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Pain – a influence of career choice

People may have many different influences when deciding upon a career; a person may choose a career based upon

  • the pay
  • the location
  • the benefits
  • the schedule
  • the prior personal connection to a particular location
  • the mission of the organization
  • the geography of where the organization is located

There can be many different influences that may influence a person career decision.
One particular influence can be pain.

Sometimes a person may have difficulty doing a particular activity that may create pain for the person.  A person will likely want to avoid doing that particular activity that creates pain.  A person will likely want to be in a job position that will not contribute to their pain.  For example, a person may have a back problem that limit a person from lifting above 10 pounds.  A person would likely then want to find a job position that does not require a person to lift above 10 pounds

So how does one do a job search based upon the physical, how does one avoid job positions that may create pain?  Here are some ideas that may be helpful

Just to mention I am not a medial doctor or lawyer – please see an expert for individual guidance)
I also saying physical to mean both physical and mental difficulties that a person may have.

Get Expertise help

I think searching for a job position based upon the physical; is one of the more difficulty ways to search for a job.  You are not going to find a job search engine that will allow you to separate job positions based upon the physical (or nothing I have seen).  You are going to have a lot of stress dealing with both the physical issues and the job search.  An expert may be able to for example give ideas on how to approach a potential employer with your physical difficulty.

 

Here some experts to look at:

  • Medical Doctor – get medical advice on the physical difficulty that you have; specially, get medical advice on what you can do physically and what you cannot do physically. For example, you may have a bad back that makes lifting difficult, A doctor may be able to define the weight limit for your back. A doctor then may write written documentation for you

There are two advantages from

  • First, your medical information will serve as evidence that you have a particular physical difficulty (a particular employer then may accept or be able to accommodate the physical difficulty)
  • Second, you will have some idea of what job positions to search for. If a doctor says do not lift above 10 pounds, you can try to search for job positions that do not require lifting above 10 pounds.
  • Career Experts

Try to find career experts who may be able to help you with searching for the physical.  Some options could be:

  • Vocational Rehabilitation – these are state offices that can help people with physical difficulties in helping to find a job position. Each state and Washington D.C. have vocational rehabilitation offices; you can do an Internet search typing in the state (or Washington D.C.) that you are interested in and then also type “Vocational Rehabilitation” to get more information
  • Career Coach – a career coach may be able to give you advice on the physical; career coach may be able to help you search for job positions that may not give you pain.

Other ideas

  • Social group – when you are searching for a job position based upon the physical; you are doing to be having enough stress; your social group can help you in giving you support and second your social group may be able to network for you in finding job positions once you have some ideas of what job positions you like to look at.
  • Physical and/or mental career associations that focus upon a particular difficulty. The association may be able to give career information that can be helpful for people.  For example, the National Association of the Deaf helps give career information to deaf people.

Go to www.nad.org

Then click Resources

This will open up a menu

Then click Employment

  • Informational Interviews – a informational interview is a way you can talk to people in the profession that you are interested in going into; an informational interview may be a way that you can learn more about the physical area in a particular profession
  • Occupational Outlook Handbook – the Occupational Outlook Handbook is a government publication that comes out every two years; the Occupational Outlook Handbook gives information on many different career fields. You can go to the Occupational Outlook Handbook and sometimes gain some knowledge of the physical activities needed for that career.

Go to https://www.bls.gov/ooh/ – the Occupational Outlook Handbook

You can then search for career fields by keyword search and by category

You can then go into a particular career field and then choose “Work Environment” section of a particular career

  • Job position itself – sometimes the job position itself can sometimes give details on the physical; I will often see this on job descriptions from larger organizations
  • You may often not know the physical features of a job position when you are first applying for the job; you may find it valuable to apply for jobs that you are not sure about, and then learn more about the job in a job interview and/or job offer.  You can then better evaluate the job once you learn more about it. (again, I would suggest using an expert to gain guidance on how best to approach a potential employer with your difficulty)

 

Own Business
No one know you better than you.  You may want to consider owning your own business (either full or part time).  You are in full control of how to do the tasks; this can be advantage for some people who may need to have work adjustments but they can do the work adjustments for themselves with their own business.  Some ideas of where to start a business could be:

 

  • Score.org – score.org an organization of volunteer business people who can help people start and grow their business. Score.org is connected with the Small Business Administration.
  • Small Business Administrationhttps://www.sba.gov/ a federal government agency that can give you information on starting and growing your business.

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