Article for a Sunday supplement maybe - have a read and see what you think.

alfa beta

A few months ago I lost my job and encountered a bit of a problem. The problem centred around my attempt to find some sense in the fact that I’d spent years building up an array of skills, knowledge and experience in a particular field of endeavour only to find that these apparent assets had rather suddenly been rendered completely worthless by what was euphemistically termed ‘market forces’ – in other words, the work I did in this country could be done more cheaply somewhere else.

Of course there were the other problems that accompanied the loss of a job, like bills and food and stuff, but the big one was the psychological blow of being told – in a roundabout way – ‘thanks for everything, but as of today you’re of no use to us here at Smith and Jones Ltd, so off you go, toddle along now, that’s a good fellow…’

‘But hang on’, I could hear myself shouting in my own mind – pointlessly of course – ‘What about all the stuff I know about your product and how it’s made and marketed and the value I as a human being can add to your enterprise as a whole? Hey, what about that?’ The response to such a demand was of course already in the public domain and involved such well worn phrases as ‘global downturn’, ‘lack of demand’ and ‘necessary restructuring’. It could also be summed up in another well worn, but semantically much more accurate, phrase, that of: ‘Yeah, yeah, whatever….’

For weeks I pondered over the macro-economic theories that might have been regarded as the basis for my lack of value in the workforce. I thought, for example, of the incessant desire on the part of the consumer to demand cheaper goods and how this led inevitably to the movement of manufacturing operations from a country like ours to a country like…well, pick any one really, they’re all cheaper. Those damn consumers, I thought, they were the real reason. They were what lay behind my demise. I blamed them and their ignorant consuming habits over and over again until it was pointed out to me that I myself was in fact one of them and in blaming them I was blaming me, which of course only added to the worthlessness I felt, as it now became apparent that not only had I lost my job but I had actually contributed knowingly to that loss by doing things like shopping in Lidl and downloading Beyonce mp3’s from a cheeky little website that hadn’t paid for them in the first place. I mean, how was I to know!

In the end, when it came to that deeply rooted need to find someone to blame - because, lets face it, blaming myself wasn’t going to get me anywhere - I began to settle half-heartedly on a tenuous combination of ‘the government’ and ‘management’ alternating between the two on different days of the week depending on how I felt. Everyone else seemed to take comfort in pointing out the deficiencies of these two groups of people, so surely I should too. But it just didn’t feel convincing. What good did it do to lay the blame for my job loss on Brian Cowen’s shoulders – as if he didn’t have enough to be getting on with in the first place. It wasn’t as if I could ring him up and ask for my job back in any case, though to be honest I never tried that approach. As for management, well blaming them made even less sense. My job title had been ‘Account Manager’ which to all intents and purposes made me an integral part of ‘management’ – so, as was the case with my consumer theory, once again I found myself coming to the conclusion that the person to blame for my job loss was – well, me of all people! Which was a completely ridiculous conclusion, because it simply couldn’t have been true.

Or could it?

In a strange way, there was something about that conclusion that made a small tiny teeny bit of sense. It wasn’t that in blaming myself I was achieving something that could release me from my current situation and propel me into a bright new future. But rather, in not finding anyone else to blame convincingly I was slowly being forced to admit that the whole ‘blame’ concept was all a bit of a red herring. There were simply too many factors, too many people, too many interests and too many forces involved in placing me in my current environment - that of ‘on the dole’ - for me to single out one and say ‘that’s why.’

So, I gave up on the blame game and looked for another angle. And then it hit me. Like the proverbial bolt. And it was this. If you don’t have a job, it might be because there’s too many of you trying to do the same thing.

It was simple. It was all-encompassing. It was accurate. All in all it was a beautifully conceived philosophy and one that I instantly knew might well serve to extricate me from my current humble situation and deploy me with style back into the world of enterprise and employment – or what non-politicians like you and me call work. It was the answer to all my questions. And it was all based around one key element, that of ‘difference’. If you can’t get a job doing what you do, then do something a bit different and – here’s the important part – a bit different from everyone else.

But what?

Now that was the tricky bit. What skills could I draw upon to announce to the world that I was a new me, a completely reinvented and reinvigorated version of my former ordinary self. That I was an employable, valuable, in-demand entity, brimming with talent, overflowing with confidence and oozing with ability. Actually it was more than tricky. It was downright impossible. My self focussed SWOT analysis – for those of you with a marketing bent – began to look decidedly lopsided, unfortunately in the W and T directions. In fact my lack of natural talents, not to mention acquired skills, was almost immediately apparent when the first entry in my S or ‘Strengths’ box was ‘full, clean driving licence’ – and even then I was lying as I had actually picked up two points for a speeding offence a year before (just never told the wife so best keep it like that.)

