“It’s Been So Long!”
Many people have been “out of the swing” of interviewing for many months, perhaps a year or more. “It’s been so long,” I hear. It sounds like someone who hasn’t had a date in months! After a while it seems like people shut down and become so discouraged, they no longer seek out opportunities and they become frightened of opening up about themselves to anyone. In this age of Internet and privacy paranoia, it is easy to isolate and no longer be in touch with what you once meant to say…if only you were given the chance.
It doesn’t help that we continually hear about the horror stories at interviews, the reneged offers, subterfuge and general mistreatment and disrespect of job search candidates. It’s a lot to ask of ourselves to put it all out there for a total stranger and not know how we will be received and if we will have a job offer we can live with. And that the economy needs to come back up and jobs need to be created again.


I’m not going lie to you. Most people I know from conducting business in the field of employment and training—not all of course—but most people who are laid off—are over 50. It is so devastating for this population because not only do they have to cope with the financial and social aspects of unemployment, they have the added burden of fearing that they will never recoup for their elder years. Their jobs are gone and they believe they personally are finished, washed up, done, caput.


