If you are like me and you’ve been blessed with the opportunity to study your masters, but have decided not to venture abroad on holiday this year, and instead opted to work as much as possible before embarking on another 9-10 month journey of studies to get a postgraduate degree, then either you have a job or you do not and you are actively looking for one. I for one fall into the latter category, or at least did, until this week.
I peruse Linkedin quite often but I have found no one mention this debacle of temporary jobhunting. Simply put, it’s tough… for two main reasons. The first and most obvious is the lack of flexibility the jobseeker has. Temporary jobs, those for summer, in any case, are notorious for lasting three months at a maximum and two months at a minimum. It makes sense for a jobseeker to scout out job roles for this period of time to earn some cash, but more importantly, build on their experiences and skills in any sector they may find somewhat interesting including retail, hospitality, or administration. Yet fastidiously, it is difficult to find work when as one employer can be quoted to have said you are “overqualified” for a role or the employer is looking for someone long term, that being beyond la rentree, or as known in the UK, the back-to-school season.
Disappointedly, this often means that while intelligent and well suited for the job, the employer is unwilling or unable to afford to take on employees on a short term basis. This could be because of finances (the employer would have to recruit more employees to make up for those s/he will lose come September), time (an employer would have to further the employee hunt for individuals they can take long term should they decide to postpone the employee hunt for some time closer to September) and the lack of certainty this creates for their business and client relations (client relationships may be affected by frequent change of employees).
While I sit at home toying with the idea that perhaps joblessness is ultimately for the benefit of the business, it would be insincere of me not state that it remains an inconvenience, all the same. The bigger picture is that there are not enough summer job vacancies available, perhaps just where I live or more broadly, further afield. Fortunately, some European based leisure websites list vacancies for recreational campsites or holiday parks/resorts where young people can find work all over Europe, and as a bonus, improve their language skills, and had I looked sooner this might have been good options.
However, with only a few weeks to go before the start of another academic year i’ve decided to forgo job-hunting and focus solely on gaining skills from volunteering, writing, spending time with friends and family, growing closer with God, and preparing for my masters because as 1 Corinthians 10:31 says, ‘ [So] whether you eat or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God’. So shall it be.
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