Section one: The Missing Link
Kunle was excited and anxious at the same time as the day for his resumption at his new job approached.
It has been a grueling recruitment process and he almost gave up at a point. It took six months for the company to finally give him and the other three selected their offer letter.
His friend, Stella, told him about the job opportunity. He had applied to several companies since he passed out from NYSC about two years ago and the only place he got opportunity to work and get paid was a secondary school where he served as a counselor and also taught Economics.
For the first six months after NYSC, he had been sleeping at home and applying until he met Mr. Jones who gave him an invaluable advice.
Mr Jones is an Hr consultant and a neighbour to his brother in Ajao estate where he is staying. He had told him he needed a job.
After collecting his CV, he said “It will be hard for you to get a job, you don’t have any experience outside your NYSC.”
“How can I get experience if I don’t have a job?” I replied.
He smiled and his countenance changed to that of a teacher scolding a student for doing wrong and said “You don’t have experience because you are not ready to work.”
“Sir but that is not true! I have been submitting my CV all around the place. I have attended several interviews.
How can you say I am not ready to work” I replied hurt at the manner he was talking to me.
He looked at me with a burrowing eyes, making me very uncomfortable and after a brief silence that lasted to me like eternity, he said “This is the problem with most of you, you always get hurt when someone is telling you the truth. You feel because you went to school, passed out of NYSC you are now entitled to get a job.”
I buried my eyes, not able to look at his face. “What’s his problem? I said to myself. “If he can’t help me get a job he should leave me alone. Which one be insult wey he dey rain on me?”
He continued. “There is a difference between a job and work, in the context of our society.”
There is work all around you, the neighbor’s child that needs help with her home assignment, the community youth project that needs a hand, the NGO that needs a volunteer and even your own personal purpose in life, you don’t need a job to achieve that!
You only need to get your sleepy arse of that bed and go out to meet the need of people. Whether you are paid or not, it doesn’t matter. There are free career seminars here and there that will develop you.”
My face lightened as he spoke.” I am all for this” I was thinking. This is the missing link.
“What you are doing is building up yourself, in job seekers terms, you are getting experience.
If you stay at home all day, applying here and there, you may finally get a job but you would have lost precious time that you should have used to develop yourself.”
“My advice for you young man, your work is crying for you out there, go out and do it while waiting for your so called job. Let your blessing find you ready.”
“Hmm, I am grateful sir for this timely counsel, I will make amends.” I said, excitement roaring up in me and flashes of what I can do coming to my mind.”
“By the way, didn’t you participate in any extra curricula activities in school and NYSC? Your CV is a virgin even if you get a job with this CV, what the company will offer you will be poor.
Your CV is showing you have learned nothing and handled nothing other than you seating in a Nigerian University and listening to a half asleep lecturer reading his notes to you.”
He spoke again with that candor I was beginning to appreciate.
“I did sir. I was the president of a youth development group in school, also was an executive in my department.
During my service year, I was very active in my MDG group and later became the president.” I replied.
“That is a good one” he said. You have scored some points there. You have experience in leadership and team work, you have organized and delivered projects, your communication skill has been groomed by those activities.
You have developed your negotiation skills when you wanted to convince your team to buy into your vision.
You have succeed in some ways and also failed and learned your lessons.
These are experiences that you should aptly frame into your CV.”
I was now grinning like a football player who just scored a goal.
“All you guys look at as experience is working behind a desk in an office. Anywhere you have taking responsibility for something is an experience.
What most companies want is someone that is hard working with an internal drive to achieve something. Not some lazy arse”
“Thank you sir. I really appreciate and would get to work immediately.”
“You better do, I will assist you with your work and then we will see what happens next. I have to go now. It was nice meeting you Kunle”
” Sir, this is a life changing meeting for me. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much”
“You are welcome Kunle, see you some other time.”
…To be continued
Author’s Note:
This is purely fictional and for personal development purposes. When you share do acknowledge @ohteehem …gracias!
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