
Change Makers: A Podcast from APH
Change Makers: A Podcast from APH
Resources for Job Seekers
What resources are available for job seekers? This episode breaks down a special toolkit that helps those looking for employment and build critical skills that will ultimately lead to a successful job search.
Participants (In Order of Appearance)
- Narrator
- Sara Brown, APH Public Relations Manager
- Richard Rueda, APH ConnectCenter Assistant Director
- Lori Scharff, APH ConnectCenter
- Marianne Haegeli, Program Director, NSITE Learning and Leadership
- Selene Monjaraz, Toolkit User
Additional Links
<silence> Welcome to Change Makers , a podcast from APH. We're talking to people from around the world who are creating positive change in the lives of people who are blind or have low vision. Here's your host.
Sara Brown:Hello and welcome to Change Makers . I'm APH's Public Relations Manager, Sara Brown . And on today's episode, we are talking about the Enhanced Job Seekers toolkit, the toolkit brought to you by APH'S ConnectCenter, and NSITE is an accessible self-paced free online training course. And the purpose of this Job Seekers toolkit is to assist you in acquiring and building those critical tools and skills that will ultimately help you land a successful job. Interview. Here to talk more is APH's Richard Rueda, Lori Scharff, and NSITE's Marianne Haegeli, along with Selene Monjaraz. Hello everyone, and welcome to Change Makers.
Richard Rueda:Hello. Thank you. This is Richard. Uh , thank you for having us.
Marianne Haegel:Hi, Sara, it's Marianne. Pleasure to be here.
Lori Scharff:And I'm Lori Scharff. I'm a content manager focusing on careers and employment for the Connect Center.
Selene Monjaraz:Hello, this is Selene. Thanks so much for having me on.
Sara Brown:Okay, well again, everybody, welcome to the podcast and we're talking about this awesome topic. But before we get into that, can we just go around and everybody introduce yourself and let us know what it is that you do.
Richard Rueda:All right . Uh , my name is Richard Rueda. I am with the APH ConnectCenter , uh, online resource of tools, webinars, and , uh, blogs that help blind and low vision individuals succeed and thrive in life. I am the assistant director here at the ConnectCenter.
Marianne Haegel:My name is Marianne Haegeli. I'm the Director for learning and leadership at NSITE, that's N-S-I-T-E. And our mission in life is to get blind and low vision individuals gainfully employed. So to achieve that, we have a whole portfolio of , um, uh, learning programs, professional development programs ranging from employment readiness all the way to industry certifications, and then we do a warm handoff to team members who help with employment services and , uh, job search for those individuals.
Lori Scharff:And I'm Lori Scharff. I'm the content , um, creator for content related to careers and employment for the ConnectCenter.
Selene Monjaraz:Yeah , I'm Selene, I'm a student. I work with APH Student Advisory on blogs, webinars and other media content, and to generally help guide , uh, and create resources for students by students. So I help with that side of things.
Sara Brown:Alright , well thank you all for that. So we're talking about the Job Seekers Toolkit. Would, would someone like to explain what's new with it, or how about... Let's go from the top... what is the toolkit?
Richard Rueda:Well, it's a free , um, go ahead. Yeah,
Marianne Haegel:I was gonna say it's actually the APH Job Seekers Toolkit, but in partnership with NSITE, we've taken it to a new level and we started a couple of years ago. Richard, why don't you get into the history a little bit.
Richard Rueda:Yeah. So, and thank you Marianne and thank you Sara. The APH Connect Center Job Seekers Toolkit actually was created several years ago , um, a a project of Karen Wolf with the American Foundation for the Blind. And at the time it existed in , uh, a sole document , uh, Word and PDF, and was a very good thorough, intense document that just lived there. And we, when it came to the ConnectCenter , uh, re um , emerging this and , and taking it from the top, we , uh, looked around and really wanted it to be with online so that students, job seekers and employers and and practitioners working with job seekers could really interact with this. So we partnered , uh, found some great partners out there with NSITE and Marianne. And , uh, over the past two years, it's reemerged onto their learning management system, which Marianne can talk about here in just a minute. But , uh, within that toolkit there are , uh, five courses, and it's a free online self-paced , uh, tool that folks can take. And here in a minute we're gonna hear more about those courses, the LMS and , um, how some of, there's , there's content for practitioners to observe what the Job Seeker is doing.
