Recently moved. Ideas for finding work?

June 30, 2019 11:14 AM

I recently moved back to my home state to care for my aging mother. She died and I need to find work. The bulk of my working life has been in academic libraries followed by a few years of miscellaneous support positions in a community college. I would love to be an executive assistant; while I have the skills for it, my resume reads library and miscellaneous work.

What I am doing to help myself: updated my LinkedIn profile and am considering hiring a pro to redo it and my resume, carrying personal contact cards with me and giving them out, just found and will attend a community job seekers group tomorrow. Do you have other ideas for me? I am open to other kinds of support roles, but do not want to go back into a library because reasons.

posted by KleenexMakesaVeryGoodHat to Work & Money (9 answers total)

Best answer: Temping. Temping. Temping.

Seriously. Find a temp agency you like, go in and be super professional. Your first couple of gigs will be very entry level, but if you're good they'll quickly place you in long term assistant roles where you can make a name for yourself.
posted by anastasiav at 11:39 AM on June 30, 2019 [8 favorites]

Best answer: Any meetups in your area. Professional are great for things you're interested in. Social meetups can also help because your loose/extended network is a great source of job tips. Go regularly and get to know people. Even if they don't turn up a job for you, the odds of making at least one friend are pretty good, and someone in their network might have a line on a job as well.
posted by bilabial at 11:59 AM on June 30, 2019

Response by poster: Just to save the trouble of anyone else typing it out, I forgot to say that I have put in a call with a temp agency.
posted by KleenexMakesaVeryGoodHat at 12:19 PM on June 30, 2019

If you're open to remote work, consider looking for a job as a virtual assistant. You can also search indeed.com for remote work (put "remote" in the location). FlexJobs is a good paid site for finding remote work—you can try it for one month and cancel if it doesn't suit you.
posted by smich at 12:52 PM on June 30, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: It sounds to me like you be qualified for a wide variety of office or administrative roles. I would recommend perusing the common job sites (Indeed, LinkedIn, etc) and applying to anything the seizes your fancy. If you are not currently working, I would assume you could devote your time or energy to a few applications or interviews that don't necessarily lead anywhere without too many hard feelings.

I do hiring in the tech industry. If I come across an application that includes a literate cover letter demonstrating the applicant actually read the job description and is even remotely qualified for the position, it almost always go to the top of the pile. So I would recommend having a generic cover letter highlighting your strengths and charms that you can quickly tailor to a listing that catches your attention.

Good luck!
posted by bunbury at 5:21 PM on June 30, 2019 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Thank you for all of your replies. I'm marking this resolved but I'm still very much open to more replies.
posted by KleenexMakesaVeryGoodHat at 6:32 PM on June 30, 2019

Best answer: +1 to temping as a way to get a full-time permanent job - it's worked for me twice. If there's an employer you particularly want to work for, find out what temp agency they use, sign up there, and indicate that you want to work for that organization. Even if you don't get hired directly through your temp job, you'll get experience with their internal software and culture and get in that network.
posted by momus_window at 6:40 PM on June 30, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: First of all, sincerest condolences to you and your family.

I am currently an EA and strongly recommend either temping or going to a placement agency. The one thing I'd suggest is to really get to know what you will or won't put up with in an executive/assistant situation. Join the IAAP in your region and peruse the job board.

I had to make a very difficult pivot away from advertising project management years ago and chose being an executive assistant as a career path. It's a great career but, once again, you have to know yourself very well. Boundaries are crucial. Best of luck and if you need any further advice, feel free to memail me!
posted by theseventhstranger at 12:00 PM on July 1, 2019 [1 favorite]

Check out your local state run employment services. If you are still in Sparks, it would be Nevada Job Connect. My local version offers a variety of resources for building your job search skills as well as social support and encouragement from other job seekers.
posted by metahawk at 4:25 PM on July 1, 2019