newjerseynewsroom.com

BY WARREN BOROSON

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

Some 50 former employees of the Daily Record attended a convivial reunion on Saturday at the VFW Post in Denville, N.J. — the Daily Record being a Gannett newspaper in Parsippany, a newspaper whose staff has been drastically shrinking in recent years.

I'm an alum myself, and I took the opportunity to ask former employees for job-hunting advice.

Patricia Yost, who had skillfully arranged the reunion, worked at the paper from 1997 to 2008 as a receptionist — at which point she was laid off. She's still looking for another job.

Her advice: "Take a little time to adjust. Don't get discouraged. You'll get a break sometime."

She herself has had three job interviews, but was never called back. "Not finding a job," she says with a shrug, "has a lot to do with your age."

Janice Miller started at the paper in 1984, and had three different jobs there — including administrative assistant to the sports editor. She left the paper for good in 2002, voluntarily, and has had fulltime jobs since then.

er advice: "Good luck. It's tough out there. I feel bad for anyone who left a job — involuntarily or voluntarily."

Sally Capone worked as a copyeditor at the Daily Record for 19 years, and left "because I didn't like the crazy hours." Since 2002, she's been a reporter for Recorder Publishing.

Her advice: "Even a part-time job is difficult to get now. People might try to get a job as a census-taker."

Kathy Shwiff worked at the Daily Record from 1998 to 2007, winding up as the business editor. She left to join Dow Jones Newswires, where she's working now as a writer on the rewrite desk. Her reign as Daily Record business editor is known as the Golden Age. (Yes, I worked there then.)

Her advice: Consider freelance work. The money you make can keep the wolf from the door. And it might land you a full-time job.

In her career at the Daily Record, Connie Rooney wound up substituting for a missing librarian — a job for which she had no experience. That was bad enough, but there was also no one to give her advice. Meanwhile, there were five years worth of photographs to file. Soon she was warned, "Shape up or ship out." She thought it over, and — decided to ship out.

Now she believes that she was a bit rash. If she had hung on, she says, even if she had wound up being fired, she would have been eligible for unemployment compensation.

A few ex-Daily Record people filled out questionnaires. Among them:

Susan Forgione was let go in March of 2009, and "I sure do miss everyone. After 33 years working there, I felt like we were almost family. At 59, it's hard to reinvent yourself and start all over again when you thought your next life situation would be retirement."

Margaret Miller wrote: "After being paroled from the DR in December 2008," she attended an institute for medical billing and coding, and passed the national exam in December 2009. "I am now an unemployed Certified Coding Assistant." She adds: "Being laid off after 24 years was hard to deal with. Knowing that corporate greed brought us down was even harder to take."

One current Daily Record employee, whose identity I shall safeguard, wrote: "Currently hanging by a thread."

Another current employee, whose job has just been eliminated, gave this advice: "Network. And tell people what job you're looking for. Be persistent. Use your contacts. Be open-minded" (don't necessarily rule out a job you suspect you're not good at, or that you think you might not like). And "Stay positive."

As for myself, I left the Daily Record three years ago, after my nationally syndicated financial column was killed by the new editor, who was and is, clearly, an idiot.

My advice to job-seekers: Be willing to take a job out of the area, but (1) don't buy a house there yet, and (2) ask for a contract. And remember: You're after just one job; it doesn't matter than you're turned down 100 times. Apply directly to companies — don't wait to see ads somewhere. And I'll tell you a tactic I've used successfully: At the end of an interview, when there's sometimes an awkward silence, I say, evenly, "If you offer me this job, I'll take it." (And I mean it.) Would-be employers like to hear that.

By the way, the Daily Record (Bill Donnellan, editor) hired me in 1997, when I was 62 years old. That should give even older people a little encouragement.

Warren Boroson's financial column appears in the Money section of NewJerseyNewsroom.com on Mondays. He's looking for a well-paying writing job with short hours, in a warm climate, with a personal secretary who looks like Nicole Kidman.