unemployments anonymous

I received a letter from the unemployment office telling me that I had been selected to participate in their re-employment assistance program, or RAP, the cutesy acronym that the program was referred to throughout the body of the text. The letter went on to say that, while my participation in this program was not mandatory, there was a good possibility that my unemployment checks would stop if I failed to show up. So, motivated both by the promise of a new job and the fear that my unemployment checks would be yanked, I headed off for their little RAP session this morning.

Chuck was waiting for us, the unemployed, as we filed into a windowless room with rows of computers stretching from the main door to the back wall.

“Just grab a seat,” Chuck told us. “As you’ll see on your screen, we’ve been working in conjunction with the local careerlink offices and have developed a search engine in which you can locate employers that are hiring in the area. Now, if you simply click in the upper left-hand corner on the ‘job seekers’ button, you’ll find that we have over 1,300 jobs listed in our database. The goal, of course, being to help you find gainful employment.”

Following Chuck’s instructions, I clicked on the button and, true to his word, 1,300 jobs were found. Upon closer inspection of the jobs that needed filled, however, I soon found that the majority of these jobs were ‘counter help’ positions that paid ‘competitive wages’…which, I felt quite sure, was simply a fancy way of saying that there were openings for retail workers at $7 per hour. Thus, while employment could be secured, my definition of ‘gainful employment’ was quite different from Chuck’s.

Not bothering to apply for any of the ‘competitive wage’ positions, I began glancing through some of the various flyers that were handed out as we walked into the room. On one was information regarding weekly ‘job club’ meetings that were offered at the unemployment office. As Chuck made his way through the aisles, I stopped him and asked what, exactly, a job club was.

“Well,” Chuck told me, “our job clubs are a chance for people to network. You may not realize this, but networking is a very valuable resource in securing a job.”

“But Chuck,” I asked, “aren’t most of the people in this club unemployed? How is networking with someone that doesn’t have a job going to help me get a job?”

“These people all know other people. And you never know which one of these connections that someone else has may help lead you into a job,” Chuck reasoned.

“Uh-huh…but if these people actually had connections like that, don’t you think they’d use that connection to get a job for themselves? Meaning that they wouldn’t be unemployed and wouldn’t be attending the job club in the first place, thus making the whole networking idea moot.”

“Look,” he told me, “it’s the skill of networking that’s important. You may have to attend several job club meetings, but the skill you learn from participating is what will ultimately help you find a job.”

And with that, he disgustedly walked off and left me thinking that a ‘job club’ meeting sounded more like a support group than something that would benefit you in the form of a paycheck. And with any support group, the first step is admitting that you have a problem.

Hello. My name is Terry. And I am unemployed.