Any advice on finding a part-time job that can be a stepping stone for future?

There are many online jobs that are posted in Freelancing sites where you can work as an assistant or staff for a film company or a related industry. This is also another way of getting an exposure.

Everyone wants these great jobs but are not willing to put some time in to produce some public content for themselves.

Let me explain.

As an employer, the VERY BEST thing that you could ever show me, is your own site, or your own videos, or your own articles. Ask any employer and they will say the same.

It shows you have initiative, drive and what you do is your passion.

But hardly anyone ever does it. And they complain about not having experience.

If you’re really interested in the film industry, whip out that smartphone you have that can shoot everything in true HD, and actually make a little 3 minutes video. Post it on youtube or Vimeo.

Repeat. Improve. Repeat.

Start following blogs that are written by film people and 3D people. Know the industry players and the lingo. Download some of the many free books on Google Play or iBookstore or Kindle or just plain e-books out there. Heck, if you’re truly interested go to the bookstore and pickup a book on Film or 3D.

Learn about lighting (literally millions of videos and articles on the web on lighting).

When you actually start studying in a school or get a job in the industry, you would have your portfolio, which is your Youtube channel.

You will be years ahead of your fellow students who didn’t do anything.

You will be the first person to get that job.

Don’t be lazy. Start now. Follow your passion outside of an institutional or corporate setting to get great at it.

And if you say it’s hard, or you can’t do it. Then you should stick to that cashier job.

Forever.

@Ericson thing is, I do not have time currently to do any of that. I’m not even talking about a job in the film industry atm, I’m going to pursue that after I have finished with University. I’m so busy with University at the moment and that part-time job. I have no money at all for my tuition so I have been working as many shifts I can in between school. I figured, if I were to work that much there, might as well find a better job, one that can provide me with more valuable experience.

That’s saying that you’re not interested in that as a career to me. If you were you would be following that as an interest in your spare time. Less TV. More passion. If you’re “dreaming” of working in the industry, then it’s just a hollow dream unless you do things to move towards it. Even as you work hard away at your full time job ask yourself…. “Self, what can I do now, so that in 5 years I will be in a better place?”. Too many of us sit on our butts and just dream away life. Sorry Janice, but that’s the plain truth.

Too many of do not think outside of the narrow confines of our day to day jobs and lives to see how we can start a learning path on our own. Get your job for sure, but follow your passion in your spare time. So in 5 years from now you’ll be insanely great at it. If you do not want to follow your dream (even for an hour a day), then its not your dream and you should do something else with your life.

I don’t watch tv, I don’t go out, I have no social life as it is. I don’t have very much time to myself at all. Even now, I am writing this during my lecture break. I’m struggling in my current program as it is. That’s exactly what I plan to do after University. I want to find a good job, but I want to pursue what I want in my spare time. But htat is just not possible currently. But for that to happen, I need to be able to find a job that can sustain me, and pay off any of the fees and loans I have racked up the past years. And so, at the moment, I am more concerned with finding such a job, I don’t need to have what I want right now, I’m being realistic, I have to put what I want on hold til I graduate, and that does not seem bad to me. Everything I have learned is self-taught from when I did have free time, but again, I plan to pursue this after I graduate. This wasn’t about pursuing my dream job, but about finding a part-time job that could be a stepping stone for a full-time job after I graduate so I can sustain myself while I pursue my dream.

I do, however, have a portfolio, not complete mind you, but I do have a few piece I am confident enough to use.

So what do you have spare time for that will affect your life in the future?

I ask because when I was younger (your age), my spare time was spent messing around with electronics, computers, writing, etc.

This was because I vaguely recognized that my future was going to be in that area.

Sure, I had to work in my parents store every day. Go to school. Do homework. Do chores. The same things that you have to do at this moment.

However when I started school form computers+electronics I was well ahead of everyone in the class. I’ve never gone for an interview in the above areas where I did not get the job. And this was all because I could talk about the self-learning I did.

My problem with everything that you’re saying is that it’s a cop-out. You’re just making excuses.

You’re saying that you don’t have the time (that’s not true). Whats really true, is that you don’t have the passion.

People who have the passion to do things – do them, or attempt to do them. They don’t whine about not having time. Why? Because there is always time.

End the things in your life that do not contribute to your future in some way.

Chose the time each day wisely. Every day that you pass wasted means you have to make it up in the future. You’re only 20. These is the most valuable time in your life that will shape the rest of it.

And you know what the sad truth/thing to all of this wasted time is? There is going to come a day when you really and truly have no more time.

That day is not today. That day is not now.

Wake up Janice. Get off your ass and do something with your life.

Thats tough love.

And everyone, the reason why I’m giving Janice such a hard time right now, is that too many young people put off preparing for their future until they’ve left University.

It’s the wrong thing to do, especially if you are not in a very pre-determined field like Law or Medicine.

If its anything you can learn yourself then you need to be doing it before school, during school and after school.

Anything else is not doing enough.

See, I see and understand everything you are saying. However, I am quite insulted that you’re saying I’m being lazy and doing nothing for my future. Prior to the pi program I switched to, I was in a more predetermined program and realized after two years it simply was not my niche. I was in a program that combined computer science and robotics. I was having so much trouble with calculad and computer program I had to leave. I stayed in school and switched to a different program. honestly, when I’m not in school, I’m working, when I do have time I dabble but I have little time for that. And I want to prepare for the future hence asking for advice on finding a better job. I might not be pursuing that dream at the moment, but I am trying to prepare for the future. Reason why I am struggling so bad noe I’d because of how badly I did in my previous program, I had retaken coursedmany times and was still unable to do well, so I am making up for it now.

Pardon the spelling, my phone is hard to type on.

• computer science, robotics and 3d arts.

UPS as a package handler (which is part time, with benefits eventually) can lead to a career as a driver job, which can support a household. WIthin the next few years there is going to be a wave of retiring drivers, therefore you won’t be a package handler for long. Not glamorous by any means, but it pays decent.