In creating a brand new me I figured firstly that anything involving an actual skill was out of the question. The reason for this was quite simple: I had none. I had worked in ‘management’ remember, thus negating the need to actually be good at doing anything myself. I did have a particular penchant when it came to making sandwiches. That couldn’t be discounted. But in an era when even stalwarts like O’Brien’s Irish Sandwich Bars – to give them their full title - were finding the going tough, I was hardly going to make my fortune creating new and exciting combinations of meat, cheese and ancillary salad-based products between two slices of bread. That just wasn’t different enough.

So I racked my brains. (It took about ten minutes.) I thought ‘Rock Star’ but there was a little problem with that. I couldn’t sing or play the guitar, drums, bass or keyboard, and to be honest I didn’t really look the part either – not that that ever stopped Phil Collins. I thought ‘Inventor’ but having found myself constantly impressed by pretty much every entrant on Dragon’s Den I quickly ruled that out too, as obviously my standards when it came to new ideas and gadgets were seriously low. ‘Airline pilot’, now that would be cool, and it would only set me back a 100k to get trained up fully. Yup only 100k, oh well. I then crossed ‘Architect’ off my list - no work around. And ‘Lawyer’ – no aptitude for the job. ‘Share trader’ – no idea how. ‘Stay-at-home Dad’ – no kids. Good grief, where was I going to end up?

Slowly but surely I worked my way down the list of options….and I mean down. After crossing off ‘Sewage Pipe Unblocking Technician with a Hands-on Approach’ and ‘Body Double for Films Starring Tubby Men’ I came to ‘Writer’.

Now that was an interesting concept. I could string two sentences together. I’d done essays in school and sent emails to people from time to time – which they must have understood as they occasionally replied. I’d once read a whole book by Jeremy Clarkson and laughed at the lines where if he was reading them he’d pause and drop his voice an octave for dramatic effect. I even knew what the word ‘publisher’ meant. In fact, I figured I was just about ready to give this writing thing a shot and all I actually needed to really get started was a computer, a printer and a wadge of paper – or a ream as we, ahem, writers call it.

So now here I am a couple of weeks later, armed with a laptop that’s seen some seriously better days and an idea for a novel that I’ve plagiarised from an old Stephen King short story. I guess I’ll just pad it out by a few hundred pages, through in a raft of new characters, set my printer to ‘double line spacing’ and then my agent – I like saying that though of course I don’t have one – will do the rest. It’s simple. In fact, so simple I can’t believe I didn’t set about writing my masterpiece years ago.

But you know what the best bit about being a ‘writer’ is? The best bit is when people you meet at a party or in the pub say something like ‘and what do you do for a living?’ and you reply ‘I write’, they go ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ and actually appear to find this fact genuinely interesting. Funnily enough that never happened when I said ‘I’m an account manager in a promotional marketing company.’

I can only imagine their reaction if I ever get anything published. Well, it won’t be for the want of trying.

EileenG

It has possibilities, but not for a Sunday supplement. The last third is the best, I would start with that, and work from there.

Everything down to "But what?" could be cut. It doesn't give the reader anything useful, though some of the ideas, if rewritten, might be usable.

Sunday supplements tend to take pieces that involve a lot of information and interviews with several different people.

davyjose

It's just a little too introspective for me to be a Sunday newspaper article, or any kind of article really. you need a certain level of detachment from the situation TBH.

One of the greats in current opinion pieces is Johann Hari who writes for the Independent (British). He seems to carry the same level of gravity to his pieces as you do, but with the right perspective.

Another idea might be to use humour, like Rod Liddle from the Sunday Times -- i'm not quite sure why, but when you lace (read: douse) a personal article in humour, it's much more acceptable for the reader.

alfa beta

Constructive stuff there Eileen and Davy - thanks for that.

Thankfully the editorial staff at the Examiner don't seem to be quite as critical as you guys and I got an email back this morning saying they'll run the article (only sent it out to them at the same time as I posted here last night) - so that's the best I could really hope for with my first attempt at putting pen to paper in this way.

I'll certainly take on board your observations when I get round to scribbling another 'opinion' piece and will post here again to get your views.

Cheers

EileenG

Congratulations. How much are they paying you? Make sure they are paying the proper rate.

davyjose

alfa beta wrote: »

Constructive stuff there Eileen and Davy - thanks for that.

Thankfully the editorial staff at the Examiner don't seem to be quite as critical as you guys and I got an email back this morning saying they'll run the article (only sent it out to them at the same time as I posted here last night) - so that's the best I could really hope for with my first attempt at putting pen to paper in this way.

I'll certainly take on board your observations when I get round to scribbling another 'opinion' piece and will post here again to get your views.

Cheers

That's brilliant news

Well, if you've got a style that works, go with it. Ignore us. There are rules that count for 90% of situations, but that doesn't mean they can't be broken. Also (and I'm sure Eileen won't be offended by this) what the hell do we know? We're not the editor of the examiner. We're just folks trying to give the best advice we can.

