For those of us who are on furlough, and havent heard anything from their employers: Are you applying to jobs while on unemployment?
While I know technically we are supposed to be applying to jobs while on unemployment, I personally haven’t. It seems like a wasted effort to me, right now, and I am still hoping that I will be brought back on.
I feel the same way. Though, I have been casually searching on the internet , including outside of NYC. I can tell you now that I haven’t found much regarding design work (not sure what fashion division you work in).
So I feel you, it seems like a waste of time since there’s not much out there anyway
Women’s apparel design in NYC - so it feels super “non-essential”.
I was casually looking, with the same mindset, but then my company kept extending furlough, and I started catching the hint, that maybe things werent going so good. I suggest to keep communicating with management. At my place, they went mute, which was a huge hint.
Some employers just don’t know what to tell their furloughed employees. As of today, we don’t even know if the federal kick-in to unemployment is going to be extended or not.
I am looking for new opportunities while on unemployment as am ready for changes.
I don’t think anyone knows what’s going on. Once schools open (or don’t open) in September, there will be a domino effect. Who is going back to work? Who is going to stay home with the kids? Will we be working from home? Will we go back to the office? Companies will better know which employees are able to come back and act accordingly. Consumers will better know if they need to do fall shopping or not (kids back to school and adults buying work pants vs new pj’s etc).
i reached out to a recruiter i’m friendly w/ (she works with many different companies in LA) to ask if there are any actual jobs or if the listings i’m seeing everywhere are old. she said prior to the 2nd shutdown, jobs were increasing but now it’s pretty bleak again. honestly, as someone who was laid off in may due to covid, i’m just half-assedly applying to whatever listings are open, knowing that they won’t most likely won’t contact me.
also, beware - i’ve come across at least two scams from listings on ziprecruiter; the 1st was obvious as heck but the 2nd i could only confirm after i visited the linkedin page of the woman i was “scheduled” to meet with via video conference. she was already aware of the scam using her name (but not her real actual contact info) and posted about it on her LI timeline.
With respect to @selenster 's post, two things people need to look out for with job listing scams.
Job listings that ask for your SS#, Routing #, or anything else that can be used to attack your finances.
Job listings that require an investment by the job seeker to get started.
Be sure to avoid these two scenarios at all costs.
good points! fortunately for me those were not the situation. what i will stress is if the email is something like “company.HR@gmail.com” instead of “xyz@company.com” (ie: gmail instead of an internal company email) is a HUGE giveaway. also, these two “jobs” asked me to contact them first, which did trigger some suspicion because i’ve never worked any recruiter who asks me to contact them first - if they want to interview/hire you, they contact first.
Probably a phishing scam. Smart that you stayed away.
I’ve been furloughed twice, first time with a return date and the second time without return date, I’m moving forward with a new search. This is an interesting time but I think it might end up being a variety of part-time/freelance jobs versus one main employer.
I’ve been furloughed for 5 months with no contact from my team who is still working and minimal contact with HR (they’ve only contacted me to collect money.) I’ve been casually searching here and there and have had two companies reach out but I don’t think I’ll be going back to my employer. So when I’m ready I’ll put more effort into searching for freelance gigs.
I’ve been furloughed for five months and no contact what soever from my employer. at first I applied for job i wasn’t qualified for to ensure I didn’t get a call back because I was waiting for my employer to call us back. unfortunately i haven’t heard back any my unemployment benefits are gonna run out soon. This week I’ve started really job hunting and i have a few interviews…Lets see how it goes.
I finally was let go after 5 months.
I would say if you need a job to survive then start applying to other jobs while furloughed. There is no guarantee that you’ll get your original job back.
Here’s a Covid story that’s a real kick in the tuhckus…, the person/compamy I am working for currently… Wait, before I begin this needs the backstory… my boss and I meet at a prior company we become best of friends and work great together for 3+ years. The company we’re at together was a toxic Serian company, that is no longer in business. He left first for a great job and quickly got me on board, as his designer/merchandiser after working FT for him at “our company” for over 4+ years, the job wasn’t requiring a need for a FT designer so I began working as a Freelancer but consistantly, which works great for me because at the time my child was only in elementary school. I have been happy doing 4.5 years of freelancing, in the beginning of 2020, there was enough work to put me back on FT, we were just waiting for the Spring season to start then Bam! Corona-fuckin-virus!
Everything was put on hold, but I am ok with that because no one know what the hell is going on, and I was still working… finishing a line and our customers are all in!!. Now, here’s the kicker… My Employer/friend informs me that he hired his child FT!!! His Child was getting the Covid run around at their job. I guess I would have done the same, but really!!! What really sucks is that a decade ago, I helped his child to put together their portfolio to get accepted into College for Design, and it was a struggle because the talent in my opinion was less than average.
Now, in a nutshell, I am going to be out of a job. WTF!!!
that does stink. Well, some years ago, I started a division for a man who had a small, prosperous company. Very nice guy, I brought in over 10 million very quickly and I was well compensated. His daughter needed a job, he brought her in and gave her a vp title. She immediately started to offend the customers, screw up production and abuse the staff. He put me in charge of fixing all of her disastrous actions. Finally, I left for another job. I couldn’t have her destroy my reputation - following her and cleaning up her messes. He closed the company the following year. It was the best job, he was great to work with, beautiful goods, and it was completely avoidable.