Optimism ? Well, its a state of mind that lots of people talk about but
not quite so easy to stick to !!Some people even think it helps people
to recover from illness, salespeople are encouraged to practice it in
their manner when trying to close a deal , lots of people read things
just like I am putting on my blog..daily inspirations..somehow or
other, at some, time we have all experienced the benefits of being
positive...
Looking on the bright side
can help to at least make things a bit better...if you are out of work,
think of the opportunities it can give to use your time to do things
and learn new skills while making yourself employable....just a few
years ago I was the most reluctant Facebook user, and only joined
because my friends said I must, and now here I am learning how to blog
and hopefully to turn it into a business..all because I have discovered
a talent for writing and marketing.
I have had a
life that would hardly encourage optimism, and yet I think it is a
personal choice, to be optimistic or not. How we think about the world
and the people we meet in it, and how we relate can often influence
what we get back...
How can we become optimistic
?...I'm certainly not saying it is easy, and many people have lives
which would defy the most cheerful thinker, but the thing abut being
optimistic is that we can almost learn it while we are doing our daily
things and not have to make special time for it..so the next time we
fill in a job application, or send off that CV....
...I
have learned this at least by my experiment that if one advances
confidently in the direction of his dreams and endeavours to live the
life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in
common hours....
Henry David Thoreau
Thursday 28 June 2012
Motivation
Where did I get my idea for the site ...what was my motivation
I guess like many people who set up a website, my idea came from experience. I am 52 with disabilities and health conditions which frequently would have to be declared on a medical form as part of a job application and even if not, limit the kind of work I can do, and the buildings in which I can do it due to access.
I had been in receipt of Incapacity benefit for many years, and at the last medical I had been asked to attend I had been exempted from further medicals so my benefit would have been secure for at least a while and although money was indeed very tight, it was with care, a (just) manageable budget. Although no longer physically able to work in my profession as a nursery nurse, I had attended the Labour governments New Deal programme, and its successor pathways to work, and always had the intention to try to get such work as I could physically manage. Because you don’t have to be earning much to be better off than you are on benefits, if you are single, living alone and only have one benefit income coming in…and also it would stop people talking about me if I was seen out during business hours !! However, this became urgent in October 2010, when one of the first cuts made by the new coalition government, a cut to the rate at which mortgage relief help was paid took effect.
We have heard in the media a lot about ‘Housing Benefit’ the help some people receive towards the cost of their rent, but little attention has been paid to the cut to mortgage interest relief. I have always felt that there is a hidden attitude on the part of the DWP that if you fall on hard times lose your job, have health issues…you are not entitled to help with your housing if you own a property. it is assumed that you can sell it as an asset and indeed taken as right that you will do so, have a duty to in fact…and live off the proceeds…the only thing is that perhaps afraid of being seen as discriminating against home owners the governments have not admitted this to be the case. And as much as I am known to fly the red flag, Labour did not do much better in this respect. Home owners are considered to be ok, they are assumed to have savings and assets, as indeed I did before my divorce, and of course they can always sell their home
However, like many things it is not so easy and simple in reality. Very few people would be in a position to sell their home at a high enough price to pay off the first mortgage and buy a new property outright, and if they are not working then they would be unable to obtain a new mortgage without an income.
Once there has been a history of financial problems and unpaid debts, such as resulted for me after coming out of a divorce with nothing in an attempt to keep the home I had bought before my marriage, it becomes as good as impossible to rent a property as a credit check is usually carried out on prospective tenants before a rental lease is granted, and the council will not rehouse you as the view is taken that if you did not pay your mortgage, then you made yourself intentionally homeless.
In February 2011, I was so it initially seemed, fortunate to get a job. Even then adaption’s had to be made to the stairs of the building I worked in, but this only seemed to suggest that the employer intended originally to keep me on. I gave up my benefits and took the job, and after only two weeks, although the manager insisted he had been very impressed and would give me a good reference, he decided that on reflection he could not afford my appointment after all. …
I was given a week’s wages and asked to clear my desk and leave. On going home I telephoned my adviser at Pathways to Work, who immediately advised that I must do something that I had heard of and did know the procedure for...make a rapid reclaim for my benefits. Bearing in mind that although I had been forced to take a job by the cut to benefit rates, my health had not changed and I had been exempt from having to seek work, had I been able to live on what I got in Incapacity benefit….I did however, suggest to my adviser that I could see trouble looming as I had taken a job, even if the manager did have to rebuild the staircase for me to do it!!