Marianne Haegel:Yeah, so, so basically that partnership, like Richard mentioned, started several years ago now and, and has just been amazing. I mean , one of the, one of the better collaborations we've ever had with an outside organization. So we took this fantastic content that existed and structured it into five individual , um, online learning programs. And Lori will give you an overview of the content in a little bit, but the whole idea of housing it in a learning management system , um, makes it a lot easier to access when needed at any given time. It's easier to search for the actual topics you need to address as a job seeker right now, instead of having to weed through a hundred and , I dunno how many pages of PDF files. And so we placed it on our LMS, which is called NSITE-U and uh, obviously users will need to set up an account for themselves, it's absolutely free, but then they have access to this free resource anytime they want, day or night 24 7. Uh, also if you , once you complete the whole course, you can still download the PDF of everything. So if you want that offline copy, you have that available. Uh , but maybe Laurie , you can talk a little bit about the different courses we developed and, and what they help folks achieve.
Lori Scharff:Sure. So course as, as, as we've previously stated, it consists of five courses and each of the courses has anywhere between five and 10 subsections. So the first course is self-awareness, and that looks at networking and developing your network, everything from your family to, you know, when you're looking for a job, who do you wanna know? Who do you want to know that you're looking for a job? You want your hairdresser to know , uh, you know, you want maybe the receptionist at your dentist's office if you , uh, wanna do something clerical. So these all people are all people that could become part of your network. So it goes very basic and how to develop your network, who's in your network. Then we move into con uh, developing various contacts within the type of employment that you're looking for beyond your rehabilitation counselor. And we then move into skills and interests, strengths and weaknesses. And then we look at matching those skills and interests and abilities into what are the skills and interests in this specific job that you're interested in. Course two , um, is a career exploration and resource , um, identification. So this moves into areas about searching for a job. How do you search for a job? Nobody's given a job. Well, very few people I guess are given a job. Um, but searching for a job, job analysis, finding , um, different , uh, mentors like a professional mentor. Um, and then moving into informational interviewing and the importance of informational interviewing and also job observations or job shadowing, things like that. Course three focuses on finding employment and that discusses disclosing disability, making a disability statement for yourself, and then really honing the skills of how to talk about your disability and , um, becoming comfortable with that because sometimes we can use words that mean a lot to us as a person with a disability, but when you're talking to somebody who may not know anything about blindness or low vision, you could say video magnifier, and they don't even know what that means. Or my slate and stylists or my braille display. So we talk about, you know, how to broach those types of things , um, <affirmative> and then also developing a personal data document, which would be a document that would then help you further along in the application process. This lesson , uh, course also focuses on the application process, resume writing and cover letters. So a lot of great content in that course. We then in course four, focus on the interview. Everything from , um, you know, when you get the call or contact or text for an interview, what's some additional data that you might need as a person who's blind or low vision, you might need to know like, "what's the nearest cross street ?" Maybe your paratransit won't take a reservation without it. So, you know, things like that to consider. Also , um, you know, preparing for your interview, dressing for the interview, those, all of those great areas. And then our fifth course is how to keep a job because getting a job is, is great, but it's also important to work on skills , um, needed to , to keep a job, maintaining good relationships with your coworkers , uh, you know, letting somebody know that you might be struggling with something and how do you do that? Um, and so those are basically the five courses in a nutshell.
Marianne Haegel:You know, Sara, what really spoke to us at NSITE about the way this , uh, Job Seekers Toolkit was structured is that it hit all these topics that a lot of people struggle with, and we rarely talk about. We know people are d desperate to find a job. They apply for everything under the sun, often not know, even knowing whether this is a good fit for them, and then they're surprised when they get rejected or no responses at all. So I love the fact that we build from the beginning with self-awareness. "What is it that you actually want to do ?" Match that with the skills that you have, possibly identify skills gaps and see what you can do about it. Maybe there's training out there, maybe there's certificates or certifications you can obtain. And then move right into a career exploration. "How do I go about finding out about a company I that has an open position advertised?" "Do I actually wanna work for them?" You know, just because we're desperate for a job shouldn't mean that we just willy-nilly accept everything that's out there. That is a very dangerous thing. And for me , it was the perfect build of how we allow people to understand what's important about themselves, what's important about an employer and a position, and then how to go about refining that search and finding that opportunity.
