jobhunt

I ve been looking for a job for about three weeks now. Since I finished my dissertation at the beginning of September I have been without work, except for a day of writing at Nonleaguetoday. Following on from my Masters, I would like to be a sports journalist. Without question writing about sport of the highest level on a daily basis would be fantastic; fun, interesting and rewarding. Sports journalism however, is not the pursuit of the sporting. Weekends are when the big action happens, Football, Rugby, Cup finals etc. Weekends are also when I play sport, exclusively cricket in the summer and increasingly football in the winter. As a freelance sports writer you cannot afford to pick and chose, you cannot afford not to be flexible, and you cannot afford to be unavailable at weekends. I don't wish to quit at the first hurdle, but liekwise I dont want to waste my time and efforts. I am not short of contacts; friends have been kind enough to provide me with some fantastic network opportunities, and as such I have a small advantage over must budding reporters. A uni friend, who is as good a writer as I could hope to be, experienced a similar problem this time last year. Working on the student newspaper he could write about what whatever he liked, although mostly he chose a specialist subject, music. As a young writer, options are limited, and you are restricted to the things that matter least, the stories which are small enough even for you to handle. As such I feel that I am best advised to seek more stable employment , at least for the time being. On top of job satisfaction, I still aim to be independent and self sufficient. Thus, I need a regular income, one that journalism, with my level of experience and skill, is unliklely to provide. I have become more general in my job applications, applying for teaching positions, sales, graduate schemes and sports coaching work. Now, after several weeks of unsuccesful applications, mainly for positions involving journalism or more general media, partiuclarly at sky and the beeb, I have become increasingly keen just to start work. Finally. Students. Tax dodgers , cut your hair and get a job!