Well done dude. Put a smile on my face, in what has been a good news-free week

JackFeeney

alfa beta wrote: »

A few months ago I lost my job and encountered a bit of a problem. The problem centred around my attempt to find some sense in the fact that I’d spent years building up an array of skills, knowledge and experience in a particular field of endeavour only to find that these apparent assets had rather suddenly been rendered completely worthless by what was euphemistically termed ‘market forces’ – in other words, the work I did in this country could be done more cheaply somewhere else.

Of course there were the other problems that accompanied the loss of a job, like bills and food and stuff, but the big one was the psychological blow of being told – in a roundabout way – ‘thanks for everything, but as of today you’re of no use to us here at Smith and Jones Ltd, so off you go, toddle along now, that’s a good fellow…’

‘But hang on’, I could hear myself shouting in my own mind – pointlessly of course – ‘What about all the stuff I know about your product and how it’s made and marketed and the value I as a human being can add to your enterprise as a whole? Hey, what about that?’ The response to such a demand was of course already in the public domain and involved such well worn phrases as ‘global downturn’, ‘lack of demand’ and ‘necessary restructuring’. It could also be summed up in another well worn, but semantically much more accurate, phrase, that of: ‘Yeah, yeah, whatever….’

For weeks I pondered over the macro-economic theories that might have been regarded as the basis for my lack of value in the workforce. I thought, for example, of the incessant desire on the part of the consumer to demand cheaper goods and how this led inevitably to the movement of manufacturing operations from a country like ours to a country like…well, pick any one really, they’re all cheaper. Those damn consumers, I thought, they were the real reason. They were what lay behind my demise. I blamed them and their ignorant consuming habits over and over again until it was pointed out to me that I myself was in fact one of them and in blaming them I was blaming me, which of course only added to the worthlessness I felt, as it now became apparent that not only had I lost my job but I had actually contributed knowingly to that loss by doing things like shopping in Lidl and downloading Beyonce mp3’s from a cheeky little website that hadn’t paid for them in the first place. I mean, how was I to know!

In the end, when it came to that deeply rooted need to find someone to blame - because, lets face it, blaming myself wasn’t going to get me anywhere - I began to settle half-heartedly on a tenuous combination of ‘the government’ and ‘management’ alternating between the two on different days of the week depending on how I felt. Everyone else seemed to take comfort in pointing out the deficiencies of these two groups of people, so surely I should too. But it just didn’t feel convincing. What good did it do to lay the blame for my job loss on Brian Cowen’s shoulders – as if he didn’t have enough to be getting on with in the first place. It wasn’t as if I could ring him up and ask for my job back in any case, though to be honest I never tried that approach. As for management, well blaming them made even less sense. My job title had been ‘Account Manager’ which to all intents and purposes made me an integral part of ‘management’ – so, as was the case with my consumer theory, once again I found myself coming to the conclusion that the person to blame for my job loss was – well, me of all people! Which was a completely ridiculous conclusion, because it simply couldn’t have been true.

Or could it?

In a strange way, there was something about that conclusion that made a small tiny teeny bit of sense. It wasn’t that in blaming myself I was achieving something that could release me from my current situation and propel me into a bright new future. But rather, in not finding anyone else to blame convincingly I was slowly being forced to admit that the whole ‘blame’ concept was all a bit of a red herring. There were simply too many factors, too many people, too many interests and too many forces involved in placing me in my current environment - that of ‘on the dole’ - for me to single out one and say ‘that’s why.’

So, I gave up on the blame game and looked for another angle. And then it hit me. Like the proverbial bolt. And it was this. If you don’t have a job, it might be because there’s too many of you trying to do the same thing.

It was simple. It was all-encompassing. It was accurate. All in all it was a beautifully conceived philosophy and one that I instantly knew might well serve to extricate me from my current humble situation and deploy me with style back into the world of enterprise and employment – or what non-politicians like you and me call work. It was the answer to all my questions. And it was all based around one key element, that of ‘difference’. If you can’t get a job doing what you do, then do something a bit different and – here’s the important part – a bit different from everyone else.

But what?

Now that was the tricky bit. What skills could I draw upon to announce to the world that I was a new me, a completely reinvented and reinvigorated version of my former ordinary self. That I was an employable, valuable, in-demand entity, brimming with talent, overflowing with confidence and oozing with ability. Actually it was more than tricky. It was downright impossible. My self focussed SWOT analysis – for those of you with a marketing bent – began to look decidedly lopsided, unfortunately in the W and T directions. In fact my lack of natural talents, not to mention acquired skills, was almost immediately apparent when the first entry in my S or ‘Strengths’ box was ‘full, clean driving licence’ – and even then I was lying as I had actually picked up two points for a speeding offence a year before (just never told the wife so best keep it like that.)

In creating a brand new me I figured firstly that anything involving an actual skill was out of the question. The reason for this was quite simple: I had none. I had worked in ‘management’ remember, thus negating the need to actually be good at doing anything myself. I did have a particular penchant when it came to making sandwiches. That couldn’t be discounted. But in an era when even stalwarts like O’Brien’s Irish Sandwich Bars – to give them their full title - were finding the going tough, I was hardly going to make my fortune creating new and exciting combinations of meat, cheese and ancillary salad-based products between two slices of bread. That just wasn’t different enough.

