Dee Lindsey was laid off from from her last “real” job as an administrative assistant in January 2013 — and has since had a difficult time finding steady work.
Lindsey feels more prepared to tackle the job market now that she has finished the WorkPlace’s Platform to Employment, a program to train the long-term unemployed to compete in the current workforce and beat the lingering effects of the recent recession.
She was one of 102 people who graduated Tuesday morning at Gateway Community College — some with jobs and others with renewed confidence and a repertoire of new skills.
Former New Haven mayoral aide Joe Carbone started not-for-profit WorkPlace in order to help the large sector of the workforce that is chronically unemployed and unprepared to find jobs. “No class of American should ever be discounted,” he said.
Carbone himself was unemployed for eight and half months, a time during which he was “embarrassed,” “scared” and “depressed.” He said he now sees his experience as formative to his current work.
“With all the things I had going for me, that’s how unemployment affected me,” he said. Now WorkPlace operates throughout the country, using public and private dollars to boost people’s chances of finding work again. Many of the long-term unemployed are more than 50 years old, he said.
Normally, those who have exhausted their unemployment benefits have a less than 20 percent chance of being employed again. With Platform to Employment, those odds jump to almost 80 percent across the state, Carbone said. “The answer is clear. This works,” he said.
Carbone pointed out the rows of 48 chairs that stood empty on one side of the room. Each chair had taped to it a blue piece of paper with the name and job of a program graduate — who skipped the ceremony because they had to work.
“I wish we had nothing but empty chairs,” Carbone said.
State Rep. Toni Walker called the graduates “champions” as well as “heroes.” As co-chair of the state legislature’s Appropriations Committee, she helped approved $3.6 million to create Platform to Employment in 2014, and then to fund it for two more years in 2015.
“When you’re out of work, you tend to get tunnel vision,” said Glenn Fuller, who found a job early on during the program using newfound skills. Fuller had been a technical sales representative, with training as a coating inspector. An early “skills assessment” made him realize he could apply for a wider range of industries.
He also learned how to target the “hidden job market” by networking with contacts. Before meeting with customers for an informal transaction in mid-November, Fuller searched for their company on LinkedIn and realized they were hiring for a position that interested him. He brought a resume with him to the meeting.
When they told him the job was filled he “probed further,” and found out there were more spots. He asked if they would consider him for an outdoor sales position, if it came up, and handed over his resume, which was “80 percent finished.”
That afternoon, they called him to schedule an interview for the next morning. The conversation finally turned into the perfect job offer. Employed, Fuller stayed in Platform to Employment to help his peers look for jobs and hone his job skills even further.
Unlike Fuller, Lindsey has not yet found work. She is 58 years old and not ready to retire. She learned from the program how to actually network and seek job opportunities on LinkedIn, and found more confidence in her ability to learn unfamiliar technology.
“I’m not out of the water yet,” she said. “I can do this.”
If that pretty woman cant get a job, than no one can. Fact is, there are no jobs that normal people would take. They cant even get the crap jobs where employers like Gourmet Heaven or Thai Taste pay less than minimum. I was told I would have to apply online for a YEAR to get the lowest position at Home Depot. Now that's what I call getting screwed. IKEA folks said it takes months to get OK'd by the head office (Stockholm???). THERE ARE NO JOBS.
We need an FDR type resuscitation for this country where the state, local, and fed. govt.'s hire people to fix and maintain the infrastructure that's still viable. We need to train more electricians, carpenters, plumbers, bricklayers, tree surgeons, botanists, doctors, nurses, and much, much more. And pay living wages, benefits, and pensions for when they are too old or sick to work. Otherwise you can kiss this country and all it's luxuries good-bye. Bring home our soldiers and sailors to pitch in while they are young and healthy. Right now service people commit suicide---22 a DAY---when they come back if they come back.
As far as our food supply, we need more Mexicans, not less. Tom Vilsack probably agrees with me (Sec. of Agriculture). No doubt almost every item you eat has been handled by at least someone from south of the border. And by the way native people from Mexico to Chile were here genetically way ahead of Columbus or the Vikings. Natives of "America" crossed the Siberian landmass from Asia and that is why South Americans look Asian more than us. A large swath of the US used to be Mexican lived on by real natives of this land.