I’m in the US, no degree, and absolutely sick to death of working in retail.
I’ve tried all the jobs website. They haven’t even gotten me an interview. The only job search method that’s ever given me results is to think of businesses near me and apply to them directly. But that only leaves me working more retail, since public facing businesses are all I’m interacting with.
I just want a job that pays my bills, and lets me work on a consistent schedule. I’m so sick of having my hours constantly whipped back and forth. I just want to go to bed at the same time every day.
Spend a few months in Vocational school > massage therapist > pass all the licensure tests > earn up to $500/day working at a spa. Some people earn even more than that too.
If you can swing the time and tuition, every urban hospital needs CNAs. It’s probably the least schooling for the most job security. Phlebotomy as well. Hospitals also, historically, offer cheaper/better health care if you stay in house.
Mileage will vary a lot by location, in terms of pay and such, but it’s worth looking into. In adfition, it shows you options and offers tuition reimbursement.
Hospitals, not long term care. The latter is awful, in most locations.
Barring that, there’s no schooling options like EVS and logistics/supply runners. The latter will be among the first cuts if Congress allows further cuts to Medicaid or Medicare.
Nursing?? But OP said “lets me work on a consistent schedule. I’m so sick of having my hours constantly whipped back and forth. I just want to go to bed at the same time every day.”
I don’t think nursing is very forgiving in that regard. They alternate 3 shifts, 24/7, constantly changing it around. No consistent schedules, and say goodbye to going to bed at the same time every day.
Another thing to consider: learning a trade.
I don’t know what the trades are like in the USA but here in the UK, once you have a tradesperson you like and who does an above-average job, you go back to that same person until they retire.
It could be anything people need. Electrics or plumbing are high-skill trades and really well paid. Cleaning is a good low-skill trade, it’s hard work but it’s a job for life. Buy some tools, get good at it. Start with windows, they’re easy and basically everyone needs it, and all you need is a squeegee, a clean towel, and a bucket. Get a dedicated business phone number and email address. Print up some flyers with fixed prices (find out what other local businesses are charging and undercut them slightly until you get on your feet) and your business phone number on, and distribute them as far as your legs will carry you.
I worked retail and retail adjacent for almost 20 years. I just started a corporate job for a very big electronics company. The answer?
Know people.
I know it sucks to hear, but it really truly is who you know. I got lucky once but it’s seriously all about the connections you make. Your best bets are from informal friends. People who know you well enough to say you’d be good for a job, but they’re not invested in you either being there or not.
The only reason I am where I am now is because I made connections. Read the book “How to Win Friends and Influence People” if you’re an introvert. It helped me understand how people view each other’s interactions better.
There’s a lot of remote jobs too that you can start looking into. Use your retail planning and selling experience for remote sales roles or remote account management.
Know people.
This aspect cannot be overstated. I landed my biggest* jobs because of my professional network. Moreover, I landed those roles during some serious labor market carnage: Dotcom Bust, Great Recession, and the current knowledge career uncertainty.
*Highest salary, longest running, best environment, most career growth, or some combination thereof.
My first job was pizza delivery for a local shop. My mom knew someone who worked there, and I got the job through her. They weren’t exactly hiring for the position yet, but they knew they were going to need someone seen because their current delivery guy was going back to college in a couple months. She knew I was looking for a job, floated my name to the owner, and he called me.
Second job was a warehouse shipping/receiving position. Again, got it through a family friend who was their accountant or something. He mentioned they were looking for someone, I said I might be interested, and he basically set everything up for me to come in and interview and I was basically hired on the spot.
Now I work in 911 dispatch. This is basically the only job I actually found and applied for myself, I saw they were doing some sort of hiring event and I thought it was something I could do. Still though, I worked my connections, my brother in law is a firefighter, and knows a lot of people in local public safety/first responder circles, so I got him to ask someone he knows who works here to put in a good word for me. It could be that I just really impressed them, but I only had one interview and a lot of people who got hired at the same time as me, some arguably with more impressive resumes, had to go through an additional round or two of interviews.
So as the old saying goes, it’s not so much what you know as who you know.
