{"id":62826,"date":"2014-02-28T08:00:41","date_gmt":"2014-02-28T13:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=62826"},"modified":"2014-02-27T17:36:01","modified_gmt":"2014-02-27T22:36:01","slug":"unemployment-opportunities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=62826","title":{"rendered":"Unemployment Opportunities"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Veda Darby Soberman, Head Editor,\u00a0INALJ Hawaii<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Unemployment Opportunities<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"veda.darby.soberman\"<\/a>Throughout graduate school I also worked full-time (in a non-library\u00a0setting). I spent many a sleepless night tackling research papers, only to get a few\u00a0hours of sleep before heading off to a full workday. Time to do anything besides\u00a0work or schoolwork came in precious little nuggets. I couldn\u2019t even find any time in\u00a0my schedule to complete a real internship. When my position was cut to half-time\u00a0due to budgetary issues, I was disappointed by the blow to my personal finances,\u00a0but excited\u2026yes, excited, at the opportunities being partially unemployed would bring.<\/p>\n

What I looked forward to was the time to immerse myself in the things I loved to do,\u00a0the ability to pursue professional development opportunities, and being forced to be\u00a0disciplined in my job pursuit.<\/p>\n

Time is of course something that most of us would love to have in endless\u00a0supply. While under- or unemployed, there is some time to fill. Why not take the\u00a0time to pursue a new hobby, or rediscover a passion from the past which could\u00a0possibly serve you professionally? Start with thinking about what would be your\u00a0ultimate dream job, and dream BIG! Forget about any of your doubts and fears. Just\u00a0imagine that penultimate career. Maybe it\u2019s being a comic book museum curator,\u00a0architecture librarian, or fitness blogger. Make honing your skills at something you\u00a0enjoy your part-time job (your other part-time job being directly seeking a job of\u00a0course). Schedule time to learn and do more of what you like to do. You may never\u00a0actually get that fantasy job, but in the end, you\u2019ve spent the time to become skilled\u00a0in something you love. You never know, one day that dream opportunity to be say,\u00a0an archivist of Southeast Asian folklore may actually come along, and when it does,\u00a0you will be more than ready. This is helpful in keeping a positive outlook on a\u00a0stressful job search and life in general. Finding or creating an enjoyable activity to\u00a0do regularly will help to avoid boredom, feelings of aimlessness, and possibly even\u00a0depression.<\/p>\n

It is important to continue to better yourself professionally as well. Funds\u00a0may be sparse during the time of unemployment, but take advantage of the free\u00a0services at your local workforce development office to help with your professional\u00a0development. The Workforce Investment Act of 1988 established workforce\u00a0investment activities to increase employment, retention and earnings, and increase\u00a0the occupational skill attainment by participants. Local workforce development\u00a0offices offer a variety of training, access to community resources, and job search\u00a0support. Qualified individuals may be able attend community college classes,\u00a0participate in internships, and receive on-the-job training. And just because you\u00a0have a MLIS, don\u2019t scoff at the value of certificate trainings or community college\u00a0classes. It is an opportunity to broaden your scope of education, and hence your\u00a0value and knowledge as an information professional.<\/p>\n

Honestly, being employed, especially in a job which may be out of your field,\u00a0but with which you are comfortable, could actually be a hindrance to your moving\u00a0on and hopefully up in your career. The job hunt may not be a priority when you\u00a0are still receiving a steady paycheck. Getting rid of that pay could be the fire needed\u00a0to really jumpstart your job pursuits. Whether stipulated by unemployment\u00a0requirements or not, force yourself to apply for at least one job week. In my state, in\u00a0order to receive benefits, claimants who are not part of a union must apply for a\u00a0minimum of three jobs per week. In the library job world this may involve applying\u00a0for positions you seem to not be qualified for, those for which you are overqualified,\u00a0and maybe those which would require relocation, but this is fine. You can\u2019t go\u00a0wrong, as long as you are putting your best foot forward for all of the jobs for which\u00a0you apply. More applications mean more practice with what works and what\u00a0doesn\u2019t. It could even lead to better and more connections within your field, which\u00a0means more opportunity.<\/p>\n

Hopefully this helps those of you who are currently under- or unemployed,\u00a0or takes the anxiety out of the prospect of future unemployment for others.\u00a0Honestly, my period of partial unemployment was not very long. In fact, it was so\u00a0brief that I didn\u2019t even get to spend much time at all on the things mentioned above,\u00a0but it is a great plan for when I have another period of unemployment, and it\u00a0definitely helps to make me feel that things will be okay during those times when\u00a0fortune seems to shine a bit less brightly on my professional life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Veda Darby Soberman, Head Editor,\u00a0INALJ Hawaii Unemployment Opportunities Throughout graduate school I also worked full-time (in a non-library\u00a0setting). I spent many a sleepless night tackling research papers, only to get a few\u00a0hours of sleep before heading off to a full workday. Time to do anything besides\u00a0work or schoolwork came in precious little nuggets. I…<\/p>\n

Read more \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":58834,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[145],"tags":[69,3592,3607,5438,5223,49,3868,254,5994,3941],"class_list":["post-62826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","tag-article","tag-blog","tag-inalj-hawaii","tag-opportunities","tag-positive-attitude","tag-spare-time","tag-time-management","tag-unemployment","tag-unemployment-opportunities","tag-veda-darby-soberman"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/veda.darby_.soberman1.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1WoMK-glk","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=62826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/58834"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=62826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=62826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=62826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}