So I racked my brains. (It took about ten minutes.) I thought ‘Rock Star’ but there was a little problem with that. I couldn’t sing or play the guitar, drums, bass or keyboard, and to be honest I didn’t really look the part either – not that that ever stopped Phil Collins. I thought ‘Inventor’ but having found myself constantly impressed by pretty much every entrant on Dragon’s Den I quickly ruled that out too, as obviously my standards when it came to new ideas and gadgets were seriously low. ‘Airline pilot’, now that would be cool, and it would only set me back a 100k to get trained up fully. Yup only 100k, oh well. I then crossed ‘Architect’ off my list - no work around. And ‘Lawyer’ – no aptitude for the job. ‘Share trader’ – no idea how. ‘Stay-at-home Dad’ – no kids. Good grief, where was I going to end up?

Slowly but surely I worked my way down the list of options….and I mean down. After crossing off ‘Sewage Pipe Unblocking Technician with a Hands-on Approach’ and ‘Body Double for Films Starring Tubby Men’ I came to ‘Writer’.

Now that was an interesting concept. I could string two sentences together. I’d done essays in school and sent emails to people from time to time – which they must have understood as they occasionally replied. I’d once read a whole book by Jeremy Clarkson and laughed at the lines where if he was reading them he’d pause and drop his voice an octave for dramatic effect. I even knew what the word ‘publisher’ meant. In fact, I figured I was just about ready to give this writing thing a shot and all I actually needed to really get started was a computer, a printer and a wadge of paper – or a ream as we, ahem, writers call it.

So now here I am a couple of weeks later, armed with a laptop that’s seen some seriously better days and an idea for a novel that I’ve plagiarised from an old Stephen King short story. I guess I’ll just pad it out by a few hundred pages, through in a raft of new characters, set my printer to ‘double line spacing’ and then my agent – I like saying that though of course I don’t have one – will do the rest. It’s simple. In fact, so simple I can’t believe I didn’t set about writing my masterpiece years ago.

But you know what the best bit about being a ‘writer’ is? The best bit is when people you meet at a party or in the pub say something like ‘and what do you do for a living?’ and you reply ‘I write’, they go ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ and actually appear to find this fact genuinely interesting. Funnily enough that never happened when I said ‘I’m an account manager in a promotional marketing company.’

I can only imagine their reaction if I ever get anything published. Well, it won’t be for the want of trying.

Dear Alfa,

Good piece and well written. The story itself was very close to my own. You should get yourself a copy of the current 'Writers and Artists Yearbook' which details all contact details for copy submission in magazines, newspapers, etc.

Is is tough to make a decent living in freelance but not impossible. In relation to the book - Go for it. The best advice I ever got was from a best-selling author and was.... '|Just Write the f...... Thing!

I did and it was published a year later.

Below are some interesting 'writing' quotes from quotations.com

Jules Renard (1864 - 1910)
Writing is the only profession where no one considers you ridiculous if you earn no money.
Jules Renard (1864 - 1910)Thus, in a real sense, I am constantly writing autobiography, but I have to turn it into fiction in order to give it credibility.
Katherine Paterson, The Spying Heart, 1989The only reason for being a professional writer is that you can't help it.

Best of luck but never give up,

All the best, Jack.

Antilles

Gah, OP, I read through the first few replies and wanted to add my comment but didn't have time earlier. I really like your writing style, and the piece was great. I'm so happy for you to get it published (and on the first try too!)

DublinWriter

Sorry if this sounds harsh, but here's a couple of points:

1. It's an opinion piece. Are you famous? Are you in the public eye? If not, forget about writing non-commissioned opinion pieces for the Sundays...it's too subjective.

2. It's too long. The sub-editors for the Sundays that I've written for would scream if I went over 1,000 words.

3. Paragraph structure. What looks good in MS-Word doesn't necessarily look good when proofed up for a broadsheet. Max two sentences per paragraph and keep them punchy and to the point.

4. Phil Collins can actually play the drums, and is his day was one of the most versatile players around.

5. Keep trying, you've got a kernel of talent there.

6. Read George Orwell's 5 Rules for Effective Writing - people take MA courses in journalism and they wouldn't have learned as much.

Antilles

OP, two questions.

First, out of interest, did you submit this cold to the editor or go through a standard "external submissions" process for the Examiner?

Second, when is your piece being published? As sad as I might sound, I'd get a kick out of reading it in print

Raiser

Congratulations OP - am delighted for you - I'm a bit surprised at some of the above comments; there seems to be a 'before and after' effect taking place here where people have, lets say, gracefully revised their learned opinions subsequent to your success.

Your piece is relevant, timely and probably exceeds the standard of writing printed each weekend in most of the Sunday papers.

