Finding your current job

Believe it or not, I found my job through Monster.com. I sent my resume through the ad and about 3 weeks later they called me. I've been here since 2001.

I went to a temp agency to find an accounting job. The temp agency told me that I would be doing payroll and do medical billing. Since I had some medical backround, I thought ok. I went for the first day and found out that I would be a secretary. Not what I wanted. I went home and cried. My husband said give it another day, and see what happens. I went to my new boss and said, what will I really be doing, because this is not what I was told. They told me and I decided to give it a try. Thank goodness I did, because I love my job and wouldn't traded it for anything. February was a year and I hope to see 20 more.

I found an ad in the city newspaper for an administrative assistant and applied at the employment office. I've been with the company 16 years.

26 years ago I walked into City Hall as a Kelly Girl (that's what they called us back then.) I worked for six months as a temp and then was hired as a Clerk-Steno to work in the Planning Department. For 15 years I worked as the recording secretary for the City's Planning Commission. 11 years ago I transferred to the Redevelopment Agency of the City as the Administrative Aide to the Redevelopment Director. I couldn't ask for a better job.

I moved to Los Angeles for two years to support my daughter in her quest to break into the movie business. When I came back home, I had no job, no money, no health insurance -- pretty bleak picture. I worked temp jobs (making $8 an hour after making $21 an hour in LA!) to make ends meet. Every day, I called the jobline for a major employer in our area (silly now that I think back since they only update it once a week but desperation drives you to desperate means), convinced that I was destined to work there.

Finding no admin jobs, one day I decided to listen to every job on the jobline, find anything I could do and worry about getting an Executive Admin slot once I got in the door. Instead of choosing the option for "Business Support", I chose Operations. Hidden there, in obviously the wrong place, I heard "EAA" which I was delighted to find out was "Executive Administrative Assistant" to the President of one of the company's subsidiaries. I wasted no time getting my resume to them and after three interviews, was hired three days later at the salary I had requested and started the following Monday! (I had been told it would take about two weeks to finalize the process.)

I've been with the company five years now and will always believe that knowing my determined nature and "out of the box" attitude, God hid that job so I could find it. And my daughter? After appearing in several films, she decided that Hollywood just wasn't worth the moral compromises she faced. She's now starring in her favorite role: wife and mother of a beautiful two-year-old little girl, whose name, oddly enough, means "Little Famous One".

Two months after an attorney acquaintance left our firm to work else, she called to say that the secretary she took with her "wasn't working out" and since she knew my work and reputation at my current firm (her old firm), she'd love to have me as her secretary. I barely had to interview, took no tests, and negotiated an excellent salary and benefits with almost no fuss. If you work the hardest and best wherever you are at the moment and get a good reputation, people remember. This kind of referral is like gold!

I found my first job through a friend who was working for an energy services company. They needed someone to work part-time. Now I am full time senior administrative assistant and still working for the same company for 31 years and I enjoy every minute of it

I worked at a local hospital in a research lab. There was a huge biotech firm new to the area...THE place to work. A technician in the lab interviewed and got in. She emailed me not too long after that the admin assistant in the lab was planning on leaving...eventually. I held on for 9 months (the research lab was a tough place to work so it was a long wait). The admin did leave when her husband got relocated. I interviewed and got the job!

I was working a temp agency and was asked to fill in for an admin that was going on materity leave for 3 months. While I here temping, I was asked if I would like to work here full-time and I said I was interested. I took the shorthand and typing tests and passed.

Once the admin came back, I was asked if I would like to work for another manager since his admin has just started working for another deparment. I said yes since I was waiting to hear about my possibility of being hired here permanently. I worked for this manager and the first one as her admin had to go back out for a few weeks.

After a working for the second manager a couple of weeks, he asked me if I would be interested in working for him full-time. I said that I would and I was hired full-time the next week.

I have been in several departments since there, but I will be here 20 years in August.

Judy
St. Louis