Just how many CV's

[Teamedup]

I was at a friends last night.  Over the last two years he has sent over 500 cv's and has had well over 300 negative replies, a hundred or so simply didn't reply. He showed us the file, what a huge pile of rejection. This week he has just restarted work. He has had to invest in the company that took him on.......

Well qualified in his field, plenty of experience, good looking bloke, well turned out, early forties. He has even taught his metier up to BTS level. For the last year he has applied for anything going including working on those brico wagons that do the rounds.

Five hundred cv's and not a bite, isn't that a lot of cv's.

[Piprob]

Yes Teamedup. It's tempting to try and give a CV the widest possible appeal by making it general. But they need to be focused, particular work in particular organisations - and that usually means having several versions of the same CV, and it also means loads of information- gathering and preparation. One of the key questions necessary to determine the size of the challenge is: assuming I have the required knowledge, skills, and character and I beleive my CV demonstrates this, then 'how many applications should I need to make in order to get one interview, and how many interviews should be necessary before a job is offered?

Only when you have established a sensible answer these questions do you really know when something is wrong. Useful feed-back is almost impossible to get, otherwise.

[Teamedup]

I understand that and I would hope that our friend would. His work has always been in sales and the commercial side of things and that is what he taught too. I would really have hoped that he would have known how to present and sell himself under these circumstances.

[0BRIAN WOODHEADI,m here in franceddMMyyyy0Falseen-USI,m here in franceTrue]

TU,how does one teach sales when no one is buying,you must know the unemployment rate in france like the rest of us in france at the moment is high,15% down here,the french have a good cushion to help them come to terms being without a job and then RMI,while individual cases are sad it,s a fact of life and while sad look at the UK and point your dinner guest to the fact that the UK has changed and look where it his now,like you know,I,m here in france

 

 

 

[SaligoBay]

500 sounds quite nightmarish, I haven't reached those dizzying heights of 3-figure numbers yet.

Felt MUCH better when I looked at Le Point yesterday and saw that Montpellier has 20.9% jobseekers. 

Two of my friends here are now working.   One is lucky enough to have a maman in publishing in Paris, so does proofreading for her online.   The other is so desperate to work that she's accepted a 4-month contract in the collège in Mende, about 120 miles away.   Took her three and a half hours to drive there yesterday.   She'll be "commuting" 2 or 3 times a week, staying there on a dormitory boarding basis, husband and 2 école-primaire age children stay here.

 

[Jo53]

Oh god, this is depressing. Better half (not French) was made redundant from French job in November. He could get another job in the UK, but I think his chances around here (and anywhere outside a few big cities) are pretty much zero. Commuting to the UK just isn't practical on any sustained basis. But we're not ready to go back to the UK yet, even though we're pretty sure that's where our long-term future, and that of our children, lies. We feel we haven't given France a proper go yet (been here just over 2 years).

The dilemma: do we follow the work back to the UK and abandon our life here, or do we struggle on here for a couple of years before being forced back, only to find that it's then much harder to get a job after 2 years' unemployment. I know it's a trivial situation compared with the things some people face, but it's heartwrenching all the same, and I think it's a situation many of us over here find ourselves in.

Jo

[Russethouse]

Jo - Is your husbands job something he could do on a temporary contract ? If it is maybe he could do some assignments in the Uk to keep his experience up to date ?

[Piprob]

I hope so much that those with worries about securing work and income will soon find a way through. For two years, until this coming April (when we leave the UK for our new home in France), I have been teaching job search skills in deepest Peckham - south London. The problems in France are clearly a great deal worse, particularly for those born elsewhere.

If the French job market operates in any similar way, there are two key fall-backs: First, are there any opportunities to become an unpaid volunteer with a not for profit organisation? This keeps your confidence up, your skills current, your 'contacts' network alive, and can lead to paid employment with the same outfit - (this worked for me). Second, is there another occupation you could turn to or train for, widening the potential sphere of work available to you - (this also worked for me because I recognised I had some 'transferrable' skills)?

Its too easy to waffle-on, I know, but ... ... ...the really important need is to maintain your self-esteem whatever happens. Often we learn from childhood that our 'worth' is in what we can do. But that is entirely wrong. It's who you are that counts. Unfortunately, when they can't find work, people are sometimes tempted to present themselves as someone else.

The best book (the most practical instruction manual) I have ever read on the subject of getting work (and staying sane) is "What colour is your Parachute".

I send all those who find themselves in this predicament my profoundest well-wishes.

[Teamedup]

Piprob, I have never heard of anyone yet here who has managed to get a job via volunteering contacts. Most of the people I am friends with are benevole for something or other, plus all the people I know who are the volunteers I work with. And from time to time there is someone, a friend or fellow volunteer who is unemployed or scraping a living. The friend I've mentioned is President of our association and has a huge web of contacts and it just did not help.

The other problem is taking someone on here. One has to have a huge turnover to well cover the extra costs and some businesses just can't afford it.

I don't know, maybe if the economy was booming this is how it would work. But so far I've yet to see it happen like that.

 

[Jo53]

Thanks Gay and Piprob. Yes, contract work is a possibility and we're keeping a lookout for it. And the 'what colour is your parachute' book sounds good!

Jo

[Russethouse]

Fingers crossed - Good Luck !