DublinWriter

Raiser wrote: »

Congratulations OP - am delighted for you - I'm a bit surprised at some of the above comments; there seems to be a 'before and after' effect taking place here where people have, lets say, gracefully revised their learned opinions subsequent to your success.

Success? I didn't see the article published?

alfa beta

Hi Dublin Writer. Thanks for the advice you gave in the above points. Very interesting and helpful - especially the stuff about overall length and formatting for newspaper column size.

Must pick up Orwells book.

(By the way, the Phil Collins ref was in regard to 'rock star looks' alone - and not his obvious talent and ability - good point though - need to reword that line to ensure the right meaning is conveyed.)

Also, with regard to your second post, you're right it's not been published yet. The sub-editor has come back to me with some queries around who my employers were and whether we might be stepping on toes by running the piece etc (This is something I hadn't really considered, even from my own point of view). But 'Success' is relative. And while a 'we're interested' reply from an editor may not ensure publication (and may indeed be the very least an experienced writer would expect), at least it gives me the confidence to know that someone actually read beyond the first few lines and saw enough merit in the piece to send me an email. For me, that in itself represents a 'success' (is that sad or what!!!)

To be honest, even the fact that a number of more experienced writers (like yourself) have read the piece here on this forum and offered constructive advice has proved incredibly useful. I'm not going to claim I know how to write or that I have any idea how the system works or that everything I scribble deserves to be published - but in listening to people like you, Eileen, Davy, Jack and others, I may someday be able to come a lot closer to claiming those things.

In the meantime you'll find me beavering away here, working as hard as I can towards achieving that - mainly by taking on board all the advice I can get.

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions guys - appreciate them.
AB

Raiser

DublinWriter wrote: »

Success? I didn't see the article published?

I'm sorry Dublinwriter but the above sentiment portrays you in a very poor light......

Alfa Beta was obviously delighted and affirmed by that piece of correspondence - I was just offering my congratulations, while you seemingly have a multitude of paper cuts from rifling through Sundays bulk pulp in some dark and haunted episode of Shadenfreude.

Can you not just be happy for your one-time protégé? Or can you really not stand to see your wisdom utterly contradicted by a series of actual real life events?

- Why not write a redemptive piece below this where the Villain repents and offers the Hero of the tale a belated but heartfelt apology along with his humble congratulations?

alfa beta

Ah Raiser - that's a little harsh

Dublinwriter's advice re paragraph length (and formatting in word) and his/her endorsement of Orwell's book are both helpful recommendations in my view.

Now, lets not turn this thread into one of those petty bickering contests that so many deviate into!!!

AB

afaphoenix

alfa beta wrote: »

A few months ago I lost my job and encountered a bit of a problem. The problem centred around my attempt to find some sense in the fact that I’d spent years building up an array of skills, knowledge and experience in a particular field of endeavour only to find that these apparent assets had rather suddenly been rendered completely worthless by what was euphemistically termed ‘market forces’ – in other words, the work I did in this country could be done more cheaply somewhere else.

Of course there were the other problems that accompanied the loss of a job, like bills and food and stuff, but the big one was the psychological blow of being told – in a roundabout way – ‘thanks for everything, but as of today you’re of no use to us here at Smith and Jones Ltd, so off you go, toddle along now, that’s a good fellow…’

‘But hang on’, I could hear myself shouting in my own mind – pointlessly of course – ‘What about all the stuff I know about your product and how it’s made and marketed and the value I as a human being can add to your enterprise as a whole? Hey, what about that?’ The response to such a demand was of course already in the public domain and involved such well worn phrases as ‘global downturn’, ‘lack of demand’ and ‘necessary restructuring’. It could also be summed up in another well worn, but semantically much more accurate, phrase, that of: ‘Yeah, yeah, whatever….’

For weeks I pondered over the macro-economic theories that might have been regarded as the basis for my lack of value in the workforce. I thought, for example, of the incessant desire on the part of the consumer to demand cheaper goods and how this led inevitably to the movement of manufacturing operations from a country like ours to a country like…well, pick any one really, they’re all cheaper. Those damn consumers, I thought, they were the real reason. They were what lay behind my demise. I blamed them and their ignorant consuming habits over and over again until it was pointed out to me that I myself was in fact one of them and in blaming them I was blaming me, which of course only added to the worthlessness I felt, as it now became apparent that not only had I lost my job but I had actually contributed knowingly to that loss by doing things like shopping in Lidl and downloading Beyonce mp3’s from a cheeky little website that hadn’t paid for them in the first place. I mean, how was I to know!

