Graduated two years ago! No permanent job yet!

I have Asperger's Syndrome and I graduated with a B.A International Relations (about a 2:2 in English system) from an American Uni here in England in 2012 and I have been volunteering with a charity bookshop for two years.

The problems I am having are: knowing what my strengths/skills are, knowing what I enjoy, what job do I would like to have,understanding job descriptions correctly and marketing myself on a CV and cover letters. It just all feels so unnatural to me.

I only did the degree just to have a better chance of employment, I was not really that passionate about the subject.

I happen to be one of those with Aspergers that don't have fixations on certain subjects. I really admire others with the disorder who do have a strong interest and/or talent but I do not seem to have any whatsoever to contribute anything meaningful and this makes me have a sense of jealousy. I sort of feel as if I am a minority within a minority.

Does anyone here have any advice as to how someone with the difficulties I am having to come to a solution to all this?

I have had those problems ever since I was in high school and I am still in the same situation despite all my hard work over the years.  

I think the Government could do a lot more to solve its out of work benefits bill by cleaning up DWP/Job Centre attitudes, than this astronomically expensive filtering process to exclude often genuinely disabled claimants.

The DWP/Job Centre seems to be a magnet for bullies and people with a grudge against society who freely abuse their position by picking on the people they are supposed to be helping.

But the effect is to undermine confidence and demoralise job seekers who, without this Gulag Archipelago mentality, might actually more quickly turn things around and get another job.

Instead the DWP/Job Centre bullies wreck people's resolve and eagerness and it means people being needlessly out of work for far longer.

I also think we need to push much harder for better autism awareness at Job Centres.

Hi Asketchum,

You have raised interesting points about the job hunt after graduation. Some of it will be familiar to almost every graduate, as a lot find it takes time to get job security, but there is a need to provide more support to people on the spectrum.

It is astonishing how they (DHSS/DWP/Job Centre etc) still play this game of telling you to hide qualifications. This has been going on for years. I recall being in difficulty during the slump in the early 1990s, and being told to pretend I didn't have a PhD, as they said this reduced my chances of finding work. Their advice - make up a story for what you did those three years - in other words lie on a job application!

I've certainly heard before of graduates being told to hide the fact they've done a degree.  It is difficult to comprehend the mindset of the DWP - perhaps a recruitment qualification for the DWP is a proven record of deceit. It is pretty hard to create a convincing fiction and not be caught out, but the bigger issue is why they think hiding qualifications works.

There is a theory about job finding called the qualification pyramid. The fewer qualifications you have, the more people there are hunting for the available jobs. The sensible thing is to go for the higher entry jobs needing more qualifications, because actually you really do have better chances. In other words the higher up the qualification pyramid the more likely you are to find a job - provided you are being realistic about your abilities (which does raise problems for people with autism - see below).

But the other side of this strategy is that employers want people who will stay. So obviously someone hiding better qualifications will move on when a better opportunity turns up. So understandably employers get very angry when duped in this way. Why DWP/DHSS/Job centre etc think lying in an application is sensible is beyond comprehension. Perhaps there needs to be a test case where they get prosecuted.

The point where people on the autistic spectrum get into difficulties going up the pyramid is whether their disability, or employers' reactions to it, makes it harder to find jobs higher on the pyramid. It usually means people with autism selling themselves short. But going down the pyramid doesn't solve this, as you are then an over-qualified disabled person trying to compete against more applicants.

Where I think DHSS/DWP are coming from with their insane strategy is that there is a glut of graduates after jobs every year.

But the solution isn't about hiding the degree, it is about value added. What more can you offer an employer?

This is where your recent experiences ought to be advantageous. You are at least working, even if a mix of voluntary and low paid or short term. You are getting a good range of experience, particularly in roles helping others (and your theatre experience is good). That could make you attractive to employers, because you will have skills in helping others to engage (which for someone with autism usually making that harder is really good).

Build up a portfolio of these experiences demonstrating the positives, how they have made you potentially valuable. That could be better for you than doing more routine low paid jobs on a steadier basis like shelf stacking or telephone call centre which many graduates end up doing for too long, which doesn't contribute much to useful skills.

Also the university sector may provide longer term opportunities if you can stick with these experiences for a bit. Student support does need people with personal experience of difficulty to help other students. So you are in the right place, even if the prospects seem uncertain.