I’ve been talking over the course of my last few posts about some of the frustrations experienced by unemployed graduates and school-leavers and their parents, and today I want to look at the situation that sometimes arises when well-meaning parents offer advice that might have been relevant in their day, but is now, quite frankly, past its sell-by date.
Life is all about change and you don’t have to be old and decrepit to remember a time when the world looked like a very different place than it does today. Any youngster in their forties, for example, will easily remember the time before computers. Although to today’s younger generation that might make their parents seem like dinosaurs, really it’s just a mark of the extent to which things have moved on.
Whether in terms of science, technology or even the music of today, there are of course those parents who have their fingers on the pulse, but there are also others who seem to be stuck in a bygone era. Perhaps the ability to keep up with the times depends on circumstance and whether there is an active need to do so, or maybe it’s about believing that yesterday’s ways were better ones and wanting to cling on to how things used to be. Who knows?
Of course in terms of careers, many parents have had to ‘get with it’ in order to stand any chance of getting or keeping a job. For those who’ve been with the same employer for many years and not had to face today’s job market personally, however, it’s easy to think that the job search techniques of yesteryear still apply now. In their eagerness to see their children into employment, some parents who are hanging on to out-of-date notions could actually be hindering rather than helping their chances with their out-of-date advice though.
Things move on in all aspects of life, and this is just as true of job-hunting as everything else. Not only have the routes to employment changed dramatically since the Internet became a firmly-established part of our lives, but recent years have also seen an increasing amount of research carried out into what employers want, how they make their hiring decisions, where they find their most promising candidates, what motivates people in the workplace and why employee satisfaction is integral to an employer’s success. Little, if any of this information was available until a few years ago, but it is vital for those in today’s highly competitive job market.
As a parent, therefore, unless you’re actually out there using the techniques of today or have done your research thoroughly, you would be well-advised to think twice about recommending the tactics that you used in your own youth. Yes it’s important to look at all avenues when the employment situation is as tough as it is, but encouraging your youngster to spend all of his or her time scouring newspaper ads almost undoubtedly isn’t doing him or her any favors.
Giving advice, especially when it hasn’t been asked for, can be pretty dodgy territory anyway. Giving advice which isn’t directly relevant to the individual in question or the world of today, however, can be downright irritating to the person on the receiving end. Think about young families bringing their newborns home from the hospital only to have mothers or mothers-in-law preach to them about how things were done in their day. If that’s one you’ve ever experienced, you’ll understand how great the temptation is to just tell them to ‘Butt out!’ and remind them that we have disposable diapers today and that more recent research has shown that lying a baby face-down in its crib causes greater, not lesser, risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.
Up-to-date, relevant and credible advice which is offered on request can be absolutely invaluable to your young job seeker, but if it is out-of-date or is being foisted upon them, it will do nothing but cause alienation and irritation. If you’re not in touch with what’s happening in today’s job market, far better to recommend that they speak to somebody who is, whether that be a trusted friend, family member or a professional in the career field. Otherwise, you could just be sending them down a blind alley and damaging your relationship into the bargain!
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