In the end, when it came to that deeply rooted need to find someone to blame - because, lets face it, blaming myself wasn’t going to get me anywhere - I began to settle half-heartedly on a tenuous combination of ‘the government’ and ‘management’ alternating between the two on different days of the week depending on how I felt. Everyone else seemed to take comfort in pointing out the deficiencies of these two groups of people, so surely I should too. But it just didn’t feel convincing. What good did it do to lay the blame for my job loss on Brian Cowen’s shoulders – as if he didn’t have enough to be getting on with in the first place. It wasn’t as if I could ring him up and ask for my job back in any case, though to be honest I never tried that approach. As for management, well blaming them made even less sense. My job title had been ‘Account Manager’ which to all intents and purposes made me an integral part of ‘management’ – so, as was the case with my consumer theory, once again I found myself coming to the conclusion that the person to blame for my job loss was – well, me of all people! Which was a completely ridiculous conclusion, because it simply couldn’t have been true.

Or could it?

In a strange way, there was something about that conclusion that made a small tiny teeny bit of sense. It wasn’t that in blaming myself I was achieving something that could release me from my current situation and propel me into a bright new future. But rather, in not finding anyone else to blame convincingly I was slowly being forced to admit that the whole ‘blame’ concept was all a bit of a red herring. There were simply too many factors, too many people, too many interests and too many forces involved in placing me in my current environment - that of ‘on the dole’ - for me to single out one and say ‘that’s why.’

So, I gave up on the blame game and looked for another angle. And then it hit me. Like the proverbial bolt. And it was this. If you don’t have a job, it might be because there’s too many of you trying to do the same thing.

It was simple. It was all-encompassing. It was accurate. All in all it was a beautifully conceived philosophy and one that I instantly knew might well serve to extricate me from my current humble situation and deploy me with style back into the world of enterprise and employment – or what non-politicians like you and me call work. It was the answer to all my questions. And it was all based around one key element, that of ‘difference’. If you can’t get a job doing what you do, then do something a bit different and – here’s the important part – a bit different from everyone else.

But what?

Now that was the tricky bit. What skills could I draw upon to announce to the world that I was a new me, a completely reinvented and reinvigorated version of my former ordinary self. That I was an employable, valuable, in-demand entity, brimming with talent, overflowing with confidence and oozing with ability. Actually it was more than tricky. It was downright impossible. My self focussed SWOT analysis – for those of you with a marketing bent – began to look decidedly lopsided, unfortunately in the W and T directions. In fact my lack of natural talents, not to mention acquired skills, was almost immediately apparent when the first entry in my S or ‘Strengths’ box was ‘full, clean driving licence’ – and even then I was lying as I had actually picked up two points for a speeding offence a year before (just never told the wife so best keep it like that.)

In creating a brand new me I figured firstly that anything involving an actual skill was out of the question. The reason for this was quite simple: I had none. I had worked in ‘management’ remember, thus negating the need to actually be good at doing anything myself. I did have a particular penchant when it came to making sandwiches. That couldn’t be discounted. But in an era when even stalwarts like O’Brien’s Irish Sandwich Bars – to give them their full title - were finding the going tough, I was hardly going to make my fortune creating new and exciting combinations of meat, cheese and ancillary salad-based products between two slices of bread. That just wasn’t different enough.

So I racked my brains. (It took about ten minutes.) I thought ‘Rock Star’ but there was a little problem with that. I couldn’t sing or play the guitar, drums, bass or keyboard, and to be honest I didn’t really look the part either – not that that ever stopped Phil Collins. I thought ‘Inventor’ but having found myself constantly impressed by pretty much every entrant on Dragon’s Den I quickly ruled that out too, as obviously my standards when it came to new ideas and gadgets were seriously low. ‘Airline pilot’, now that would be cool, and it would only set me back a 100k to get trained up fully. Yup only 100k, oh well. I then crossed ‘Architect’ off my list - no work around. And ‘Lawyer’ – no aptitude for the job. ‘Share trader’ – no idea how. ‘Stay-at-home Dad’ – no kids. Good grief, where was I going to end up?

Slowly but surely I worked my way down the list of options….and I mean down. After crossing off ‘Sewage Pipe Unblocking Technician with a Hands-on Approach’ and ‘Body Double for Films Starring Tubby Men’ I came to ‘Writer’.

Now that was an interesting concept. I could string two sentences together. I’d done essays in school and sent emails to people from time to time – which they must have understood as they occasionally replied. I’d once read a whole book by Jeremy Clarkson and laughed at the lines where if he was reading them he’d pause and drop his voice an octave for dramatic effect. I even knew what the word ‘publisher’ meant. In fact, I figured I was just about ready to give this writing thing a shot and all I actually needed to really get started was a computer, a printer and a wadge of paper – or a ream as we, ahem, writers call it.

So now here I am a couple of weeks later, armed with a laptop that’s seen some seriously better days and an idea for a novel that I’ve plagiarised from an old Stephen King short story. I guess I’ll just pad it out by a few hundred pages, through in a raft of new characters, set my printer to ‘double line spacing’ and then my agent – I like saying that though of course I don’t have one – will do the rest. It’s simple. In fact, so simple I can’t believe I didn’t set about writing my masterpiece years ago.

