As I’ve been busy lately working on my daughter’s EP album (can we still call a CD or collection of songs an album?), I’ve been trying to keep my chin up and stay focused as well on the job search. We all know how the economy affected a lot of people’s jobs, and it seems for every job posting out there, there are probably a few hundred or more people applying to each one.

That in itself makes job hunting tough, and add that as time goes on and the days, weeks and months of being jobless, one starts to lose steam, and in some cases become less selective. Even though I know applying for jobs I’m overqualified for will never get a response back from an employer, it seems the one’s I am very qualified for result in the same response — either zero or “Thanks for applying, however…”. So, I pretty much apply now for anything that suits my fancy — well, almost everything.

Which brings me to job boards and those listings. First, I don’t quite get why when applying for a job, and employer a) never responds back or b) waits months and months before they do.

Second, job listings and job boards. There are a LOT of job boards, which seem to be listing the same jobs. But, what gets me is how effective those boards really are. We all know of Dice, Monster (I have never gotten a response back from any job on Monster in the past umpteen years), Careerbuilder, and even, yep, Craigslist. To be fair, I’ve recently been getting a number of calls from recruiters from seeing my resumé on either Dice or Careerbuilder.

Which brings me to job postings and how serious is Craigslist as a job finding tool. Every so often, I go there to look for freelance work as I’m on the job hunt. Out of every freelance gig I’ve responded to, I get zip back. Okay, so much for that as a “fill in the spare time” resource. I remember when my phone was ringing off the hook to do freelance work.

Then I decided to check out the “real” jobs on Craigslist. According to their site, Craigslist has more page views than Careerbuilder or Monster. That means more people are looking at and most likely responding to ads on their site, which in turn one would think employers would put there ads there vs. the bigger more “professional” job boards.

As I perused the jobs on Craigslist, I was kind of shocked at what employers were listing as job requirements and the compensation they were willing to pay. For the most part, the majority of jobs I looked at required senior experience (good), tons of responsibility (okay), full time, client interaction, and so on. Then at the bottom of the ads are listed the salary. In most cases it was either $30-40k per year (what?), or $15 an hour (WHAT???). As an example I give you this ad, found here: http://sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/ofc/1521822417.html

a 6 year old company in Escondido, is in need of a production coordinator. The production coordinator (PC) will manage the entire audio production process for christianaudio.

There are four main parts to this position:

Production Management
manage key processes such as casting, quality control, reviewing manuscripts, checking pronunciations, and working with tight schedules to meet deadlines

Vendor management
manage key vendor relationships with narrators, QC reviewers, print publishers, and others.

Graphics and Printing Process Management
printing support, reviewing and proofing packaging material…

Data Management
Coordinate and manage distribution of data to trading partners, distributors, retailers, and web service providers

Post Production Process
getting books out to reviewers, copyright filings, and other finishing activities

Hours: Full-time (40) (a split / Part-time roll will be considered)

Necessary traits and abilities

Self-starter, friendly, process / detail oriented, task-driven, with strong follow-up skills, MS Excel, Word, Gmail, ability to multitask, point person handling the flow of various files and information, professional phone skills, deals well with deadlines.

Secondary needs
some graphics ability with Photoshop, Illustrator, and basic imaging programs

• Location: Escondido, CA
• Compensation: starting at $13. After satisfactory 90 day review raise to $15

Wow. $13 an hour. Where do I sign up? $13 an hour comes out to $27,040 a year if you work a full 40 a week. Being an hourly job, you actually only log 37.5 a week. After taxes, $13 an hour comes out to slightly less than unemployment. In fairness to the company, I did ask what kind of person they were looking for, and pointed out for the job requirements listed, the salary seemed extremely low.

In response, they did say they were looking for someone who is either a high school student or full time college student, and they want someone they can keep an eye on all day, who they expect will need a lot of hands on management. That explains the pay scale, but not the requirements. In any case, I do wish them the best in finding that right person (or persons).

It seems there are a lot of jobs like that on Craigslist — lots of requirements, minimal pay. Meanwhile, I’ll keep checking the job boards every now and then. Maybe that perfect job will pop up soon, I’ll get interviewed, hired, and be able to call myself part of the workforce once again.

• Random Thoughts