I’m at a bit of a crossroads and discouraged at the moment with how job prospects are going. Trying to figure out what to do next.

I’ve worked at a call centre for the last 11 years for a government healthcare provider. I started there when I was a teenager as one of the people on the phones, but worked my way up to a monitor position within a few years where I listen to other people’s calls and provide coaching. I also have duties in operational support with the team where I do timekeeping, scheduling, supervise shifts, and some data analysis. I am highly skilled with databases and Excel.

The job has been fine, but I basically reached the highest role I could have on the team many years ago. I’m also only listed as a casual employee in my job despite working full time hours. This fact was a point of investigation in the department as I was looking after many crucial tasks despite being a casual employee, but they determined my duties were still in scope for my position.

Without going into too many specifics, my manager has continuously made it clear that there wouldn’t be more opportunities for me to advance at the company despite my strong performance. Main reason being that higher roles are already filled by long serving employees who have given no indication they will be leaving any time soon. So I have been looking to leave the company for a long time as I’m frustrated being a casual employee for so long.

I decided reduce my hours and go back to school in 2020 to improve my job prospects. I ended up staying in school for 4 years and completing a BBA with a major in supply chain management. During this time I also married my wife and we had a daughter in my last semester at school.

At the end of my degree, I got a job with a national railway company working as a dispatcher in their operations centre. They liked my experience working on phones and my education. This was the permanent position I was looking for with benefits and only a slight hit in pay. The role was shift work though with day and night shifts. They would schedule me on whatever shifts they needed and many days I would go home to sleep for 8 hours and head back to work another shift. The job was very stressful and they were short staffed, meaning overtime was forced frequently and you could end up working 16 hours straight.

All my colleagues there were basically giving me advice or strong hints that I should get out while I can. Being incredibly burned out and not seeing my wife or new baby for days on end, I decided to leave and go back to my original job where I could technically make more money and work more consistent hours during the day.

This was the right decision for my family and I don’t regret leaving. I’ve been able to help my wife with raising our daughter and I have gotten to spend a lot more time with them that I would’ve missed out on.

My plan with going back to my old company was to work there for a few months while applying for other jobs again and move into a different role somewhere else. This was in June 2024 and it has been over a year now since I made this change, but I am still at my old job.

The first month I landed two intervews that I felt I did fine on, but didn’t receive any offers. I kept applying for roles, but things seemed to dry up quickly. The last 11 months I had two other applications where I made it to multiple interviews and felt like I as a really strong applicant, but ultimately someone else was chosen. I have applied for over 100 jobs in the last 12 months now and I’m still stuck where I am. I usually apply for operations supervisor or coordinator roles. I would like to grow into a project manager role or a not for profit company job, but I’m not targeting those roles this early in my career.

I am wondering if I am doing something wrong. I apply when I can, but being a parent and working, I don’t always have time everyday. I make tailored resumes and write cover letters. Sometimes I’ll use AI to help write the cover letters faster, but I’ll always adjust them to be more natural and better fit the posting. I apply, apply, and apply and I hear nothing most of the time. Sometimes I wonder if I was put on a blacklist since I left my railway job pretty abrubtly, but I felt like it was on fine terms, and it seems absurd that such a thing would exitst.

I’m lucky that my wife has a great job and provides us benefits, but I need a better job with better pay and benefits to provide a better life for my kids.

I’m wondering if I should pivot industries or pursue training in a different field. I wouldn’t say I’m particularly career picky or feel that I am too good for certain roles. I know a lot of people define themselves by their career, but I really don’t need a glamorous career. I would be open to anything at paid 60k-100k or more with benefits and had reasonable working hours and time off.

I’m wondering what industries or roles are lucrative or have opportunities that people are seeing? Is there training that would be worthwhile to aquire? I also hear about people getting reached out to by recruiters all the time, but that never happens to me despite being on Linkedin and such. I really just feel I need to reorient myself, I’m just looking for where I should be looking for opportunities.