But you know what the best bit about being a ‘writer’ is? The best bit is when people you meet at a party or in the pub say something like ‘and what do you do for a living?’ and you reply ‘I write’, they go ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ and actually appear to find this fact genuinely interesting. Funnily enough that never happened when I said ‘I’m an account manager in a promotional marketing company.’

I can only imagine their reaction if I ever get anything published. Well, it won’t be for the want of trying.

Excellent article, I would try specialist magazines
Regards
A

lilywhites1982

Some of the people on boards are constantly looking on the negative side of things and seem to be afraid or highly reluctant to be positive about anything. I think the article is great, humorous and very topical. Best of luck with it mon amigo!! Let us know when it will be published so we can buy a copy

treasher

alfa beta wrote: »

A few months ago I lost my job and encountered a bit of a problem. The problem centred around my attempt to find some sense in the fact that I’d spent years building up an array of skills, knowledge and experience in a particular field of endeavour only to find that these apparent assets had rather suddenly been rendered completely worthless by what was euphemistically termed ‘market forces’ – in other words, the work I did in this country could be done more cheaply somewhere else.

Of course there were the other problems that accompanied the loss of a job, like bills and food and stuff, but the big one was the psychological blow of being told – in a roundabout way – ‘thanks for everything, but as of today you’re of no use to us here at Smith and Jones Ltd, so off you go, toddle along now, that’s a good fellow…’

‘But hang on’, I could hear myself shouting in my own mind – pointlessly of course – ‘What about all the stuff I know about your product and how it’s made and marketed and the value I as a human being can add to your enterprise as a whole? Hey, what about that?’ The response to such a demand was of course already in the public domain and involved such well worn phrases as ‘global downturn’, ‘lack of demand’ and ‘necessary restructuring’. It could also be summed up in another well worn, but semantically much more accurate, phrase, that of: ‘Yeah, yeah, whatever….’

For weeks I pondered over the macro-economic theories that might have been regarded as the basis for my lack of value in the workforce. I thought, for example, of the incessant desire on the part of the consumer to demand cheaper goods and how this led inevitably to the movement of manufacturing operations from a country like ours to a country like…well, pick any one really, they’re all cheaper. Those damn consumers, I thought, they were the real reason. They were what lay behind my demise. I blamed them and their ignorant consuming habits over and over again until it was pointed out to me that I myself was in fact one of them and in blaming them I was blaming me, which of course only added to the worthlessness I felt, as it now became apparent that not only had I lost my job but I had actually contributed knowingly to that loss by doing things like shopping in Lidl and downloading Beyonce mp3’s from a cheeky little website that hadn’t paid for them in the first place. I mean, how was I to know!

In the end, when it came to that deeply rooted need to find someone to blame - because, lets face it, blaming myself wasn’t going to get me anywhere - I began to settle half-heartedly on a tenuous combination of ‘the government’ and ‘management’ alternating between the two on different days of the week depending on how I felt. Everyone else seemed to take comfort in pointing out the deficiencies of these two groups of people, so surely I should too. But it just didn’t feel convincing. What good did it do to lay the blame for my job loss on Brian Cowen’s shoulders – as if he didn’t have enough to be getting on with in the first place. It wasn’t as if I could ring him up and ask for my job back in any case, though to be honest I never tried that approach. As for management, well blaming them made even less sense. My job title had been ‘Account Manager’ which to all intents and purposes made me an integral part of ‘management’ – so, as was the case with my consumer theory, once again I found myself coming to the conclusion that the person to blame for my job loss was – well, me of all people! Which was a completely ridiculous conclusion, because it simply couldn’t have been true.

Or could it?

In a strange way, there was something about that conclusion that made a small tiny teeny bit of sense. It wasn’t that in blaming myself I was achieving something that could release me from my current situation and propel me into a bright new future. But rather, in not finding anyone else to blame convincingly I was slowly being forced to admit that the whole ‘blame’ concept was all a bit of a red herring. There were simply too many factors, too many people, too many interests and too many forces involved in placing me in my current environment - that of ‘on the dole’ - for me to single out one and say ‘that’s why.’

So, I gave up on the blame game and looked for another angle. And then it hit me. Like the proverbial bolt. And it was this. If you don’t have a job, it might be because there’s too many of you trying to do the same thing.

It was simple. It was all-encompassing. It was accurate. All in all it was a beautifully conceived philosophy and one that I instantly knew might well serve to extricate me from my current humble situation and deploy me with style back into the world of enterprise and employment – or what non-politicians like you and me call work. It was the answer to all my questions. And it was all based around one key element, that of ‘difference’. If you can’t get a job doing what you do, then do something a bit different and – here’s the important part – a bit different from everyone else.

But what?