Then came the most bizarre of circumstances…anyone on benefits knows that should your circumstances change in anyway even if perhaps you feel a bit better and think you could do more …you must inform the DWP…but it does not work in reverse. The DWP have no obligation to inform you as a claimant if your benefit position changes…the right to rapid reclaim for people on Incapacity benefit had been quietly closed down with no notification to claimants, a few weeks before I took the job. Of course I can see that the DWP were not going to advise claimants of this because they did not want them not taking a job, knowing that they would not get their benefits back if it did not work out…people like myself who had claimed Incapacity benefit and had not yet been assessed for the new Employment and support allowance
( ESA) found that if they took a job, gave up their benefit and then had to reclaim, then they had to make a new claim for ESA, which is an entirely different benefit with different entitlement rules. Indeed we all know from the media information that it is as good as impossible to get ESA. I am partially sighted, have arthritis, a severe vitamin deficiency which affects my bones, suffer from limitations and discomfort due to two fractures, have high blood pressure and a heart condition, and not surprisingly stress and anxiety, however, I was told that even if I did manage to make a successful claim for ESA, and I may well not have done so, I would be placed in the work related group meaning I would have to look for work….there was no certainty at all that I would be considered entitled to any claim of ESA, and only this week a Jobcentre plus adviser agreed with me that even though my GP is issuing me with certificates, now called fit notes, and ticking the box saying I should not be working, it is not your GP who decides these days if you should work or not but the government and ATOS…
With no salary, and no benefit income coming in either, I had no choice but to take whatever money I could get most quickly and that was Job seekers allowance, with of course a huge drop from my previous Incapacity benefit levels because I was no longer considered to be disabled in anyway…
So….I am now considered suddenly as if by a miracle, cured and perfectly well and able to compete for work and apply in the same way as any able bodied job seeker, and if I do not have a job soon, then I am to be sent on the work programme. In the winter I was terrified that my signing day would fall on a day when there was ice on the pavements as in very bad weather I am as good as housebound…well, as housebound as a person living alone can be…you sort of learn as far as your income allows to be prepared in advance for bad weather...one of the biggest fears being unable to get out to top up gas and electric meters and when you phone the energy companies to beg them to allow you to pay by direct debit they say that you should have put extra money on your meter through the summer to cope with the winter weather..!! Summer is for me just a time to try to pay some bills that I cannot pay in the winter due to the gas and electric meters taking most of my money!!
The work programme will be a very interesting experience for me since if it snows and is icy and I am on the programme in the winter I won’t be able to get there, so my money will be stopped and if it is like when the Jobcentre sent me for training in CV’s and covering letters at the infamous A4E…There was no lift and I could not manage the building...I am still completely unclear about how I tell an employer when I do get a job that I can only come to work in good weather !! Well…weather with no icy pavements!
Now that I am considered fit and well by the DWP, there is of course no recognition of my disabilities and so I am not referred to any programme to help people back into work that has criteria where you have to have disabilities and be in receipt of a sickness related benefit to attend…
Recognising how little help there is out there for older people having to get work, there have been big cuts in the services available for people with disabilities who need to seek work, but for older people considered to be without a health issue, there is even less and even if which is unlikely that the retirement age for me stays at 65, highly unlikely as I say, I still have thirteen years (at least) to work before I get a pension….recognising just how little help is available for the many who must find themselves in a similar position to myself, and aware of how quickly one issue leads to another...e.g. debts to the real risk of losing your housing, then you don’t have time to concentrate on meeting your job seeker rule of looking for work because you are too busy sorting out your debts and housing, so you get sanctions on your benefits, it was this that gave me the idea of setting up what is in this its earliest embryonic stages a sort of one stop advice site with pointers to the resources and information I have found and or used myself….
Valerie
I guess like many people who set up a website, my idea came from experience. I am 52 with disabilities and health conditions which frequently would have to be declared on a medical form as part of a job application and even if not, limit the kind of work I can do, and the buildings in which I can do it due to access.
