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View Full Version : Looking for Work in Oregon


HawaiianShirts
03-18-2008, 03:52 PM
My wife and I have decided that we want to move to Western Oregon. I like rain; she hates snow. Sounds like a pretty good compromise to me. I need to find a job. I'm going through all the regular channels like WorkForce Services, want-ads, and Monster.com (I might try CareerBuilder, too), but I thought I'd also post here on the off-chance that someone knows something the other places don't.

The job would have to be in one of the larger cities because my wife is blind, doesn't drive, and relies on public transit to get around. We're thinking the Eugene/Springfield area, Corvallis, or Salem. Portland is a possibility, but that's just a little bit too big for our tastes.

Our lease here is up at the end of May, so I'd need to start the job after that point. By then, though, I'll have my bachelor's degree in Psychology with a minor in English, both the teaching emphasis. I have taken the Teacher Education and Training courses, but due to financial concerns, I didn't go for the teaching license. I would prefer something that would let me use the English portion of my degree, but really I'm just looking for work that pays as much as I make now or more and that I can tolerate for a few years while we get settled into a new area.

I have three years retail sales experience, one year clerical, one year in-bound telemarketing and customer service, three months hotel housekeeping in Yellowstone National Park, and two years pizza production and delivery. I'm good with computers, though by no means a "tech." I also did a lot of high school theater, both on-stage acting and off-stage techie work.

Anybody know of any leads I could look into? (Feel free to use Private Messages if you don't want the whole board to get clues about your secret identity.)

Triscuitty
03-26-2008, 03:09 AM
I live in Portland myself, so let me just say the public transportation system here is EXCELLENT. :D http://www.jobdango.com and http://www.portlandhelpwanted.com are good local places to job search the Portland metro area. Actually Jobdango is for most of the Pacific Northwest area, I think, not just Portland. And that's pretty much all the advice I'm qualified to dispense. :P Good luck to you, wherever you decide to go!

HawaiianShirts
04-14-2008, 04:05 PM
Update:

Just want to say thanks to everyone who responded to this post, including those who contacted me by PM. So far that JobDango site has been the most useful, but I've managed to find several leads from nearly all of your tips, and I've even have had two preliminary phone interviews. With any luck, I'll have a job by May.

'Nother question though: Has anyone heard of a company called Executive Search? I got a voicemail from them this morning. The guy sounded like he was in a call center, but he said he'd seen my resume (probably on Monster or CareerBuilder) and thought I'd be a good candidate for some unnamed Fortune 1000 company. Then he suggested I call him back so "we can go over (my) resume and make sure this is something (I) do, in fact, qualify for." I might return the call even though the area code says he called from Georgia, which is a little bit farther away from Oregon than I like. I haven't decided yet. But does that sound just a little fishy to anybody else?

(And if anyone is wondering why I'm being slightly paranoid about job offers, it's because I've been offered work six times now--by customers at my current job--that's been described as "Customer Service" or "Financial Advisement" or "Legal Advisement," and each one has turned out to be either door-to-door sales or cold-call telemarketing.)