The Job Search

Having been employed at one network for 22 years, it’s been a very long time since I actually looked for work. Now that I’m job hunting, I’m thinking back to those first job searches and how absolutely everything about the process has changed.

My First On-Air Job WGBB Radio

                                        

It was back in the early 80s. I had my resume professionally printed. I typed cover letters on my IBM Selectric, a college graduation gift. Those letters took quite a bit of time as too much white-out or correct-a-type and you had to start again. I mailed out my resume and then waited by the phone- literally waited by the phone.

 

No cell phones then, and, at least in my parents’ house, we didn’t have an answering machine either. I would call a News Director at a small station and when someone on the other end  said they’d call  back, I thought they meant it. I would sit in my mom’s kitchen waiting for the phone to ring.

These days I am sitting in front of my desktop computer, waiting for it to beep at me, telling me I’ve got mail. My resume is in here somewhere. It has never been printed, but it gets uploaded several times a day. I log on to journalism job sites,  apply online and wait.

 Here’s what I’ve found out.

1-  There are jobs out there but a whole bunch of the ones I qualify for are in the Middle East. In case anyone is interested, Al Jazeera is looking for English speaking producers in Qatar.

2-   Everyone lists “social Media fluency” as a qualification. I have never “tweeted” but since I have a Facebook account  I go with yes on that one.

3-  It would be better if I spoke Spanish, especially in California.

4-  While I always felt I was underpaid, apparently I was wrong.

The experience is entirely impersonal. After uploading my resume I have no clue whose desk, if anyone’s, it’s landing on.  My favorite part of the online application is the grid that comes back to me with information culled from my resume. Several sites must use the same program because it comes back with my job history as follows

Title- Senior Producer / company- CBS News

Title- President-   /company- Ford

Really?? The President of Ford?? That’s because in my resume it says responsible for the coverage of the death of President  Ford. I’m thinking I shouldn’t correct it and I should request 100 times my salary.

The best part of looking for a job has been calling old friends and former colleagues. Folks I’ve worked with are everywhere, network executives, rival morning shows, talk shows  and web sites. I’ve had the good fortune to catch up with people I really like and admire.  I’m touched by how helpful some people have been and the quickness with which they’ve responded. I’m thinking the old saying what goes around comes around is true. I like to believe I was kind and helpful to all the people who came to me looking for work. Hopefully, my resume will land on one of their desks.  But in the meantime, with my history at Ford, I’m sending my resume to the new and improved G.M. I should be a shoo-in.