I had been in receipt of Incapacity benefit for many years, and at the last medical I had been asked to attend I had been exempted from further medicals so my benefit would have been secure for at least a while and although money was indeed very tight, it was with care, a (just) manageable budget. Although no longer physically able to work in my profession as a nursery nurse, I had attended the Labour governments New Deal programme, and its successor pathways to work, and always had the intention to try to get such work as I could physically manage. Because you don’t have to be earning much to be better off than you are on benefits, if you are single, living alone and only have one benefit income coming in…and also it would stop people talking about me if I was seen out during business hours !! However, this became urgent in October 2010, when one of the first cuts made by the new coalition government, a cut to the rate at which mortgage relief help was paid took effect.
We have heard in the media a lot about ‘Housing Benefit’ the help some people receive towards the cost of their rent, but little attention has been paid to the cut to mortgage interest relief. I have always felt that there is a hidden attitude on the part of the DWP that if you fall on hard times lose your job, have health issues…you are not entitled to help with your housing if you own a property. it is assumed that you can sell it as an asset and indeed taken as right that you will do so, have a duty to in fact…and live off the proceeds…the only thing is that perhaps afraid of being seen as discriminating against home owners the governments have not admitted this to be the case. And as much as I am known to fly the red flag, Labour did not do much better in this respect. Home owners are considered to be ok, they are assumed to have savings and assets, as indeed I did before my divorce, and of course they can always sell their home
However, like many things it is not so easy and simple in reality. Very few people would be in a position to sell their home at a high enough price to pay off the first mortgage and buy a new property outright, and if they are not working then they would be unable to obtain a new mortgage without an income.
Once there has been a history of financial problems and unpaid debts, such as resulted for me after coming out of a divorce with nothing in an attempt to keep the home I had bought before my marriage, it becomes as good as impossible to rent a property as a credit check is usually carried out on prospective tenants before a rental lease is granted, and the council will not rehouse you as the view is taken that if you did not pay your mortgage, then you made yourself intentionally homeless.
In February 2011, I was so it initially seemed, fortunate to get a job. Even then adaption’s had to be made to the stairs of the building I worked in, but this only seemed to suggest that the employer intended originally to keep me on. I gave up my benefits and took the job, and after only two weeks, although the manager insisted he had been very impressed and would give me a good reference, he decided that on reflection he could not afford my appointment after all. …
I was given a week’s wages and asked to clear my desk and leave. On going home I telephoned my adviser at Pathways to Work, who immediately advised that I must do something that I had heard of and did know the procedure for...make a rapid reclaim for my benefits. Bearing in mind that although I had been forced to take a job by the cut to benefit rates, my health had not changed and I had been exempt from having to seek work, had I been able to live on what I got in Incapacity benefit….I did however, suggest to my adviser that I could see trouble looming as I had taken a job, even if the manager did have to rebuild the staircase for me to do it!!
Then came the most bizarre of circumstances…anyone on benefits knows that should your circumstances change in anyway even if perhaps you feel a bit better and think you could do more …you must inform the DWP…but it does not work in reverse. The DWP have no obligation to inform you as a claimant if your benefit position changes…the right to rapid reclaim for people on Incapacity benefit had been quietly closed down with no notification to claimants, a few weeks before I took the job. Of course I can see that the DWP were not going to advise claimants of this because they did not want them not taking a job, knowing that they would not get their benefits back if it did not work out…people like myself who had claimed Incapacity benefit and had not yet been assessed for the new Employment and support allowance
( ESA) found that if they took a job, gave up their benefit and then had to reclaim, then they had to make a new claim for ESA, which is an entirely different benefit with different entitlement rules. Indeed we all know from the media information that it is as good as impossible to get ESA. I am partially sighted, have arthritis, a severe vitamin deficiency which affects my bones, suffer from limitations and discomfort due to two fractures, have high blood pressure and a heart condition, and not surprisingly stress and anxiety, however, I was told that even if I did manage to make a successful claim for ESA, and I may well not have done so, I would be placed in the work related group meaning I would have to look for work….there was no certainty at all that I would be considered entitled to any claim of ESA, and only this week a Jobcentre plus adviser agreed with me that even though my GP is issuing me with certificates, now called fit notes, and ticking the box saying I should not be working, it is not your GP who decides these days if you should work or not but the government and ATOS…
With no salary, and no benefit income coming in either, I had no choice but to take whatever money I could get most quickly and that was Job seekers allowance, with of course a huge drop from my previous Incapacity benefit levels because I was no longer considered to be disabled in anyway…
So….I am now considered suddenly as if by a miracle, cured and perfectly well and able to compete for work and apply in the same way as any able bodied job seeker, and if I do not have a job soon, then I am to be sent on the work programme. In the winter I was terrified that my signing day would fall on a day when there was ice on the pavements as in very bad weather I am as good as housebound…well, as housebound as a person living alone can be…you sort of learn as far as your income allows to be prepared in advance for bad weather...one of the biggest fears being unable to get out to top up gas and electric meters and when you phone the energy companies to beg them to allow you to pay by direct debit they say that you should have put extra money on your meter through the summer to cope with the winter weather..!! Summer is for me just a time to try to pay some bills that I cannot pay in the winter due to the gas and electric meters taking most of my money!!
