Get to work this summer, without a job

The summer is half over, you’ve been out of school or out of work for months, and you’re starting to feel desperate. You are sure you’ve lost the last brain cell you ever had. Ideas, which used to be your strong suit, elude you completely. What’s next?

If you’re a student living at home this summer, redemption with the folks doesn’t seem likely by the time July rolls around, but I’m here to tell you that you can still find work this summer with a little (very little) sweat, and the help of a few Office Online templates.

Try one of these, and I bet you will have something lined up by next week:

1. Pound the pavement … some more. A student without much work experience can get a lot of mileage out of a simple resume. Use a log to track businesses where you’ve dropped off resumes, and don’t forget to send thank you notes for job interviews.

2. Offer landscaping services. In this economy, many of your neighbors have stopped their landscape service and are probably in desperate need of some weeding, pruning, or mowing right now. A simple door hanger or a business flyer with pull-off tabs can drum up enough business for the rest of the summer. Be sure to schedule appointments.

3. Advertise babysitting skills. I speak only for every working parent in America when I say that childcare is a parent’s summer nightmare. If a teenager offered to “entertain” my children for a one-day trial, and handed me a babysitting log or a checklist of what they did with my kids, I would, well, I would cry with joy, and then I would hire that teen for the rest of the summer.

4. Join forces and wash cars. You might have friends in a similar employment predicament right now. A car wash fundraiser to buy your fall semester school books could result in a few contacts with employment leads for next summer. Be sure to vacuum their seats.

5. Organize a neighborhood garage sale. Approach a few families in the neighborhood and offer to clean out their garages in exchange for the proceeds from a multi-household garage sale. Or, if you’re a prolific artist, you might consider teaming up with other artists to advertise an arts and crafts sale.

6. Make family a priority. Whether it’s your family or someone else’s, convince an elder to pay you a stipend to create a family history book, a vacation photo album, or a vacation newsletter. You might be surprised at what you learn.

7. Start a book club. Take this opportunity to catch up on your reading. Maybe you have other unemployed friends or access to a retirement community filled with enthusiastic readers. Put together a reading list, and make a flyer to recruit book club members. Organizing anything requires initiative; put your book club on your resume.

Do you have summer job-hunting tips to share? Let us know what has worked for you.

--leslie