We’ve compiled key messages from our Job Seekers Seminar instructors into 3-minute speeches. Quickly get the motivation and advice you need to prepare for your job search!

 

Topic – Opportunity only comes to the prepared

Good morning, everyone.
I’d like to thank you all for braving the cold weather to come and join us.
It’s always the quiet before the big bang, and I’m guessing that’s probably where you’re at right now, so today we’re going to talk about taking the next big leap: using this time to get your job.
Mind control is really important when you’re in the middle of a stressful job search. But no matter how hard you try to control your mind, the loss of confidence caused by anxiety about the future seems to have a way of biting you in the tail and causing a chain reaction that makes mind control difficult.
It’s been said that fate gives you tons of indicators to get closer to your goal if you want it badly enough, and the stronger you want it, the stronger the energy of everything in the world to help you get there.
That’s when the “opportunity” we talk about comes along, but it’s no longer an opportunity for the unprepared, it’s just information flowing through. How about you?
You see a lot of job postings, you see a lot of job postings from companies that you want to work for, and you see them as opportunities because you want them so badly right now, but if you’re a freshman in college, for example, and you’re looking for a job, you’re going to see a lot of job postings from companies that you want to work for, but if you’re not ready for a job, that’s just information, it’s not an opportunity.
I’m sure there’s at least one company that you’re desperate to work for, so what you need to do now is figure out what they’re looking for – what skills they’re looking for. Some will be looking for foreign language skills, some will be looking for certifications, some will be looking for volunteer work.
Once you’ve identified that information and you’ve created a space for yourself in that profile, then when a job comes up at the company you want, it’s the job of a lifetime.
When you’re on the verge of getting a job and you’ve had a few close calls, you lose confidence. It’s unfortunate, but it’s something we all go through at one time or another, except in very special circumstances.
I wish everyone the best of luck. And be prepared to take your chances one at a time.
That’s the key to your success.
Thank you, everyone, for listening.

 

 

Topic – Go for it with heart

When you’re interviewing for a new job, there’s a lot going on.
Standing in front of a roomful of executives is definitely nerve-wracking.
If I were in that position, there’s no guarantee I wouldn’t be nervous too.
Even if you’ve been memorizing your speech at home, you’re stuttering when you start.
You can muffle the sound of the goats, but it won’t stop your heart from pounding.
Nevertheless, talented people stand out in such situations.
There are those who shine through it all with a heart of steel.
Who wouldn’t want to be someone with a brave heart inside?
It’s a crucial moment where you have to show your whole self in a short period of time, so you need to have a steel plate on your face and a confident heart.
It’s a nerve-wracking interview, but you have to think of it as your stage and give it your all.
If you’re a nervous person, you should try everything you can to get through the interview without any regrets, whether it’s eating green tea, mind control, meditation, or deep breathing.
Appearance is also important these days.
I don’t mean plastic surgery or crash dieting.
It’s about looking confident, sitting well, and keeping a smile on your face even when you’re not being asked a question.
It’s common knowledge that a smiling face looks better than a frowning face, even if it’s the same face.
A smiling face can show that you’re in good spirits with the company, and it can make the interviewer feel more relaxed.
Many people get caught up in the specs, but the truth is that school grades, TOEIC and other foreign language test scores, part-time jobs or work experience are only relevant in an interview.
Unless it’s a career position, it’s not the main factor in deciding whether or not you get the job.
We wish all prospective recruits the best of luck and hope they can fulfill their dreams in a good job.

 

 

Theme – Let’s live with hope and positivity

It’s not an exaggeration to say that 2024 has been a year of literal frugality.
I spent less, ate less, wore less, blah blah blah blah, and fought my own battle with neoliberalism, but of course, I was overwhelmingly losing.
In the end, in November, I even wrote a resume once, as if I had lowered my eyes, but it slipped through the cracks, and my ego must have felt like a big ‘gis’.
I didn’t make a good living, but I managed to live somehow.
I don’t know if it’s voluntary poverty or involuntary poverty, and frugality and frugality are often shaken and shaken, but somehow I managed to keep my breath.
The world that made me rewrite my resume, cover letter, and everything else at the beginning of the year, when I decided to become the rustiest cog in the neoliberal wheel, must be scary.
We’ve worked hard on our resumes, studied hard, and are anxious to get a job.
I’ve heard adults say that there’s nothing to lose, and now that I think about it, it was adults who said that, but anyway, when I ask every adult I meet, “If I’m fighting neoliberalism and I’m losing, should I take a desk job with a triple-digit salary,” they all say yes.
The answer is probably a no-brainer.
In hindsight, realizing that you can live without losing is a great harvest.
It’s human to cry and scream when you know it’s only for a moment.
Instead of working long hours and getting paid long hours, I got pissed off long hours and spent a lot of money, and now I work less and get pissed off less, but I don’t have money to spend and I’m used to it, so I’m fine.
The only thing that remains uncontrollable is time, but what to do with it is a big problem.
At first, I would have gotten on Line 2 at the end of the day and flattened out, and when I thought about it, I would have gone back to my office worker life like this, wearing my employee ID card around my neck and grumbling that I hate having to stay in the office during the day.
I remember when I was younger, Dr. Lee emphasized self-sufficiency, saying that being an empty nester is a benefit, so enjoy it.
When I asked him what I should do against neoliberalism, which threatened me with death if I didn’t make enough money, death if I didn’t work harder, death if I lived like that, his advice was simple.
Say no. If you don’t like the system, if you don’t like the idea of having more, if you don’t like the idea of trampling on others, if you don’t like the idea of living, then say no.
Of course, the price of that is insecurity, and capitalism is to have a lot of material things unconditionally and to be seen as a winner, but under that system, he always said that he was always a loser, and he smiled a little, but it was never a loser’s hollow smile.
I had forgotten that that smile gave me the courage to decide that I would become a deserter if I had to.
At least I’ll have to endure this.
Let’s not just sit at home and sigh, calling ourselves losers and failures.
We are young enough to endure a few failures.
I hope we can all stay strong today.
Thank you for listening.