Lori Scharff:And we even address things like, you know, looking at the company culture be yeah, while you are either applying for or maybe interested in a job or interested in a specific field, looking at those types of things because company culture can really make or break a job.
Marianne Haegel:Uh, there's also a really powerful section on networking, and that includes invaluable information about how to use LinkedIn to, as a powerful tool for you to actually do research, develop your own personal brand and put yourself out there, make yourself visible to recruiters, and then find the job possibly through LinkedIn that is right for you. So , uh, I I really love the holistic approach from A to Z. You have the right ingredients in one central location.
Richard Rueda:This is Richard. I just want to underscore that. It , it absolutely, this is a very thorough and powerful document in , uh, online, in front of access to job seekers and practitioners. It starts from the very basic and organic to the advance . So I , I mean, nowhere else have we found , uh, and , and over our searches that there's more of a centralized place for job seekers to prepare thoroughly. You can take five minutes, but you wouldn't get much out of it. But if you take an hour or more for each course, you're, the more you put into it, the the far better off you're gonna be.
Marianne Haegel:Yeah. And, and the , the built in activities that you can complete , right? So you need to help keep yourself honest and accountable, but you can work with your VR counselor or with a , a job coach or whoever your , your who's, your accountability partner outside. Um, you can work with them to help, you know, navigate through it, complete it all, and learn so much about yourself in the process that you actually , uh, have a much better chance of succeeding in your job search.
Lori Scharff:And we also do have , um, a , uh, like an outline or syllabus of the course that professionals can receive from us so that you know, basically what the assignment is. It'll tell you what the assignment is, it'll give you links to the webinars. There's like a link in the disclosing disability section where we have a longer piece about disclosing disability that we did through Employment Connection. So as a professional, you can listen to that webinar if you choose, and then have a discussion with your consumer. And this little, like syllabus outline that we have, it's only like 25 pages. So you can say, okay, did you develop your personal data sheet and have your consumer submit it to you directly so that you know that they're really doing this and they're not just, you know, saying, oh yeah, I did that, you know?
Marianne Haegel:Yeah. And here's another important thing. This is the perfect tool ranging from pre ETS folks who are just transitioning from school into , uh, the professional life all the way through your career. Because some of us have worked in the same job for a while . Maybe there's been a gap in employment, and now I need to figure out what's happening today. And this , uh, resources, we update that very regularly. So it's relevant for today's way of finding jobs, which is also one of the reasons why LinkedIn plays a relatively important role in this tool. But , um, it , it, it can work for anybody and everybody. And I'll be honest with you, I've been joking about this in the past, but I have an ex-husband who just retired after 30 years in the government. He's not visually impaired, but I sent him the link to the job seekers toolkit. I said, you need a refresher. It's been 30 years since you've looked for a job. Check this out. And I do the same thing with my kids because I think it's such a valuable tool.
Richard Rueda:Sara, you were asking earlier under what's other things that are new with the toolkit. Obviously we talked about the courses that have been built and rebuilt and the , uh, syllabus and outline that Lori created for practitioners. But the other thing is, Lori and I took some time earlier this year to reimagine the toolkit, and we took each course and dissected it and , and really updated it with language that was relevant to today's modern job seeker to , uh, people who are born in LO Vision themselves. And we, we updated some examples on , uh, that are in there that really speak to the job seeker versus to maybe a job seeker 10 or 15 years ago. Uh, so I think we're proud of that as well.
Lori Scharff:Yeah, the , um, we used the most recent data when it came to discussing salaries and things like that. The data that was in there was from 2012, so it was a bit dated <laugh>
Marianne Haegel:<laugh> .
Sara Brown:And so anybody can use this service. This is those trying for their very first job or those that have been in the employment field for decades, that the service is just for anyone. Correct.
Marianne Haegel:Absolutely. Yep .
Lori Scharff:Yeah. And when we rewrote it, we really geared it both towards, originally it had more of a focus for youth, but we left it in such a matter where it's linguistically it's appealing to youth, but in addition to that, it's also got all this thing, all the things that somebody that might be, like Marianne said, moving from a career that they've been in for a while .
