Jill's Journal: 'I'll let you know'

By: 
Jill Meier, Journal editor

Today’s job market certainly isn’t what it used to be.

I well remember applying for a variety of jobs, scoring a few interviews out of those applications, many times of which were followed up with a “Dear John” letter in the mail.

Was I disappointed? Probably yes.

Were there times I was relieved? Probably yes on that one, too.

With jobs aplenty these days – of course, depending on your skills, training and lifestyle desires – if you’re living, breathing and willing to show up and punch a timeclock, you’re hired.

I began my working career as a young teen, starting with the norm, babysitting. The pay – 50 cents an hour and more per hour with multiple kids – certainly wasn’t all that great, but things a young teen girl wanted back then weren’t all that expensive either. So, the pay somewhat matched my desires.

From my babysitting ventures, I branched out to walking beans for the Evers family. If I’m honest, the work wasn’t all that fun, but the perks of the job – they picked you up at your front door and delivered you home the same way along with supplying a cool soda and home-baked treats for the mid-morning break. And once the beanfields were cleared of weeds, they slapped a paycheck in your hand that came with a sincere, “Thank you for working with us.”

From the bean field I ventured over to the cornfield where I detasseled corn. The days were long, the work was tiring, but the paycheck was good and it was all the motivation that I needed to keep plucking the tassels off of one cornstalk after another.

Following my freshman year of high school, my dad mentioned to one of the local restaurant owners that I was looking for a part-time job. Without hesitation, Dick told my dad to send me in and he’d have an apron ready and waiting for me to learn all that I needed to know to put out plates of tasty food.

I held that job all the way through high school. Albeit the $1.30 an hour I started out making – plus the benefits of a small deduction per work shift for food costs and the ideal location of the restaurant alongside the lake where my friends and cute boys cruised by on their “whips” through town – I honestly enjoyed that job. I liked the people I worked with and worked for and interacting with “the regulars” that stopped by for endless cups of coffee. Plus, during the school year after the dinner rush was over and the kitchen was returned to order, we were allowed to do our homework. 

My next job came about the same way I snagged that job. My boss, Dick, had a friend that owned a steakhouse where I was going to college, and all I had to do was stop in and meet him, and the job was likely mine.

I did just that. And as promised, the job was mine.

There have been many more jobs along the way, but I make mention of these part-time positions after interviewing a potential intern from our local high school recently. After telling him about the job, what the job expectations would be and the promise of a paycheck – albeit a far cry from the buck-thirty an hour I was paid for my first Social Security number-required-for-tax-purposes-job – the young man told me, “I’ll let you know.”

Those four words have been stuck in my mind ever since.

“I’ll let you know.”

Those are four words that I can’t ever remember uttering to a potential employer nor should have uttered to a potential employer.

The next morning, I received an email from the young man. He thanked me for meeting with him, but shared that the job wasn’t what he thought it would be.

Perhaps it’s because the job actually entailed work. At a desk. In front oa computer screen. It requires some creativity, maturity, ability to take direction, teamwork, willingness to learn from a seasoned graphic artist, and of course, that all-important, showing up for the job.

I’m not ready to throw in the towel just yet in my attempt to bring on a high school student intern. I’m confident there’s a student somewhere in the confines of the local high school that may just be the kind of employee I’d be ecstatic to have on staff. 

I don’t have a crystal ball as to how long this vast supply of jobs is going to last, but with rising interest rates and the possibility of a recession setting in, the job market could be tightening up, of course, depending on skills, training and lifestyle desires.

And perhaps then, it will be employers such as myself that “will let you know.”

Category:

The Brandon Valley Journal

 

The Brandon Valley Journal
1404 E. Cedar St.
Brandon, SD 57005
(605) 582-9999

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