I applied for work through my old temp agency today. I'm hoping to be out of this place in about a month and a half, but I figure I don't want to open a hole in my resume, so a little work in the meantime won't kill me. Honestly, I was hoping I'd never do factory work again, so I've been just dicking around here in Guelph, dreaming of Africa.
And, to be completely honest, one of the reasons that I managed to stop feeling sorry for myself and go out and apply is because of the cultural exposure element to working factory jobs. It's not something I want to say, but you don't see a ton of immigrants working higher-end jobs, even though most of them are highly educated in their own country.
Looking back, I had a number of close friends from Africa during the time when I was working factory jobs. One of them had a name that I now recognize as Malian (although I don't think exclusively) and one woman told me she was "West African". There's an African guy I used to work with that I still see semi-regularly.
It's not just Africa. As one person I knew who immigrated from Afghanistan noted, in the factory world it's necessary to "know the names of all the lands". A person who has immigrant parents, but who was born and raised in Canada, by my understanding is basically a Canadian. I don't know how proper it is to say, but I've always gotten along well with people of different cultures, and that magical time when two cultures meet has always appealed to me.
The woman who interviewed me today didn't bat an eye when she saw on my resume that I had been working in subsistence Africa. I guess it's not as notable, because they see people who worked in Africa all the time. But I guarantee you they don't see too many subsistence livers.
I overheard two employees at the agency speaking on how to prioritize who should be employed, and the consensus was to prioritize anyone with experience working in Canada. It kind of made me sad, because they were talking about a couple who were fresh immigrants from Canada, who they'd just put through paperwork and interviews. They had experience working in the agricultural field. That's the same as my CWY friends. I knew that they were probably cream-off-the-crop educated employees to have made it all the way to Canada, but I saw that a punk like me, who only has a high school diploma and a smattering of temp experience, would get prioritized above them. I almost feel like a dick just for applying for work, if I'm pushing such people down and stealing opportunities.
I have a policy of not applying on Fridays, because usually, if you're going to get called back by an agency, it will be the day after you apply. If you do it on a Friday, they have a full weekend to forget you. I applied yesterday, but they put off my interview until today. Tomorrow's Good Friday, so they've got a 3-day weekend to forget me. Oh well, I wasn't sure if I was hoping to get work or not, so let's just let the chips fall where they may.
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Yeah, your rule about Fridays is like how I try to schedule interviews. I avoid four times: first thing in the morning (could be running late, some people aren't morning people, including me), last thing in the afternoon (people are halfway out the door, you want time for the interview to run over if it goes well), right before lunch (see above, plus people are hungry), and right after lunch (people are full and perhaps not focusing). I want to hold as much of their attention as I can.
ReplyDeleteThere will always be people who might be better candidates than you who won't have the same chance as you to get a job, and it's good, I think, that you think of that. However, there will also be people who are less qualified than you who will have a better chance than you at a job, and it's good to remember that too. It's the nature of business: nothing is ever totally equal.