The work programme will be a very interesting experience for me since if it snows and is icy and I am on the programme in the winter I won’t be able to get there, so my money will be stopped and if it is like when the Jobcentre sent me for training in CV’s and covering letters at the infamous A4E…There was no lift and I could not manage the building...I am still completely unclear about how I tell an employer when I do get a job that I can only come to work in good weather !! Well…weather with no icy pavements!
Now that I am considered fit and well by the DWP, there is of course no recognition of my disabilities and so I am not referred to any programme to help people back into work that has criteria where you have to have disabilities and be in receipt of a sickness related benefit to attend…
Recognising how little help there is out there for older people having to get work, there have been big cuts in the services available for people with disabilities who need to seek work, but for older people considered to be without a health issue, there is even less and even if which is unlikely that the retirement age for me stays at 65, highly unlikely as I say, I still have thirteen years (at least) to work before I get a pension….recognising just how little help is available for the many who must find themselves in a similar position to myself, and aware of how quickly one issue leads to another...e.g. debts to the real risk of losing your housing, then you don’t have time to concentrate on meeting your job seeker rule of looking for work because you are too busy sorting out your debts and housing, so you get sanctions on your benefits, it was this that gave me the idea of setting up what is in this its earliest embryonic stages a sort of one stop advice site with pointers to the resources and information I have found and or used myself….
Valerie
Older workers can't get into job market | Marketplace from American Public Media
Older workers can't get into job market | Marketplace from American Public Media
This is an article from the American Public Media marketplace but still has some very interesting and relevant points and comments
This is an article from the American Public Media marketplace but still has some very interesting and relevant points and comments
Moving the goalposts
However, I think we are supposed to ignore or at least not worry about the media admitting that the claimant count for Job seekers allowance is UP..now perhaps we are, indeed I think so, supposed to be a bit dim ..like trying to add up two and two making five and not realising something is not quite right.....But would this little anomaly have anything to do with the number of sick people being forced off sickness related benefits and on to job seekers allowance. Indeed only last week at my signing on the jobcentre adviser ,when I pointed out to her that my GP is issuing medical certificates
( now called fit notes) saying that i should not be working at all, nodded in agreement when I remarked, expecting to be carried off to the Tower for treason against the state..that it is no longer your GP who decides if you are sick or not but the government...and on that point the government will not be in the least bit bothered by the looming doctors strike since they will consider doctors a pretty disposable commodity...saving us loads of money in salaries and administration costs of course.
The other aspect , well one at least as I am no statistician, is that the unemployment figures are being bent and made to look like they are improving while the truth is that many people are being forced to take part time work, which then considers them employed...The part time work may well be all that they can get but it has a comparison with something i learned when i did a course in housing and supported tenancies some time ago..being homeless does not just mean having nowhere to live, it can also mean your home not being secure because you cannot afford it, which is my own position. Being forced to take a part time job because it is all that you can get very often results in being forced off benefits because you are only just over the benefit entitlement limit, but in no way having enough income to live on and pay your bills..and it has been stated in the media this week that many , many people are in work yet living at poverty levels, levels at which the government of course is trying to move the goalposts by changing the definition of poverty....