When I was applying for jobs on my own back at 16-18 years old, even shitty retail gigs, I never seemed to get anywhere, online, paper applications, etc. never seemed to go anywhere, occasionally I got an interview but they never panned out. But when I know someone, or know someone who knows someone, I have a 100% success rate of getting hired and I’ve gotten to skip some of the bureaucracy to boot, and they’ve turned out to be pretty stable, reasonably well-paying jobs given my level of experience and such.
This sucks sooo fucking much, but it’s true. I don’t network, and the only way I’ve had decent jobs is by the people in the company getting to know me and moving up. My current job is at the place I did security for, for 3 years while getting my degree.
If you like working with your hands, look into education for the trades. People that do trade jobs are only getting more and more rare these days so theres a good chance you can get a job that way and it pays waaay better than retail in a lot of cases.
Also like others said, knowing someone is also ideal.
This right here. I know so many people who got into the trades and made $100-250k per year here in the Midwestern US. That’s after just 5-10 years in a trade. Starting out it might be half that, but you get raises as you advance in the trade and if it’s a union trade you usually also get good yearly raises. So some trades will advance your pay every 6-12 months as you step up through the apprenticeship. So you move up quickly and you’re getting paid for nearly all your training (minus some studying you do in your personal hours).
If you’re willing to work overtime, plenty is available. As others have said, there’s a large demand for people in the trades.
Check local union halls. Many of them will even help you with job shadowing people in the different trades so you can check the jobs out beforehand.
I just paid someone $500 to do a simple water line to my dishwasher. Huge rip off. But they get paid well. $200/hr.
Its only gonna go up. Fewer and fewer folks know how to do real work.
Exactly. I’d recommend everyone try and fix things themselves at least sometimes. I try and fix small things I don’t want to have to buy again if I can.
Sometimes it makes sense to pay someone, but its a good skill to have.
I stay away from plumbing and gas in my house because I don’t want to blow up or get flooded. But I do all my own electrical because I know what I’m doing!
I’m with you there. Plumbing I would avoid. I could do it, but like you said, flooding or just water damage in general makes me think twice. Gas I would be more ok with but even then I’d be wary of it.
If you’re reasonably good at using computers (you probably are if you’re posting here?), you should be able to find office jobs where your job is to enter information into computers or do similar “secretary”-like tasks. But I don’t know what it’s like in your area.
It’s been decades now, but when I was still in school I worked for a temporary employment agency for a couple summers. I had an interview with them so they could get a feel for my qualifications, then they would line me up with random office jobs that could last anywhere from one or two days to a month or more. For most of one summer I worked in the mailroom of a law office.
If you can find an employment agency like that near you it might be a good way to get your foot in the door. Keep your eyes open wherever they send you and see if there might be chances for longer term jobs. The experience of being a temp with a good work ethic can also look good on a resume.
Temporary agencies was always how my wife always found work. She had old school office training in high school, so she could always get a temp job, and sooner later she’d find one that would last a few months, and eventually they’d just want her to stay on permanently. It never failed to get her job somewhere.
Nepotism. Who’s your daddy and what does he do?
My dad’s a gynecologist. He looks at vaginas all day long.
What about customer support?
That can be a launching point as long as it’s within the company. I know several people who started in those sorts of positions and moved up quickly to non-customer facing roles.
I started as a customer service rep at a call center and moved to senior server administrator within 5 years.
Many call centers also offer tuition reimbursement which is great too.
There’s no way this job will exist in a couple of years. All of it is garbage chatbots already.
Try some sort of construction or electrical installations.
Then you learn useful skills, AND youll likely be one of the smarter people there (Lotta folks are the kind who drink a 30 pack of Busch and go to the strip club daily. Not exactly geniuses). so eventually you can get into designing drafting or management.
Or just look into drafting. Read up on how factories work. We need smart engineer type people.
Otherwise , movie theater or bowling alley? Arcade? Those jobs are hell of a lot better than Walmart. Pays shit tho.
Or, janitor. We always need people to clean. Hell, even with my full time job, I cleaned offices on weekends because it was so easy and gave me extra cash. In my case I did it alone which was great, headphones in and just clean.
Get on as a construction helper. Zero experience required, just show up on time with some basic tools every day.
Emphasis added.
what would basic tools be. Seems wierd they expect the person to show up with tools for a general helper job.