Marianne Haegel:Yeah.
Richard Rueda:And this is Richard. I would add, this is Richard. I would add that , um, this is indeed free to those in the public, and I would be remiss if I didn't mention that we are thankful to the Gibney Family for , uh, supporting this and, and helping us market to people who are blind and low vision from those who are pre ETS to adults and , and a very critical tool and, and we're proud of it. And we're , uh, it's just going to evolve from here. I think there's a lot of things we can do with this dynamic LMS that Marianne and NSITE helps us create, and there'll be even more tools to the toolkit over time.
Sara Brown:Now, why was something like this needed? Because I understand in the beginning you said it was a, a document, but what made something like this necessary, or at least to expand from that document in the beginning?
Richard Rueda:This is Richard. I would start by saying that taking it from a document to an LMS only also , uh, helps and prepares individuals to get comfortable with the computer, with the LMS and, and certain tasks that they may be doing on the job that require them to be online, to log in , to create an account, to look at courses and syllabuses and their different , uh, formats as well as actually the same media that the toolkit links to. And it, it puts you in a professional kind of frame of mind as you look at these tools, as you look at these courses, and you look at these modules and go, okay , um, what am I struggling at? What am I succeeding at? And then taking some of those and sharing them with your rehabilitation counselor, a teacher or your job search , uh, support person and, and having them help you with that. And, but do this interactive. And then if you're at the end of your day, you need to stop you, you can start where you left off. Whereas just having a document is, is less, I guess, romantic, less appealing, <laugh> , if you will.
Marianne Haegel:Yeah. I love , I love the way Richard just framed this, the whole thing is a learning experience, right? Including how to create an account and navigate a platform, which is gonna be second nature to any job you will ever have going forward, right? It's not the old days anymore. Um, but I do think also the fact that it's more easily searchable. Yes, of course we encourage you to go through it from A to Z, but if you wanna go back, you've taken the course once, maybe last year, and now you have a specific job and you want a refresher on how to prepare for that interview, how to communicate effectively with a recruiter, then you can go into the specific course of interest and within that course, into the module that you need the refresher on. So you don't have to wade through, again, a hundred plus pages of , um, non searchable PDF . You can now actually pinpoint where you want that refresher, get the information you need, take your notes, go back to your activities and say, what did I say a year ago? Would I change that today? How has my self-awareness changed? How have my career goals changed? And so it's , uh, uh, it can be a very interactive experience if you use that tool the right way.
Sara Brown:Now I'm , do individuals who are blind or low vision, do they have trouble finding employment if they just go to the standard employment sites?
Marianne Haegel:They, they do, because very often those , um, employment platforms are not accessible, right. Or, or have trouble with accessibility. So, and , and some of the communications tips that we're giving folks or workarounds can actually be found , be found in the job seekers toolkit, and then there's links to other resources that can help find, help people find the help they need. Uh, so, you know, and I told you NSITE is also , uh, providing , uh, placement services, employment services, and we do have a curated job board that where every single position , uh, must be filled by blind or low vision job seekers. So, so we are trying to help other job boards and other employers with the accessibility or lack there off of their platforms. But it is also a , a very important fact that we can't ignore that. A lot of the automated AI tools that they're now using to search through submitted resumes , um, will just filter out a lot of folks with disabilities. And that's very unfortunate. So we're trying to work with networking and other workarounds to help people circumnavigate those obstacles that are now, you know, effective everyday life.
Lori Scharff:And I think frequently, you know, people think that, okay, I've worked with the Department of Rehab or worked with whatever agency it is to assist me in my blindness rehabilitation process. Now it's time for them to help me find a job. Well, very few people actually find a job directly through rehab. You really have to go out there and pound the pavement and get moving. And, you know, we talk about working with your Department of Labor and they really, the Department of Labor are the ones that have the job , job postings in your specific geographic area. And that's really where a connection should be made because they know the industry in your area, they know the connections.
Sara Brown:So I was just curious, I feel like this would be beneficial, beneficial for potential employers to sort of go through and, and read and see this tool kit as well. What are your thoughts on that?
