as they try to get them established in permanent careers and feel like they are truly functional adults contributing to the Canadian society. Their stories are typical of those facing this generation of young people, many of whom live with their parents as a way of making ends meet (42.3% of Canadians 20-29 live with their parents according to the latest census). It’s startling to hear these young adults describe their frustration in their own voices. It’s an interesting series and well worth a listen.

Click on the image below to view and listen to the audio slideshow on the Globe and Mail’s website.