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Can't find work, getting discouraged
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I'm a 27 year old student living in Vancouver. I have 5 years of experience in fast food (KFC specifically), a job which I didn't really love and quit about a year ago when I found a serving job. Unfortunately, that serving job stopped existing after about 5 months when the restaurant went out of business. I've been out of work since January, but I only really started looking after my school term ended in May because my student loans were carrying me through until then and it was nice to have enough time to do all my school work for once.
It turns out work is really, really hard to find. I don't want to go back to fast food and I couldn't got back to KFC if I wanted because they have a policy against re-hiring people. I like serving but the 5 months of my last serving job plus another 5 months at a little place in my home town adds up to way less than the 2 years everyone wants. Even hosting jobs, which by my understanding have traditionally been the way to get into serving for people without enough experience, require experience. I have three years of school left and really need something. I teach flute lessons during the school year but I've only got 2 students, not nearly enough to make rent and expenses. I'm looking at trying to expand that but it's really hard to make any headway.
I'm going out every day. I check Craigslist, apply to everything I'm even almost qualified for, and then hand out resumes whether I've heard a place is hiring or not in my general vicinity as well as down town. I go to every open interview I hear about. I've had very few calls for interviews and only one second interview, after which I didn't get the job. I don't know what else I can do. When they ask about my lack of serving experience, I always tell them that my fast food experience has shown itself to be transferable in almost every way because it's true.
People with job-getting experience, especially serving jobs, what might I be doing wrong? I want a job and I'm a good worker. I just need a chance.
*Fake-edit* Just as I was about to post this, the one place I REALLY REALLY want to work called me for an interview tomorrow. It's a host position with a possible transfer to server. How do I not screw up this interview?
It turns out work is really, really hard to find. I don't want to go back to fast food and I couldn't got back to KFC if I wanted because they have a policy against re-hiring people. I like serving but the 5 months of my last serving job plus another 5 months at a little place in my home town adds up to way less than the 2 years everyone wants. Even hosting jobs, which by my understanding have traditionally been the way to get into serving for people without enough experience, require experience. I have three years of school left and really need something. I teach flute lessons during the school year but I've only got 2 students, not nearly enough to make rent and expenses. I'm looking at trying to expand that but it's really hard to make any headway.
I'm going out every day. I check Craigslist, apply to everything I'm even almost qualified for, and then hand out resumes whether I've heard a place is hiring or not in my general vicinity as well as down town. I go to every open interview I hear about. I've had very few calls for interviews and only one second interview, after which I didn't get the job. I don't know what else I can do. When they ask about my lack of serving experience, I always tell them that my fast food experience has shown itself to be transferable in almost every way because it's true.
People with job-getting experience, especially serving jobs, what might I be doing wrong? I want a job and I'm a good worker. I just need a chance.
*Fake-edit* Just as I was about to post this, the one place I REALLY REALLY want to work called me for an interview tomorrow. It's a host position with a possible transfer to server. How do I not screw up this interview?
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Have you tried looking for resources through your school? If it is a large university, they often have jobs that are only available for students. If it is smaller or more of a community college, they will often have centers and people who can help find you jobs with a solid recommendation from the college. It may not be ideal work, but getting anything on your resume that isn't fast food or retail will be a good thing.
Now, I've never had serving experience, so I don't know how true this is, but when asked about your lack of experience, it seems a bit odd to say that fast food is entirely transferable. Even if it is (again, I wouldn't know), the perception of the jobs is not really the same. Servers have a much more charisma-focused job description, while pretty much anyone can do fast food. So, discuss the transferability where it is concrete (think the "what did you do in X situation" type questions), but also, emphasize your ability to learn. Even if you have years of serving experience, you'll have to learn the ins and outs of a particular workplace, so a readiness to learn is really attractive.
Also, when asked about your previous job, it's generally a good idea to put it in a Situation-Action-Response format (though I forget the exact format). You want to explain the situation (provide context), discuss your actions (what you did to fix the situation), and response (what happened?). Even if the situation did not turn out great, as long as you can show that you learned from it, or that you made a reasonably informed decision, it looks good. You want to use this for "tell me about a time when X" type questions.
This one isn't in the Official Interview Strategy Guide, but I like to ask some mundane questions in the "do you have any questions for me?" stage. Questions about dress code, policies, etc. that weren't covered in the interview (you're going to have to gauge what is appropriate, and don't ask too much). This shows that you were paying attention, and is a little bit of a psychological play (if they bother telling you what type of shoes you need to wear, or whatever, then there's a subtle investment in hiring you- at least, this is my take.)
Good luck.
I definitely describe specific situations and how I have dealt with them. I think I'm saying most of the right things, I just don't have the right resume to back them up. Hopefully this place tomorrow decides to take a chance on me - the facts that most of the service staff know me and it's a hosting rather than serving job both bode well for me I think.
In most cases, an interviewer commenting on your lack of experience is really just asking "Why will you be good at this job?" So tell them!
Other tips: When they ask if you have any questions, always, always have some. Try to build off of something that they talked about earlier. And then build off their answer! Dress code, benefits, etc... are usually bad questions. Those are things to ask about after you got the job.
Know their menu! And even better, eat there sometime. Reference what you saw / experienced during the interview. Mention things you appreciated and how you would fit into that environment. It shows that you truly care about getting the position and take it seriously.
Don't ever say you "really need this job." It never comes across the way it's intended.
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