Richard Rueda:Well, it's certainly out there and available to the public. If employers , uh, do come across it, we , we'd be happy for them to look at what , uh, uh, really under the hood, what job seekers are doing to prepare for a successful job placement interview and , and so forth. And, and might help them understand what barriers are out there and what things we as job seekers and our job seekers look for and prepare for so that maybe they're , uh, more aware. And, but, but beyond that, through NSITE through the APH Connect Center, career Connect site, we do have a, a quite a variety of, of resources for employers , uh, looking to hire and, and onboard employees.
Lori Scharff:We actually have a separate section of the website that focuses specifically , um, on things that employers may wanna know about.
Marianne Haegel:Yeah . And inside does the , and we would be expanding that section. Yeah. And N NSITE does the same thing through Inside Connect our job board. And we have actually regular webinars for employers to help them make their , um, job search more inclu or employee search more inclusive and their workplace more accessible.
Sara Brown:Selene, is there anything you wanna share about this, this toolkit?
Selene Monjaraz:Yeah, so for, so con for some context, I'm actually a student in university and job search is actually something I've been , uh, working with for a while. I have actually worked on pilot programs in my city to help students with disability do job seeking. So I do have experience with this, but I wanna touch on the points that have been made that anyone can use this. I have experienced developing resources for job seeking , and I was able to learn a lot of things from the toolkit myself that I will be adding to my arsenal of knowledge. Like I think , um, one of the biggest things that really clicked for me was the discussion on , um, skill discrepancy, right? It's actually something I struggle with a lot. Sometimes when I look for jobs, whether it's on campus or it's remote work, I see like, oh, you need to type at a certain speed per minute, and I can't do that. Not just like, oh, automatically I don't apply. Um, but I think it, it works to encourage you to improve rather than discouraging you, right? It gives you the facts of what it's going to be like applying for the job. You're gonna run into skills and obstacles that you're gonna have to explain and work through. I think it's very good for walking you through the process, encouraging you, rather than being like, oh, this is going to be very difficult for you. Um, because I actually struggle with that a lot. I get discouraged very easily when I see , um, issues with accessibility, with skill discrepancy. So I think this is a very good tool for helping younger people realize, okay, there are ways around this. It's very solution oriented and I really appreciate that. It's very user friendly. I had no issues with it at all. No matter what device I used, I mostly used it on my phone and my browser, but I switched to my laptop briefly just to see, okay, yes, very accessible across all platforms. Um , but I really appreciated how short the modules were, because the courses are divided into modules. And I also appreciate just how straightforward it is. Like, like it was said, it's very linguistically easy. There aren't any complex terms that I would have to like go look up or that would make me feel like, oh, this is too advanced for me to understand. So I think anyone could understand it. The resources were great. I read the blogs and watched the videos 'cause it is , uh, included at the end of each section, right? Each module or lesson , um, to go view these things and they help you with your assignments. So I think that's awesome. Um, I, I'd say that it's a , a very wonderful resource. I have nothing , uh, bad or to criticize about the toolkit. I enjoyed using it and I appreciate that it kept me organized because that's something I also struggle with organization. So this whole, oh, you need to keep a personal data sheet or this is how you would structure your resume. Generally having that template to go off of is a really good springboard for someone like me who, if I'm just given a task, I can get overwhelmed by just the thought of how would I even go about doing this? So I love that. It's just very easy to use, I think gives, it's like, okay, here's the resource. Just fill it in. It's, it's awesome.
Sara Brown:So what's next for this? What, what, what do you all wanna have in the next year and what's the, the outlook for the , you know, maybe the next five years?
Richard Rueda:I think this is Richard speaking. I would love the Job Seekers Toolkit to not be the best kept secret that we have out there. That , um, dozens if not hundreds of individuals use this. Uh, we spent the past , uh, six months as , as the toolkit reemerged and, and , and came back online to market this to consumers at both the conferences , uh, that we've been to this year, the consumer conferences , uh, professional conferences , uh, online networking , uh, and , and in other venues we'll be at this year, we are really trying to get this tangible product tool into the hands of practitioners, into job seekers, into those who support the job seeker at all levels of their life . So really making this , uh, a , a dynamic tool that that's known. And, and we're getting this published , uh, everywhere we can on, on newsletters, on through NSITE, through our webinars, through different things that we do, even when we do our career and canine connections with Guide Dogs for the Blind , uh, we're going to mention this tool. So everywhere , uh, there's a rock, we look under it and we tell 'em about the Job Seekers Toolkit, <laugh>. And I think , um, we'll , uh, the content will continue to grow and evolve and as, as , uh, trends in the job market , um, move and change and relevant to our population as we know the unemployment rate is significant. So everything we can do with the toolkit now and in the future to help that , uh, diminish. Let's, let's do it.
