Coming home

Hi everyone!

This is a special post to update you on my future plans. I have decided that I will come back to Cork early. I will be flying from JFK to Dublin on 11th November (arriving in Dublin on 12th).

Unfortunately I have faced one difficulty after another on my American adventure. After I applied for the visa, I intensified my job search greatly. However I didn't have anything confirmed when I went out to the US. This was a risk. After I hadn't found anything that I was interested in, I applied to any jobs that I was qualified for. I only got one call-back for a job in a bank in Wells Fargo in Minnesota. I was offered a job but I hadn't received my social security  card yet so I could not accept it (even though I could have legally worked without it). I returned back to New York and finally received my social security card after almost 5 weeks. I rang up the agency and they said that the job I was offered has been filled but there are many more jobs coming up shortly. I rang them every two days but nothing had come up.

It was then coming into October and most houses are rented from the 1st of each month so I took a chance and flew to Minnesota and rented a room for a month. I went into the agency and still they had no upcoming jobs. After a week and a half of no news, I knew that nothing would be confirmed before I had to commit to another month in the house. I had also contacted a few other people in the Irish community in the US and nothing had come up there either. Before I came, I said that if I had nothing confirmed after two months, I would return home and that is what I decided to do.

A number of things contributed to me not being able to get a job. At the beginning, I applied for jobs using my Irish address (when I was in Ireland) when I should have used a US address. I changed that towards the end but I may have missed out on a few opportunities because of it. Because of my Irish education though, the companies knew where I was from and so may have been reluctant to take someone who was on a visa (it could be too much hassle and I would only be there for 1 year, when they would have to pay to sponsor me). I was applying for policy jobs in the US so the companies may have preferred a graduate who studied public policy in America, rather than Europe. The economic climate is pretty bad here anyway. There is almost 10% unemployment and I met many American graduates (who went to good and expensive colleges) that could not find work themselves. The jobs that I was initially applying to were very competitive. People who are interested in policy here do internships in DC until they are hired by the company so even unpaid internships are difficult to get. I also realised that my broad economics degree is a bit of a disadvantage. I studied a little theory, policy, business, finance, maths and stats but the jobs that I was applying to were looking for someone with a concentration of one of these. If you know a bit of everything, you don't know any one thing very well. What I thought would be an advantage (in that I am technically qualified for many roles) turned out to be a disadvantage. I have noticed that many people study very specific things here for the Master's degrees (while their Bachelor's tend to be broad).

The visa I was on was another stumbling block. It was more restrictive than I realised. Once I found a job, I had to get the manager to fill out a form saying that my work is less than 20% clerical and that I am not just filling a labour force gap (I don't know how many employers would fill this up). This was also expected to be completed two weeks before I start work even though sometimes you may not meet the supervisor until you start. The manager should also come up with a training program especially for me and provide updates of my progress to my sponsoring group. The sponsoring group also said that I couldn't use a recruiter to get a job. I found out this after I made the commitment to go to Minnesota to wait for a job from a recruiter. Of course this isn't written anywhere on their website or booklets.

So you can see from the above that many things were working against me. If I had known what I know now, I wouldn't have flown out without a job confirmed. But I knew I was taking a risk when I came out here but that's life. Sometimes risks pay off, sometimes they don't. I still see my American adventure as a somewhat positive experience. I got to really experience the US in a way I didn't before. I met a lot of friendly and interesting people from all walks of life. I met a lot of friends that studied in UCC in previous years. I got to travel a little and will travel some more.

I still have almost a month left and I hope to make the most of it. I will stay in Minnesota for another week and meet up for a final time with some friends. I'll then head to Wisconsin, Missouri, Colorado and Kansas before heading back to Long Island for a few days before I head home.

Keep checking the blog and I'll see you soon!

Richard