workplace Archives - Page 6 of 6 - The Voice of Job Seekers

How Can Underemployed Job Seekers Adapt to the New Workplace

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The underemployed face major obstacles in this job market. It’s hard to count under-employed job seekers and many statistically blends with the unemployed. Under-employment is a major obstacle and epidemic in our country. More than ever, unemployed job seekers are entering a new workplace with stresses such as lower salaries and taking positions lower than their education or previous experience. This episode will help you with some strategies and mindset to help underemployed job seekers adapt.

If you are currently underemployed, or unemployed, and expect to take pay cuts or a position that is lower than your last this is an episode for you. You may have graduated from college, and the position you accept only requires a high school diploma, this episode should be helpful. Let me know in the comments if you are challenged in any of the above scenarios.

I’d love your feedback in these three ways:

Blog: TheVoiceofJobSeekers.com (Use the send voicemail feature)

Email: [email protected]

Voicemail: 708.365.9822

Chaz Pitts-Kyser (@careeranista) is the founder and managing editor of Careernista.com, a diverse career site, with many contributors. She is also the author of Careeranista: The Woman’s Guide to Success After College. Chaz is quoted in many publications including Careerbuilder and Monster.

These are highlights from our discussion:

Chaz cited the numbers from the Employment Policy Institute 1 of 6 Americans are either unemployed or underemployed
People are regularly taking huge pay cuts going into their next position, and then add a side gig
One of the toughest adjustments is mental—coming off a long unemployment is hard to cope with the salary cuts, and downsizing their lifestyle
Unrealistic expectations, and a lack of research bring about problems outside of the workplace. Most Americans are spending more as they get more in salary, and do not consider spending less
We discuss ways the new employee (who has management experience) to work with managers that never managed someone with similar experience. How to not create a problematic situation in making suggestions respectfully
Chaz recommends expanding your vision to join committees that increase your exposure to show your experience and skills to more people throughout the company
We also discuss a few strategies that graduates and she help them by saying, “….your degree is not a magic wand.”
Chaz agrees that women adjust better to under-employment, but they do not negotiate. Even entry-level jobs are negotiable even if she recently graduated. Chaz’s book has a detailed chapter in her book about salary negotiation.

You want to check out the Facebook page for the new t-shirts that I will have an available in a couple of weeks. Let me know which ones you like the best. I have not announced a price yet, but I’d like to know your thoughts. I will announce pre-orders soon so stay tuned!

If you would do me a favor. Please go iTunes, and leave a review about the podcast. Your review will help the show’s visibility and reach job seekers that are looking for counsel and advice through podcast.

About Mark Anthony Dyson

I am the "The Voice of Job Seekers!" I offer compassionate career and job search advice as I hack and re-imagine the job search process. You need to be "the prescription to an employer's job description." You must be solution-oriented and work in positions in companies where you are the remedy. Your job search must be a lifestyle, and your career must be in front of you constantly. You can no longer shed your aspirations at the change seasons. There are strengths you have that need constant use and development. Be sure you sign up to download my E-Book, "421 Modern Job Search Tips 2021!" You can find my career advice and work in media outlets such as Forbes, Inc., Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, Glassdoor, and many other outlets.

The Values of Workplace Diversity and Inclusion

Editor’s note: Ivy Liu (@MandatoryPoster) is the guest writer today. Her website is easybusinessposters.com

One of the most heartening employment trends in recent years has been many employers’ movement growing towards giving lip service toward the complementary goals of diversity and inclusion in the workplace — whether led there by values of social justice or by the practical need to find qualified workers. After all, an increasingly competitive global market no longer leaves US employers with the luxury of excluding significant parts of the talent pool from their search.

As employers become more attuned to the need to select their workforces based on talent, even if it means looking in areas that may previously been overlooked. It is more important for employers to communicate the value of diversity and inclusion throughout their organizations. That means clearly conveying the message – not just in boilerplate statements in the annual report, but also as part of the day-to-day communications with managers, supervisors and human relations staff on how implementing these values brings practical benefits to the entire organization.

I want to suggest one way to show this. In any workplace, you will find bulletin boards displaying an array of government-required notices and posters. It may be some while since you’ve looked at them, but if you examine them carefully, you’d find they did more than merely serve notice of various state and federal labor law posters that employers must comply. In fact, in many of them, you’ll find the nation’s commitment to diversity and inclusion.

Admittedly, these notices of legal requirements don’t have the same classical or poetic resonance as phrases like “e pluribus unum” (Latin for “from out of many, one”) or the Declaration of Independence’s far ahead of its time and still-striking proclamation that we are all “created equal,” but the posters on their own prosaic way express the same values.

If you look beyond the bureaucratic-sounding boilerplate, perhaps you’ll see expressions that our nation is committed to fighting the injustice of unfair treatment on the basis of race, gender, nationality, religion, age, disability and other diversity and inclusion factors. You will find commitments to safety, health, equal pay and other factors that help create a decent workplace.

You may even find a surprise, as I recently did. As news accounts were breathlessly reporting and analyzing a recent Supreme Court’s decision allowing police to take DNA samples from those they arrest, I happened to notice an EEOC poster’s description of a 2009 law likely known to a few people, the Genetic Information Non-Discrimination Act. It bars employers from requiring workers to provide genetic data, treating them unequally based on such data, or disclosing such data to others.

The lesson I draw from the bulletin board posters is fairly basic: the values of diversity and inclusion in the workplace are not only issues of compliance with government mandates (although smart employers surely understand they need to pay attention to them on those grounds), but also ways to build better, more efficient and humane workplaces. Properly understood and carried out, these values will build mutual respect and understanding among co-workers, and make our nation a better, strong place.

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