Job Coaching

Location: Open Door Shelter

Date: Monday, July 28, 2014; 6:45-8:30 pm

Just like this time last year, Chicago Cares had asked if I could lead this project over the summer while Claire coached her volleyball league.  I looked at the online agenda that she had followed with the other leader on alternate turns and noticed that the icebreaker that I had used last year had not be done since.  I went to a coffee shop the previous Saturday and while I had my “Dream/Nightmare Job” icebreaker, I still required a main lesson for the evening.  I decided to go with “Role Reversal”, where the youth would “interview” the volunteers for a bit and the volunteers would be encouraged to give “bad responses”.  After this there would be a feedback session where the youth would identify the mistakes the volunteers had made.  Finally the volunteers would interview the youth and were expected to get more professional responses.  I wrote down some examples of what a bad and a good answer to a question would look like.  For example, if the following question were to be asked, “In your previous job, how was the working relationship with your colleagues”, a bad answer would be something like, "They were a lazy lot and I was the only person with any common sense.”  While that may have been true, a more professional response should be, “I owe my success to my colleagues and while there were challenging times – mostly due to the standards that I expected all of us to live up to – we all worked towards the common goal, which was building the business.  If that meant that I had to take a leadership role to get things done, I did so.”  I wrote down a few examples and was as prepared as I could be.

I emailed the volunteers on the day of the project and even send them the agenda.  One volunteer wrote back and asked if she needed to bring any supplies and I responded by saying that it was my task to do so.  I did go to a store over lunch and picked up some labels and candy, candy being the best bonding tool for children, youth and adults alike.  I arrived at ODS at 6:30 pm and waited for others to get there.  One volunteer sent me a note of cancellation saying that she was new to Chicago, wasn’t aware of the distances and since was running late, would have to cancel.  So that was one down.  Fortunately 3 of my volunteers arrived soon and all of them worked together at ‘Career Builder’.  I really admire people who do this, where they use their expertise in programs like these.  Another volunteer showed up soon and she said that she was doing this project as a part of a 30 day thing where she would do something new every day.  That sounded like a cool thing to do.  All of them were first time volunteers with Chicago Cares, though one of them had done the ‘MLK Celebration of Service’ before.  I told them the usual things about this place, especially about not giving the youth their contact information, even if they asked for it and rather directing them to me if they required any follow-up.

Yeah, I would visit a Parisian Bakery every day

We went upstairs and gathered around for introductions.  Another volunteer arrived and we now had 6 volunteers, including me, and 7 youth; though 2 girls looked like they would much rather be somewhere else.  After introductions I split everyone into 3 teams with couple of volunteers and at least 2 youth in each.  We were going to play the icebreaker game.  I started by saying how I was never interested in being a doctor and how I like writing and would love to be financially independent so as to do that.  One enthusiastic girl said that her “Dream Job” was to be a counselor and “Nightmare Job” was anything to do with weather or history…because of course they are related!  Another girl said that she would love to be a “Game Designer” whereas she did not want to work with people.  We assembled back as a group and now had to introduce each other’s “Dream and Nightmare Jobs”.  It was interesting to listen to everyone and when one youth said that he wanted to be a chief baker at a ‘Parisian Bakery’, I said that my dream would be to visit such a bakery every day!  One of the volunteers said that her dream was to have her own doggie day care, which sounded great as well.  It was funny that another volunteer’s “Dream and  Nightmare Jobs”, were same as mine – be a blogger and not a doctor. 

I then paired every volunteer with a youth and a couple of them would have to do double duty, though one of the youth in each group looked disinterested.  I was not participating but rather walking about and listening to everyone.  The volunteers were doing a good job of staying in character and being unprofessional in their responses – we had not told the youth about this. I stopped by a group and the volunteer asked if the youth could pose a question to me.  He asked “Where do see yourself in 2 years” and being in character, I said “In your chair’.  He said that I came across as confident and that was good.  I said there was a fine line between confidence and brash, and one should realize that.  We discussed conflict resolution and he told a story about him as a kid, when he and his siblings would fight for the remote control to see their favorite shows.  But then he realized that after his mom left for work, he could stay up and watch whatever he wanted.  This way he avoided the conflict with his siblings, but in doing so, he did disobey his mom.  I said it wasn’t the worst thing in the world to break curfew and as long as he could spin this story in a positive way during an interview, he could use it.  Say that yes, you may have disobeyed your mom every now and then, but you found a way around the conflict.

I kept walking around and heard other interesting comments from the youth such as a business idea for an ambulance with two beds so that greater number of lives could be saved during an accident.  I said that there must be a reason why they don’t do it today, perhaps they need the room for paramedics and the equipment.  He responded by saying how about we make the ambulances wider.  I said that the problem with that was then there wouldn't be enough room for them to make it through traffic.  I said that the ideas were great and I encouraged them to follow a critical thinking path to get to the right answers.  Another idea proposed was of “Self-driving baby carriages”.  I said to him find me 10 mothers who would be willing to leave their baby’s untouched when outside and then we can talk.  Our session seemed to be working as one of the youth told me that he wouldn't hire the volunteer he was interviewing since she was being unprofessional.

I went and chatted with the staff member of the facility and he was busy editing a video on his laptop computer.  He thanked us for coming and mentioned how we are really helping out these youth.  In turn I thanked him for having us over and told him how last year we had a volunteer who had returned to “give back” to this place since she had once been a resident here.  He said that this is what they needed, people like that volunteer who realize their responsibilities.  I joined a volunteer and the enthusiastic girl that we had met earlier.  We asked to see her resume, though she kept making excuses such as “printer not working” or “it was on a flash drive in her room”.  I said that if she really wanted to have us look at it, we could make it happen.  She promised to have it ready the next time we came.  We then talked about the difference between resume and a cover letter and some of the things that constitute a good resume. 

Time was almost up and so I gathered everyone back for a reflection session.  I went around and asked the people to share with the group something that they had learnt today.  For anyone who gave an answer, I handed out a candy.  Many gave great responses and our strategy of “role reversal” had definitely worked.  We bid goodbye to the youth and came downstairs where I assembled the volunteers and asked them for feedback.  They said that perhaps we could start the sessions by asking the youth what they wanted to accomplish, rather than deciding the agenda for them.  I said that the problem with that approach was that we may receive answers which we may not like, but it was worth a try.  It had been a successful session and I look forward to returning next month.