If youre super green (no experience at all) they wont expect much. You wont need much for the first year other than being able to show up, listen to directions, and not hurt yourself or others.
A framing crew will expect you to have basic hand tools more than a general construction company would. One is teaching you a trade and the other just wants a laborer.
Being a good helper gets you started toward something better. A lead, a contractor, whatever. I work for myself now, and that is very achievable for anyone.
Measuring tape, speed square, pencil, bags, durable and weather appropriate clothes/shoes. Lunch. Water. It’s just the industry standard.
thats not to bad but I honestly do not know what a speed square is unless its that little 90 degree angled metal thing maybe?
It’s that little 90 degree angled metal thing.
ok so thats not to bad. really everything discocactus listed is pretty common in any job except for the pencil, tape measure, and speed square. The speed square is then the only not common thing.
Yeah. “Bring your own tools” is a pretty common policy in a lot of blue collar work. The company might technically provide the tools you need - but they will typically provide the cheapest, shittiest versions. So the workers will bring their own tools, which are higher quality. And since they are personally owned, they are less likely to get broken or “walk away”. And since everyone is bringing their own tools, the guy at the job site who is supposed to bring the tools gets lackadaisical about that part of his job.
So you show up as the new guy, first day on the job, and they say
“where’s your hammer?”
“I dunno, I thought you guys had hammers”
“Joe, we have any hammers?”
“We got some at the office”
And now you’re just gonna stand around all day not doing shit, feeling embarassed that you don’t have a hammer. And then you go to the hardware store and buy a hammer after work that day, so Joe is able to continue slacking off at his job of remembering to bring the hammers.
- Unless you’re in Europe. Having to bring your own tools is a north american thing. Here all tools are provided, even pencils and tape measures. Hell, my last construction job even provided clothes and work boots, but that might be company specific. Also, generally north american construction companies require you to have your own hand tools, but not expensive power tools like large drills and saws. Cordless power tools can go either way but I always had my own.
Source: worked 15+ years construction in NA, and did a year in Europe before changing careers.
Depends on the trade but tape measure and pencil+sharpie is standard. Framers will need hammer and speed square, electrician will need strippers, lineman pliers, etc.
Most stuff will be provided by whoever youre working with but you’ll be expected to invest in your tools periodically. If you have to borrow something twice, you should pick it up.
Also, good protective shoes. Im a big fan of my Keens.
I was going to recommend this as well. Or going the apprentice -> journeyman route.
Don’t know where you are. But look at the directories for business parks and office buildings around you.
You could look into a government job. It’s kinda fraught with the current administration, but there are lots of entry level government jobs with regular schedules and decent benefits.
Another possibility is care work or whatever it’s called. I have a few friends who work in housing for the developmentally disabled and I’ve seen listings for jobs in psych wards/mental health type places that don’t have any degree requirements. There’s probably similar jobs in elder care too that don’t have any degree requirements.
You need education. Either a college degree or a licensed trade skill. You also need experience in a related field.
You also need to know what you want to do. You can’t just magically walk into a high paying job with good pay without paying your dues, unless you’re a nepo-baby who has a parental/family hook up.
This is good. But “need” is perhaps too strong. Lots of highly successful people without education. Lots of highly educated people who couldn’t cut it. Plus it too has barriers of it own (costs, loansharking student loans)
It’s good, but isn’t the only way.
This right here.
Annecdotal, but I have never worked for a company nor in a team that did not have a fair share of people that took the work experience route instead of the school route. It took them longer to get to the jobs fresh college grads were applying for and they had to work some shit jobs on the way, but that real-world experience gave them a perspective that college never could and it was a valued resource that provided immense benefits to the teams they worked with.
Statistically, no there aren’t. Just because you know some people who did well in life, doesn’t mean they exist in abundance. And many of them, it’s usually because they had some inherent advantage in life, like their parent getting them a career. If your dad is a CEO is pretty easy for him to get you a high income job w/o any education or experience, yeah, but that isn’t most people. It’s a visible minority.
The vast majority of people with median or higher incomes are educated, or skilled, and those who high incomes are highly educated and highly skilled.
unless OP is gifted in manipulation and/or amoral, and willing to fleece scam and exploit other people, it’s very unlikely they will have a great job without education and skills or connections. And many people with education and skills and connections, are still underemployed, often by choice though.
