Identifying Employers
Job developers ask individuals about employers that they may know or those that their family and friends know. These employers are often more open to the idea of customized employment as they recognize potential, rather than search for obstacles. Employers are also identified using the information provided by the individual about their experiences, interests and abilities. It may take some time to understand what the individual likes about a particular career.
For instance, a young woman (I’ll call her Jill) asked the job developer to find her “an office job”. But as Jill and the job developer explored office careers, Jill was not very interested in some of the tasks associated with office work. When Jill and the job developer explored further what interested her about office work, the number of possible work sites became almost limitless.
Jill has a sister that works in an office setting and, according to Jill, her sister wears nice clothes to work and spends time in the morning putting on makeup and doing her hair. Jill associated office work with the opportunity to ‘get dressed up’. Well, you can now imagine how the number of possible employers greatly expanded. As you probably guessed, Jill is working in a boutique with a primary customer base of young adults.
This example is rather basic compared to an important task of job developing, assisting employers to customize a job with an individual’s experiences, interests and abilities in mind. I’ll leave you today to think about your workplace. Look at the work your employees perform. Be imaginative, be creative. What customized job opportunities could your business provide?
