Monthly Archives: September 2013

Stay-at-Home Parents and Prisoners

I’m back after a summer of baseball, beach days, and burnt marshmallow ice cream (from Ed’s — mmm) followed by ACL surgery as soon as the kids were back in school. It’s been 20 days since surgery, and, though I have a long road of physio ahead of me, things are getting back to normal.

I’ve continued to peruse lots of career books. The best by far has been Cracking the Hidden Job Market by Donald Asher. His advice is practical and straightforward and immediately resonated with me. He confirms that the most important thing to do as a job hunter — and this is true for freelancers, too — is to talk to people, talk to people, talk to people. Amusingly, he states that stay-at-home parents and prisoners have a similar problem: they have a career emergency. The best thing to do is to “bounce”: find a job — any job — in your industry to gain experience and show off your skills, and then constantly seek a better position.

After reading Asher, I’ve renewed my resolve to network.