None of what you say is wrong. Statistically speaking you’re making two mistakes:
You are overemphasizing what is the primary path for most and concluding that everything else should be excluded. Why cut someone struggling from 31.46% of the jobs that don’t fit the optimal 1st standard distribution?
It literally isn’t as rare as you think. I know a great many overeducated and unemployed as well as a great many high-school dropouts that are Entrepreneurs, Sr Consulting Software Architects and Successful Artists.
When someone is struggling, consider the normal path might be why. A broader approach that doesn’t prejudice viable alternatives for the crime of being “not the most popular option” is prefferrable.
Oh totally. I mean, if OP is only 5’9" they should just magically grow 6 inches, that will surely solve their employment! So easy!
It is rare, and your ‘argument’ here is self-defeating. As you are trying to argue from the margins to say the margins don’t exist… lol
why would you assume that OP is some ‘unknown’ genius? maybe probably because you yourself are projecting that persona? like every other poster on lemmy… you too could have been Bill Gates if only you had tried harder in life!
If you stoped repeating the same mistakes over and over again and tried to think “where could this be right” instead of " find a wrong, even a stretch that doesn’t belong and disprove" you would be a more reasonable person to talk to.
E.g. (clearly needed here)
You think the rarity of Bill Gates disproves my point. I say a friend who is neurodivergent and a high school drop out literally just bought cleaning supplies and started going door to door to businesses on a strip asking if they needed a good scrubbing. He did a few gigs on the spot for pocket change, but quickly found several of the 2nd story offices were displeased with their after-hours cleaning contractors. A few offered a trial to prove my dude could do a good job. Once proven they offered annual contracts. The landlords and tenants all talk to each other and word got around. Boom! Entrepreneur. Today he has 3 vans and 7 employees. Still doesn’t know what standard deviation is.
This type of opportunity is everywhere. It’s not the kind that is offered. It’s the kind you find or make yourself. The biggest barrier to entry here is not trying. I could go on all day. But why? The point is made and you’ll either get it, or not.
Cool story. Why aren’t you a billionaire then, if it’s so easy?
Clearly I am just a stupid fool if I’m not. But I mean, that criteria doesn’t apply to you though, does it? You’re so smart!
Bad faith. Grow up.
Hmmm. Almost everyone I know has worked their way up to being successful. I guess it’s the company you keep.
Statistically it’s rare for an adult to be 120cm tall, therefore there exist no adults who are 120cm tall. Statistically it’s rare for someone to be in government, therefore there are no politicians in the world. Statistically it’s rare to be an astronaut, therefore astronauts don’t exist.
And all the examples I mentioned are far more rare than simply self-taught people working in the field they taught themselves. Majority of the friends I have in programming jobs are self-taught with no formal education beyond high school (if that). It’s of course highly dependent on field, and the market is saturated enough with CS graduates now that getting a programming job without a degree is going to be pretty hard, but my point is that it depends on the labour market. Some labour markets don’t care about a piece of paper declaring you went to school. There’s other ways to fill your CV and prove you have a skill.
Landscaper, tree worker, construction.
I see “hiring” signs for these jobs all over the place.
Go to EMT school. It’s a fairly short program. Shouldn’t be terribly expensive.
Do you know any EMTs? I do, and it sounds like you might also. In the US at least, this seems the opposite direction of what OP is asking. Long hours, low pay when amortized over hours on call, high stress, but potentially great personal satisfaction. Also potential career track to other first responder/medical roles, which can be another plus, e.g. wilderness SAR, marine emergency SAR, trauma nurse*, etc.
If I have any of that wrong, I sincerely would enjoy additional context and discourse.
*A close friend from high school went the EMT->trauma nurse route. He has the temperament for it and absolutely rocks it. He is doing waaaaay better financially and spiritually than most of our social circle. His hours aren’t consistent per se, 3 days on, 3 days off plus any additional shifts he wants. He could have retired about 5 years ago, but loves the work too much.
They said “no retail” and regular hours.
There certainly are standard EMT shifts. And pay varies a lot depending on area of the U.S.
OP didn’t indicate where they were looking.
