My husband and I were talking about how it can be difficult looking and applying for jobs. Currently our DIL is on the job hunt after her recovery from cancer surgery and chemo.
That reminded me of when I moved to Palm Springs to get married. I was perfectly content to spend my days soaking up the sun, floating on an air mattress in the apartment complex’s pool, when my hubby said I needed to help out and get a job.
My husband said, “I’ve been there and it sure can be tough finding a job.”
He had been literally pounding the pavement for a job and finally got hired.
As a journalism major, I applied to the local newspaper, The Desert Sun, to be a reporter.
I went through an interview process that took a few weeks, including literacy and writing tests.
My husband suggested that while I was waiting, I interview at a few more places like local radio stations where he had connections.
Then sitting one day sitting by the pool, the phone rang. My husband said it was for me.
It was a man named Cliff Brown from Cliff Brown and Associates, a PR firm located in the Bob Hope building at the local medical center. Cliff asked me to come in for an interview. I had never applied there. It turns out he was too cheap for classified ads, so on his daily trip to The Desert Sun to drop off press releases and photos, he rifled through their employment files. He pulled out my application and resume and called me. I was hired the next day.
My husband shook his head and said, “That’s now how it works!”
I told my husband that yes, that was how my first PR job in Seattle worked. I was working in a hotel restaurant as a waitress through college and one of my regular customers asked me what my degree was in. He asked me on the spot to come work for his company, which was a Native Alaskan fishing and timber company. They needed a brochure and other material. I worked there until the Seattle office closed down and I met my future husband.
How did you get your first career job? Did you have to send out resumes and pound the pavement?