Valerie
Friday 1 June 2012
Things to do while you are looking for a job
Sometimes it can seem as if there is no time to do anything
else except look for a job. It is indeed no exaggeration that job hunting is a
full time job in itself. However, it can be a very long time before you
actually get a job and in the meantime however, it is really important for our
job prospects… and for our self esteem and morale to keep up positive
activities which suggest to a prospective employer that we have not stayed in
bed all day while we have not been working.
Here are some thoughts I have had about things to do, which
do not cost too much or are even free and which will be an asset on our CV’s or
just interesting things to keep us involved and positive.
- Volunteering: gain experience, show a possible employer that we have got out of bed and kept a routine and commitment to something while not in paid employment. This can be especially beneficial for people with health problems, where an employer may have concerns about if we are fit enough to hold down and keep a commitment to the routine of work. Volunteering is also a great way to help , improve and be part of our community.
Jobcentre plus has
links to volunteering activities in its job search sections
See Volunteering while looking for work: http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/employment/jobseekers/lookingforwork
Also see: http://www.do-it.org.uk
http://www.volunteering.org.uk
http://www.csv.org.uk
· Network, network, network!! Social networking is not just about catching up with our mates, it is so much more than that and a fantastic opportunity to promote your skills and knowledge. Do remember though that networking is what it says…a net and web so don’t let it get one sided. Help out people who help you and offer to help promote a link, and advertise. Introduce people to your own connections in just the same way as you would like them to do for you.
· Blog….if you can and fancy it then set up a blog or website about something that interests you and if possible relate it to your search for work, or to the interests, skills, qualifications etc you might have on your CV. Regularly adding content to your blog and website doesn’t just show a skill for writing but it also shows a discipline and sense of commitment.
· Lastly, words of caution…do watch your online footprint and image. Employers are increasingly researching applicants on the web so be careful and be sure anything about you is positive and gives a good image!!
And while you are looking for a job, enjoy the opportunities it presents!!
Valerie
protecting your internet image
Remember...everything you do online is like a web CV.
Beware your internet footprint!!
This is so, so true when job hunting. It is increasingly
common for employers to look up applicants online and although it is especially
true of LinkedIn, it is not at all unusual for employers to look
further...Facebook, anything else they find.
When we put anything on the web it can go much further than
we might have initially thought when we posted it…the web is not described as
viral for no good reason!!
It’s a good idea to be very careful not to risk leaving a
bad impression of ourselves or making ourselves look daft by some of our posts
and internet activity ( like photographs)…we may never discover if it cost us
a job opportunity.
- Be very careful in blog and website entries and other social media etc that you do not suggest you cannot spell!! Make sure that what you post are well word processed, correctly formatted as far as you know how to do so and run the spell check!! Getting involved in other peoples blogs by contributing to them is great, especially if they are bogs which might help your job search by having made a connection but again be careful what you post and how you post it...the quality of your content is really important for your image
- Twitter...actually I am not a fan of Twitter and have so far managed to avoid it even though I have adopted many social platforms I never imagined myself using …while I am thought to be the chattiest person going, churning out small comments on everything I do and think does not appeal to me at all. However, Twitter seems to pay a big part in many peoples lives and the rest of their internet activity is often linked to it…e.g. your Twitter account being linked to Facebook…just be careful regarding the content of your tweets. Sometimes simply because a comment is short it makes it almost easier for it to be insensitive and or silly.
- Facebook…even though you most probably think of it as your personal space, think of the bigger picture and remember that everything posted about or by you is your internet footprint…be careful what information you share publicly and what you allow people to publicly share with you on your page
- YouTube…now while I cannot imagine ever having the skills to post my own videos. I know that many people do. Somehow, perhaps because it is not such a common skill as being able to use Facebook and Twitter, some people stick up videos and then almost forget them...or post them and assume that because it’s a video it just must be great and good…again be careful about the quality of your content.
The internet is indeed a great boon to modern day job
seekers (yes that includes those who expected to have been on their way to
retirement by now and who instead are job hunting)…but its best to remember
that everything we post or gets posted about us is giving an image of us to a
potential boss who sees it…make sure it’s a good image
Valerie
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