 

 

Topic – Freeters

There have been many times in my life when I’ve had to explain to people what I’m doing for a living.
Mentioning that you’re looking for a job is met with a shrug after a while.
I can’t even say that I’m a student because I’m on vacation from graduate school, and I’ve been living diligently since this year by delivering green juice in the morning and buying coffee at a cafe at lunch, but it’s just a ploy.
Adults often ask me if it’s enough to make a living, but the legal minimum wage is 4110 won and the hourly wage at the cafe is 4200 won, so even if I work for an hour, I don’t have enough money to buy a cup of coffee at the cafe, and if I sell a bottle of green juice that costs 1,300 won, I get a quarter of my allowance, so it’s not easy to make a living. Of course, there is a simple term that you can use when you don’t want to answer about green juice, cafe, and commission.
It’s “fritter.
But I don’t want to use that word over and over again.
But there are times when someone asks you what you do and the first thing they say is, “You’re a fritter.”
The look of pride on the faces of the elderly, especially those who have worked to the bone to feed their families, is the same when they pronounce the word, which in Japan refers to young people who make little money but live freely in their spare time.
I never use that word because I don’t want to see that look, which is a subtle mix of frustration, anger, and a vague sense of envy and contempt.
That ‘look’ has subtitles floating around like a foreign movie without them having to open their mouths to say it.
Do you realize how we worked our asses off to build this economy, how people like us worked our asses off to the bone so that people like you can live like that, while you work your asses off playing chilleleh chilleleh.
Young people should be doing hard labor, but these days it’s wrong, if your parents put you through college with their blood and sweat, you should be doing something like work, heh frittera ‘free’.
Selfish stuff, that’s what it says.
I know you’re looking at me right now and you’re like, “I know, I know, I know, I know, I know.
But it’s just as frustrating from this side.
I wonder how many of the young people who became ‘freeters’ did so because they really wanted to be free. They wanted to be busy, not free, but the barriers to entry into society have become so high and the bottlenecks so severe that once you’re free, you’re free forever.
And it’s not easy to be a free person.
Except for places like 24 hour bone broth soup, most of the service industries in the food industry have a clear age limit of 25 years old or younger, and you are either bossed around or you are bossed around, or you stay here for a while and then leave, so you are cheated and deceived, and the wages are low, and at best, you are treated as a social experience or a menial job, but even if you stay for a while, you have nowhere to go.
And for any young person, the way society looks at them nowadays is usually contempt.
Those who somehow break through the entry barrier and stay for a while and try to get out are those who don’t know romance, who are risking their lives on credits and accumulating specifications, and those who stay there without graduating from this or that part-time job to live somehow are free to live as they want without knowing real labor.
So the orders are coming in, “Keep your eyes down, go to a small business, work in a factory,” and it’s not just that.
You have to be young and rebellious, why are you so conformist, be politically awake, etc.
And shouldn’t the adults pity the 880,000 generation for being so quiet and used to being scorned in this era of so many orders?
Thank you, everyone, for listening.

 

 