Now that was the tricky bit. What skills could I draw upon to announce to the world that I was a new me, a completely reinvented and reinvigorated version of my former ordinary self. That I was an employable, valuable, in-demand entity, brimming with talent, overflowing with confidence and oozing with ability. Actually it was more than tricky. It was downright impossible. My self focussed SWOT analysis – for those of you with a marketing bent – began to look decidedly lopsided, unfortunately in the W and T directions. In fact my lack of natural talents, not to mention acquired skills, was almost immediately apparent when the first entry in my S or ‘Strengths’ box was ‘full, clean driving licence’ – and even then I was lying as I had actually picked up two points for a speeding offence a year before (just never told the wife so best keep it like that.)

In creating a brand new me I figured firstly that anything involving an actual skill was out of the question. The reason for this was quite simple: I had none. I had worked in ‘management’ remember, thus negating the need to actually be good at doing anything myself. I did have a particular penchant when it came to making sandwiches. That couldn’t be discounted. But in an era when even stalwarts like O’Brien’s Irish Sandwich Bars – to give them their full title - were finding the going tough, I was hardly going to make my fortune creating new and exciting combinations of meat, cheese and ancillary salad-based products between two slices of bread. That just wasn’t different enough.

So I racked my brains. (It took about ten minutes.) I thought ‘Rock Star’ but there was a little problem with that. I couldn’t sing or play the guitar, drums, bass or keyboard, and to be honest I didn’t really look the part either – not that that ever stopped Phil Collins. I thought ‘Inventor’ but having found myself constantly impressed by pretty much every entrant on Dragon’s Den I quickly ruled that out too, as obviously my standards when it came to new ideas and gadgets were seriously low. ‘Airline pilot’, now that would be cool, and it would only set me back a 100k to get trained up fully. Yup only 100k, oh well. I then crossed ‘Architect’ off my list - no work around. And ‘Lawyer’ – no aptitude for the job. ‘Share trader’ – no idea how. ‘Stay-at-home Dad’ – no kids. Good grief, where was I going to end up?

Slowly but surely I worked my way down the list of options….and I mean down. After crossing off ‘Sewage Pipe Unblocking Technician with a Hands-on Approach’ and ‘Body Double for Films Starring Tubby Men’ I came to ‘Writer’.

Now that was an interesting concept. I could string two sentences together. I’d done essays in school and sent emails to people from time to time – which they must have understood as they occasionally replied. I’d once read a whole book by Jeremy Clarkson and laughed at the lines where if he was reading them he’d pause and drop his voice an octave for dramatic effect. I even knew what the word ‘publisher’ meant. In fact, I figured I was just about ready to give this writing thing a shot and all I actually needed to really get started was a computer, a printer and a wadge of paper – or a ream as we, ahem, writers call it.

So now here I am a couple of weeks later, armed with a laptop that’s seen some seriously better days and an idea for a novel that I’ve plagiarised from an old Stephen King short story. I guess I’ll just pad it out by a few hundred pages, through in a raft of new characters, set my printer to ‘double line spacing’ and then my agent – I like saying that though of course I don’t have one – will do the rest. It’s simple. In fact, so simple I can’t believe I didn’t set about writing my masterpiece years ago.

But you know what the best bit about being a ‘writer’ is? The best bit is when people you meet at a party or in the pub say something like ‘and what do you do for a living?’ and you reply ‘I write’, they go ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ and actually appear to find this fact genuinely interesting. Funnily enough that never happened when I said ‘I’m an account manager in a promotional marketing company.’

I can only imagine their reaction if I ever get anything published. Well, it won’t be for the want of trying.

I like it and I think you should keep writing in a sort of diary style about your experiences on being unemployed and in trying to restart you life/career. Keep it light and funny. I like to do a bit of writing myself so maybe it would encourage others like me to do something similar. How do you actually send these things off.......?
Best of luck, Treasher

EileenG

Have a very clear idea in mind of what you are going to write, how long it will be (my advice, whatever number you pick, halve it, shorter and tighter is better), when you can have it by and what paper you think it is most suitable for. Then ring the editor responsible for that section and talk to him or her about it. See if they are interested, what the copy date is, how they would like it presented, and what they will pay if they print it.

Watch out for it, and as soon as you see it in print, send an invoice.

treasher

EileenG wrote: »

Have a very clear idea in mind of what you are going to write, how long it will be (my advice, whatever number you pick, halve it, shorter and tighter is better), when you can have it by and what paper you think it is most suitable for. Then ring the editor responsible for that section and talk to him or her about it. See if they are interested, what the copy date is, how they would like it presented, and what they will pay if they print it.

Watch out for it, and as soon as you see it in print, send an invoice.

Thanks. I'll bite the bullet and give it a go. I am always writing things in my head anyway so I might as well put it on paper.
regards, treasher

blacon9

Well written, but i agree with the first comment, the last third of it is the best, and ive realised why. Your writing gets a bit easier to read the further through the article you go and then starts seeming more natural, as if it's you talking and not you trying to impress the reader with a large vocab range.

I suggest editing up the start of it to be a bit more like the ending, simple and easy to read, as it would appeal to a larger crowd then and would flow better.