SOURCES OF INFORMATION

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In the early days you would typically start with the central library in your area. There you will find newspapers, magazines, directories and other fountains of information. Libraries are not what they were. Nowadays they are sometimes staffed by people who are convinced that the world owes them a living delivered to their door. Gift wrapped.

If I seem to have a low opinion of people who work in libraries it is because I firmly believe the majority of them run those libraries for the benefit of themselves and no one else. It is not altogether their fault: they simply do not have any effective management. Librarians are academics who do a good job as far as collecting and cataloguing information it is concerned.

It's in making that information available to the general public that they leave something to be desired.

Libraries employ talented and well qualified people. These people could, if they wished, help those less fortunate to look for and use information that would be of value in their search for employment.

When did you hear of a library inviting into its hallowed halls and lecture theatre the lost souls without jobs? The people who don't know how to look for information that might help them to get jobs. Ask around. Of all the people you know how many have been into a reference library lately? Not many. You may be surprised by the number of people who don't know what the facility has to offer, let alone know how to use it.

I believe that libraries, particularly Town or City reference ones could do more by being pro-active and telling the unemployed what they have to offer. They could, and in my view should, work with Job Centres opening their lecture theatres to people in need of information. There is no shortage of lecturers on the problem of unemployment. This would create an environment where ideas would be born: these ideas, with a little guidance from someone who understood the thought processes required for job hunting, could be progressed into courses of action.

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Staff vary, as they do the world over. Most are helpful if you tell them what you need to know. Don't hide your light under a bushel, come right out with it:

"I need a little help. I'm looking for prospective employers, trade and industry magazines that carry situations vacant advertisements. What do you have in at the moment? Where do you keep them?"

Tell the staff what type of work you are seeking: ask them to recommend suitable reading matter for you. Photocopying facilities are usually available but can be expensive. I used to have an A4 lined pad for the purpose and it served me well. Pocket dictation machines are quite useful but you have to fill out your record card at some point. Why not do it there and then?

Before you can manipulate information you need information to manipulate.

Another classic statement of the obvious. The biggest obstacle in the way of acquiring information is that age old condition:

"The English Reserve."

Don't imagine that it doesn't exist because it does. And it's alive and well.

Prospecting for jobs is easy. Sources of information are plentiful. All that is needed is the investment in time to talk to people and read newspapers and trade magazines. Overcoming "English Reserve" is of paramount importance.

You can never predict where an idea will come from, but local papers are a mine of information that often generate a spark. I read a piece in a local freesheet I picked up in a bacon butty shop in a what was once a mill town in deepest Lancashire.

It was about a company I happened to know well. I had done some work for one of their competitors. The company had won an order to make several miles of fencing and was running an advert for production line staff. Not only did this company need to recruit, so did the one contracted to erect the fencing which was to form the perimeter of a new H.M. Prison. The site was a hive of industry employing hundreds, perhaps thousands, of construction workers and ancillary staff. Once the fence was in position it was to expand even faster.

Many job opportunities would open up for several years into the future.

That local paper, circulation a few thousand, ran a piece about a local company who were about to recruit twenty or so people. The accompanying article led me into a train of thought that opened the door on potential opportunities for several hundred, perhaps thousands of job hunters.

Let me tell you about an experience I had in a city in the North of England, a city whose prosperity was based on manufacturing and heavy industry. As part of a drive to modernise and drag its citizens into the twentieth century the council decided to bring back the tramway, only this time it was to be called Supertram.

A number of Northern England cities have decided to do the same.

I was driving around a newly constructed one way system when the traffic ground to a halt. Some heavy footed truck driver had deposited his load on the road causing total stoppage and no prospect of movement for sometime. I was, as it happened, outside a pub. With a little shunting I parked the car and entered. It was busy - lots of guys in yellow jackets and hard hats, a sort of outstation office for the construction team.

There was a buzz in the air; life was good for locals and migrant workers alike.

