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The Shopper

Friday, November 13, 2009 11:00 AM

Photo by Elliot J. Sutherland/The Ottawa Herald


A help wanted sign hangs in the window of a new Ottawa business.

Expert: Jobs difficult to find — but they are out there

By COURTNEY SERVAES, Herald Staff Writer

Right now, Nancy Defenbaugh says she’s telling people to look into government jobs.

Those are the ones that are open. Those are the ones that are hiring, Defenbaugh, with Lawrence’s Manpower office, said.

“It’s hard,” Defenbaugh said about finding jobs right now. “Some days we’re so busy we don’t know what to do, and then there are other days we’re not.”

Defenbaugh said some jobs still are out there — even if it doesn’t seem like it all of the time.

Many of those jobs involve working in industrial positions as well as service jobs.

“Seasonal work is big now,” Defenbaugh said of working for hotels and motels or finding a job that focuses on event planning.

In addition, Defenbaugh said many jobs still are available in the health care field.

“That’s just the industry that they are going to and looking at,” she said.

Susan Webb, director of career services at Ottawa University, says health care is the direction she’s leading college students soon entering the workforce.

“There’s so much going on with the medical field that there’s a lot of jobs that are available through that,” she said.

Not only that, but Webb said some of Ottawa University’s May graduates have found jobs in Homeland security or other government positions.

“It just depends,” Webb said of which fields are most available. “You have to consider all your options.”

Webb added that some of the careers she thought were safest — like teaching — have ended up being the jobs she’s had the most trouble helping students land.

“We used to say that in five years, a lot of teachers are going to retire,” Webb said. “But since the economy came in, it has kept those teachers there, so that hasn’t held true.”

Because jobs are scarce, Webb said people may have to settle with a career they might not necessarily want.

“What you thought you might have done initially, that’s not happening,” she said. “They are having to venture out.”

That’s what Defenbaugh said she is telling people who are unemployed — there are jobs out there, you just have to find them.

“It’s just holding steady,” she said. “But there are some areas that it’s not. Across the board though, I would say it’s holding steady.”

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