Topic – Now is a great time to build your resume

Good morning, everyone.
It’s great to see so many people here and feel the passion for what we do.
Almost without exception, whether it’s a relative who calls after a long time, or a friend who runs into you, people ask questions.
What are you doing now?
I’m stumped.
I don’t know what I’m doing, I’m doing a lot of things.
I’m reading books, studying English, going to cram school, helping out in the neighborhood, working out, cooking dinner at home…
I can’t count on ten fingers.
Like most people in Korea, I’m pretty busy, and I don’t know why, and I get angry.
But when I’m asked what I’m doing, I always answer that I’m studying English, among many other things.
This simple answer is probably the key to getting a job, and it’s the key to setting your salary in the future.
As you can imagine, that’s the only thing you can expect to earn an income from, so it kind of honors the point of the other person’s question, even if it’s not the best response.
I’ve been asked if I have any good news, and I can’t help but feel like a coward.
In a world where money is power and everyone is frantically scrambling to make it, there’s a pervasive feeling that you’re an outcast, an outcast of society.
There’s a phrase called quality time.
Quality time is time that has meaning in your life, time that is creative, free, useful, and used in a way that is fraternal.
Bad time, on the other hand, is time that is not free and is forced.
In fact, the main reason we work is to maximize the amount of quality time we will someday be able to stroke.
In our vision, time becomes meaning and value, not money.
All those long, boring hours we’re enjoying right now are a value.
True labor is free and voluntary, not for income, but to create wealth and pleasure together.
I want you to be happy, whether or not people treat you like an idiot.
The joy of being in control of your own time.
When you’re reading your favorite book and suddenly wake up to the sound of birds outside your window, or when you’re in a quiet house with a cup of aromatic tea,
When you go for a walk with your mom, it’s a great reminder that you are alive.
It’s a blessing to be able to feel fully present, even if you’re not making money.
Rather than torturing yourself with stress, I want you to treat yourself with positivity.
It’s a great time to build yourself up and build your foundation.
Thank you for listening.

 

 

Topic – There are no sanctuaries in the workplace

I once had a question about my cell phone that led me to call my carrier’s customer service.
“Hello, sir, how may I help you?”
A friendly voice came over the phone, and at first I was a bit taken aback.
It wasn’t the all-too-familiar female agent voice, but a male voice that felt a little unfamiliar.
I thought to myself, “I’ve heard that companies are increasingly hiring male agents to increase trust, and I wonder if that’s the case here, too.” It was cool to realize that I was unknowingly separating male and female jobs.
I was vocal about not discriminating against men and women, but I realized that I was also discriminating against men and women.
I felt a little funny about my inconsistency.
It’s been a long time since we broke down the gender binary, but there are stereotypes that have been around longer than that, and they’re strange and foreign.
There was a moment when I was at a meeting, listening to a big man tell his story, and there was a momentary silence.
Someone asked him, “What was your dream when you were a kid?
He stammered out an answer.
Then everyone jumped in, trying to figure out what his dream was.
Finally, he said, “My dream was to be a nurse.
Everyone was stunned, both the speaker and the listener.
While the prolonged job shortage has played a role in the breakdown of gender roles, I think there’s definitely a positive side to this in that it’s opened up career options for both men and women.
As more and more men are entering jobs such as telemarketers, nurses, and kindergarten teachers, which were once thought to be exclusively female, social perceptions are gradually changing.
It is said that men are often trusted because of their certain professionalism, which creates a synergistic effect.
On the flip side, the number of women entering security-related jobs, racing drivers, and firefighters, which were once considered male-dominated, has increased significantly since the 90s.
However, in our subconscious, stereotypical minds, we are still a bit hesitant and embarrassed.
I think deep down in our consciousness, we’re still stuck in the same place we were when that man told us that his dream was to be a nurse and we were all stunned.
There are still people who say, “That’s a woman’s job,” or “What kind of woman does that,” and they don’t see anything that crosses the gender lines of a profession in a good light.
We need to realize that it’s easy to do what we take for granted, but it’s never easy to challenge what we don’t take for granted.
If you don’t break your comfort zone, you’ll only be able to do half as much as if you did.
We need to encourage those who are taking on new challenges beyond their occupational sanctuaries, and we need to be open-minded so that when we’re setting career paths or giving advice, we don’t make the mistake of limiting our options by thinking in terms of stereotypes.
Thank you for listening.

 

 

Topic – On the path to becoming a big tree

Thank you very much for joining us.
Many modern people live in a state of stress.
They say that moderate stress is the lubricant of life, but I wonder how many people live with moderate stress.
To do that, you need to control your mind and constantly cultivate it, which is not always easy.
When I was in the corporate world, I had a lot of stress about my boss, my work, and the disruption of my routine.
Now, it’s about whether I’ll be able to find a job, whether I’ll be able to land a good job, whether I’ll be able to switch gears and apply for other jobs.
It’s even more stressful.
Someone here is probably the head of a family, someone is the firstborn or the eldest child in a family.
There’s a lot of pressure on us to reciprocate with something worthy.
That’s why modern people are depressed.
But if you don’t know unhappiness, you don’t know happiness.
We need to know.
This situation I’m in may be unhappy, but it’s only by experiencing it that I’ll be able to face true joy.
We can’t understand the nature or brilliance of hope without keeping an eye on despair.
Perhaps this weakness is due to our considerable lack of awareness and study of despair or unhappiness.
It is said that the bigger the tree, the more rings it has.
A sign of having survived a harsh winter.
That’s what rings are.
But we all know that there are as many warm spring days as there are rings.
The more despair and hope a tree has, the bigger it is.
I believe that hope is just around the corner.
I hope everyone will be strong.
So, may we all be big trees.
Thank you all for listening.