I approached the bar, dropping a couple of one liners about sitting in traffic jams being like waiting for Christmas without the prospect of a turkey dinner, and moved in on the yellow jackets' conversation.

Their accents indicated I was in the midst of Irish, Brummies, Scots, Geordies and various other guys who had travelled far to work on the project. A little digging (no pun intended) brought forth a flood of information. Recruitment of local people was a waste of time.

Over eighty percent of the workforce were from out of town. The project would last five years at least and a contracts manager told me wherever they worked in the UK they always had difficulty recruiting labourers. When I remarked this was probably because of the low pay and lack of prospects the guy nearly blew a gasket.

The pay was not low. It was good. Very good. Machine minders (labourers who work alongside machines) could earn a lot of money if they were prepared to put in the work and the hours.

Wait for it, I'm talking about a thousand pounds per week.

"The norm is more like six to seven hundred pounds per week", this contracts manager said. "If a guy is prepared to work seven days a week, twelve or more hours a day then a thousand pounds a week is possible".

I was staggered.

This is how he said the system works:

An employee comes along new to the construction industry. He needs the money so he works hard and earns a lot of it. In the process he looks around and sees subcontractors who are earning a lot more than he is.

He learns what's going on, how the system works and who is in control of the work. Self education is the order of the day and before long our man who came into the construction industry by accident is controlling his own slice of the action.

There always has been and always will be a hard core of people who form the back bone of the construction industry. People who have never done anything else. Nothing wrong with that.

What is happening today, in all industries, is that labour is more mobile. Redundancy has brought out in people the need to be flexible, to look around and ask: what else can I do? As a result a whole new section of the population is doing something completely different from what they were doing ten or more years ago.

I was amazed at the opportunity that opened up before me in the hour in that pub. If I can fall over opportunities as easily as that, think what you can do if you seriously prospect. Working in construction might not be for you. I must say I don't relish going out on a frosty morning and breaking my fingernails.

I would however do it if I wanted the money badly enough. It certainly wouldn't do my waistline any harm.

Think laterally and you will have no shortage of prospective employers. All the foregoing should not lead you to neglect the obvious. The effective way of JOB HUNTING is the one that works for you. Newspapers publish adverts for jobs most days, however there are special - days when they run more. Thursday's Daily Telegraph always worked for me. On the days you identify to be more fruitful than others allow more time for evaluation.

Talking to people is by far the most effective way of bringing in quality information. Nothing is as good as the informant who says:

"My brother Joe is a manager with So and So Limited. He's looking for someone to manage the warehouse. I spoke to him about you last night and he is quite keen to see you. He said if you are interested, give him a ring to set up a meeting. Don't hang about, he's looking to appoint someone very quickly."

These do not come along very often but they do come along. I have given out and been in receipt of information of this kind many times. However, they will never come along if you do not put yourself about and talk to potential informants.

So get out and talk to people. What have you got to lose?

What does the captain of the local cricket team do for a living? Didn't someone say he was on the local housing committee? If I remember rightly my brother Joe's wife works with his wife in the wages department of that large manufacturing company on the ring road. Might be worth a word or two that one. What does Joe get up to on a Wednesday night - darts match at the Dog and Duck isn't it?

When did you last 'phone your retired uncle in that sleepy south coast holiday resort? He used to be with British Rail didn't he? Don't know off hand what he did, but worth a call. Never know with these "old un's", might turn out to be a mine of information.

You have your record card system in position. From cold start you should be up to a hundred quality leads in a week. Do not cut corners with the recording of the information. Note the salient points then put it out of your mind until the next action date. A mind cluttered with information about many and various matters creates barriers in the train of thought.

Leads for jobs come from all sorts of places. Don't overlook the obvious.

Regular calls at or to the job centre are essential. Finding a fruitful streak in one direction is no excuse for overlooking the time honoured sources of information.

Set a target, don't delude yourself about the quality of the leads needed to achieve