Lori Scharff:And to follow up on what Richard just said, yes, the unemployment is significant. Unemployment rate is significant, but even a larger number than that would be the people that are not actively looking for work. And I personally would like to think that maybe the people that are not actively looking for work would take a look at the Job Seekers Toolkit and go through it and sit down and do the assignments to help get them back on track and looking for employment. And let's take some of those people and move them from not actively looking to looking for work.
Sara Brown:And my final question I always like to ask everyone is, is there anything else you all would like to say or share on this, this podcast?
Richard Rueda:This is Richard, I think coupled with the Job Seekers Toolkit, with our partnership with NSITE, the APH ConnectCenter Career Connect site has a lot of additional supplementary resources. As Lori and I mentioned earlier on the podcast. There are resources for employers, there are additional resources for job seekers, career conversations, employment connections. It's a robust site that, again, we don't want to be the best kept secret that people can link to, to look for , uh, all things employment, career readiness, career exploration, job search , uh, and, and in getting perspectives from other blind and low vision professionals out there on how they have, have gotten into the workforce and are succeeding.
Marianne Haegel:Yeah, I would, this is Marianne. I would subscribe to every single thing Richard just said, but I , the one thing I wanna stress is that for me what stands out is this unbelievably powerful partnership between NSITE and , uh, the American Printing House. It seems to me that sometimes organizations who have similar goals shy away from creating mutually beneficial partnerships that actually , uh, enables us to help our core clients to reach their goals. And while we have some similar goals and even some similar services, we felt that this was a partnership whose time had come and we needed to leverage each other's networks and trying to get, jointly the word out that this is a , uh, uh, an invaluable resource that we all make available for free because we want to see blind unemployment significantly change into blind employment. And, and I can't stress enough that this would not have been possible if we didn't have two organizations here to see the value in that and overcome any obstacles to make this partnership work. So I wanted to thank , uh, Richard and everybody at the APH for this amazing partnership and I can't wait to see where it takes us in the future.
Sara Brown:Selene, do you have any advice for college students or teenagers who are out there searching for jobs?
Selene Monjaraz:Definitely the biggest thing is to not be afraid to network. I know that for me it can be really intimidating. And this is actually something that was touched on in the Job Seekers Toolkit. Not everybody is a social butterfly. Sometimes you're gonna have to work a little bit harder to make those connections, but you do have an end goal, so it does need to be done, right. You cannot let your anxiety get the best of you. I know it sounds easier said than done, but sometimes the best way to overcome your fear of something is to just do it. Don't think about, oh, what if just do it. I know for me that's also what I've done. That is actually how I've found a part-time work myself is, you know, I'm not shy about talking to people. Um, I've sometimes shared situations like there was a while back where um, I had to take some time off of school and work for a little bit and I was able to find something to do with my time and to gain experience simply because I was open about it. I think you have to have a good balance of just being open about yourself. Don't be so open that you overshare, right? But I think just be willing to be yourself. Authenticity goes a long way. I think people can really underestimate how personality fits into finding jobs, right? But if you have um, a good attitude and personality, it can get you very far. Versus someone who may have all the qualifications in the world but maybe doesn't have that social connection. That's something that I think young people especially are very good at or if not can excel at. If they can overcome any obstacles and anxiety they may have about that.
Sara Brown:Alright , well everybody, I'd like to thank you for coming on and talking to me today on Change Makers .
All Participants:Thank you, Sara. Thank you for having us. Thank you.
Selene Monjaraz:Yes, thank you.
Sara Brown:Be sure to check the show notes. There. You'll find links to the Job Seekers Toolkit and personal employment stories. Also, if you have follow-up questions or a podcast suggestion, let me know by sending an email to changemakers@aph.org. As always, thank you so much for listening to this episode of Changemakers and be sure to look for ways you can be a changemaker this week.