I have finally screwed my courage to the sticking place (sorry, Shakes) and am quitting my job to move to Chicago.
I have no job. I have no place to live. I am quitting on June 1.
Might I bother you for words of wisdom and advice (except that I’m a freakin’ loon for doing this without a j-o-b and a place)?
I’ll be in Chicago for a week in May to scope apartments and drop off resumes.
Per chance, can anyone recommend a cheap cheap cheap neighborhood for a single gal to call home?
Can anyone suggest good companies to work for? I’m currently an Exec. Asst. to a SVP. Been with my co. for three and a half years. Can do that if I have to. Don’t really want to. I’m a smart cookie who’s also been in middle management and worked as a legal assistant for a non-profit. Can do almost anything. Am trained in not much. But I just taught the Vice Chair at my company how to run a shredder just yesterday. That’s gotta count for something.
I must say that in my short time here on the boards I have had the pleasure of “meeting” a bunch of intelligent, fascinating people. I am not above sucking up for tips.
May the Diety of Your Choice Smile Upon Your House,
Cheap=Dangerous in a lot of cities. Why not try a roommate locator service first? You’ve got some time to play with and who knows, you might luck up and click with your roomie the way I did when I got my divorce 15 years ago, and was essentially. penniless. You didn’t mention if you have furniture, but I’m assuming you don’t. All the more reason for finding a roomie.
I’ll let the other Dopers chime in with their job and living quarters advice, and wish you the best of luck!
Here’s my whiney-ass deal: I can be an exec. asst some more. I just don’t want to. I’m moving to Chicago to pursue a career in voice over. But I need something that will pay my bills and allow me to afford my training and classes. In a perfect world, I’d make 38-45 with a family-friendly employer (the tend to not expect face time or ridiculously long hours). I’d love to do something creative or work for creative types. I have a lot of skills in taking the admin realities of creative types and making them reality. (Lots of computer knowlege and good common sense.)
I know this isn’t very specific. I am a smart cookie, though. I am capable of doing lots of things, but just don’t have direct experience I can put on a resume.
Case in point - out of college I volunteered for a non-profit. After 6 mos. volunteering, I spent 2 mos. in Mexico at a language school. I came back and was hired as their full-time legal assistant (with no legal background), with a caseload of hundreds of clients, almost all of whom spoke no English.
Sorry if this isn’t helpful. As you can see, I have a bit of a conundrum. I don’t want to do what I’m currently doing anymore, but if I have to do what I’m currently doing in order to do what I want to do, I guess that’s what I have to do, but I don’t want to if I don’t have to.
Tell me about the agencies up there. Any recommendations of good agencies? Any agencies you would NOT work for? What kind of assignments have you gotten?
If you want to e-mail me a resume, I have about six employment agencies that I have been feeding resumes to over the last three or four weeks. I got about 3 cold calls in one day from agencies and all the also rans for the last position I filled got forwarded to all of them.
I’ve temped for Adecco and currently at Snelling. Geez, there was another one that was very good. Why can’t I remember? I had that job for 18 months. I would NOT work for Manpower. Even though they’re big, they don’t pay well and they’re just weird. I hated my interview and they never have good jobs for office folk.
I’ve been an Executive Assistant mostly, but I’m currently a Data Specialist (which doesn’t actually require techhy background). There’s tons of secretarial-type stuff. You just need strong Word, Excel, and Powerpoint and you’re pretty much in like Flynn.
Your experience in Mexico is definitely a value add - make sure you emphasize that. Chicago has an extremely large Latin American/Hispanic/fill in the PC term population, and being bilingual will be a big plus for you.
Accountemps is a good temp firm - they have a lot of clerical positions and such. We’ve used them a lot in the past, and most of the resources we used as temps were hired on full-time. http://www.accountemps.com/
Unfortunately, my company is not hiring now, or I would pass on you resume.
My firm uses Seville for temps. They’ve mostly sent us good people. (They also tend to send us a lot of semi-working actor types, so your situation certainly isn’t new to them.) Good luck!
I just accepted a permanent job through an agency at a company I temped with for about four months, and I highly recommend them – Mack & Associates. They have a nice little program called Jump Start or something like that, where they’ll put you on call for the first couple of hours of a day, and if you don’t get an assignment, you’ll still get $20 for being on call.
Should have mentioned – the temp job I have is as a sales assistant, and the permanent position is marketing coordinator. They run a pretty wide administrative gamut.
Do I recall correctly that you’re coming to ChiDope, niblet?
Kalhoun - Olsten? That’s who I always temped for - they got me in where I’m at now - and have been here six years (well they hired me - I’m not still temping)
