Speaker
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Podcast
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Marcy
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Hi I'm
Marcy Markusa and you're listening to Learning English with CBC. When you hear so much talk about job losses
and lay-offs, it’s hard to be optimistic about your chances of finding
employment. But Shawn Mahoney of Opportunities for Employment believes there
are still lots of good jobs to be found in Manitoba. In this interview, he tells Terry MacLeod
about strategies people can use to find these jobs.
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Terry
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So
so tell us about some of these good jobs.
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Shawn
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There’s
a number of good jobs that are out there today. Um we’re
placing people at an astronomical rate.
We’ve actually had a record year this year in placements, um a record year in twelve years of
our existence. And we’ve placed over
800 people in meaningful employment, in all different kinds of jobs, um be it
management, trades, office/clerical, IT support, warehouse, even drivers are
making $20 an hour. There are jobs out
there.
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Terry
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And
um the jobs are still there, despite, y’know, when the downturn started
October, November? Things are still,
there are still jobs?
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Shawn
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Absolutely,
um like I just said, in our twelve year history, this has been our best year
and our best month ever was in November, the month after the stock market
crashed. So there are jobs out there,
you just need to know how to look for them.
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Terry
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So
what are the strategies then for looking for them?
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Shawn
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Well
the reality is that in the paper today, only 20 percent of the jobs that are
vacant are actually advertised. So 80
percent of the jobs that are out there to be found in the hidden job market
and there are a number of strategies you can use like informational
interviews, um cold calling,
networking…
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Terry
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Okay,
slow down. Informational interviews,
what are those?
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Shawn
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You
actually call somebody up who is in an industry that you are interested
in. You ask them for a no obligation
interview, just to sit down and meet with them and ask them about their work,
and what it is all about, and see if there’s a fit for you. And take that
opportunity to actually engage with them and sell yourself a little bit. Because there’s no obligation and no
pressure, you develop a great relationship, a great friendship, you leave
your resume with the person, you’d be surprised how many people call back.
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Terry
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Okay,
so you mentioned a couple of other strategies?
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Shawn
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Um cold calling is really
unique. Um we had an interesting…
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Terry
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Is
it as hard as it sounds?
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Shawn
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No
it’s not and we actually had an interesting example in our in our
agency. One of our facilitators had a
group of people sitting in front of him, and he used a cell phone and a
microphone on the cell phone and he actually called an employer himself and
talked with the person and said, “My name is Joe Smith, these are my skills,
my gifts, I’m a hard worker, I’m eager to to begin work and I’m wondering if
you have any vacancies?” And lo and
behold, the person had three or four vacancies. He talked about them, said, “Will you be
okay if I met with you tomorrow?” and got an interview right off the top.
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Terry
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This
wasn’t fake?
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Shawn
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This
was live, on the phone. And ah the facilitator got a job interview. And the participants were just stunned at
the fact that it was that easy.
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The Hidden Job Market - transcript
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