Autism and underemployment
I previously wrote how a late diagnosis meant that that I was unable to access a number of programmes which help people with Autism get into work. This blog is about underemployment – working in a role for which I am overqualified.
Personally, I struggle with interviews in large part as I am not as expressive as most people and therefore don’t come across as interested enough in the role. As I’ve not passed most interviews, I’ve worked a lot as a temp and I’ve never earnt a huge amount, despite the fact that my earning power should be at least in line with the national average salary given my background and skillset. I have had permanent roles, but one contract was zero hours and didn’t provide much work, and another place I worked for closed down. I have a permanent job but it doesn’t provide me with as many hours as I’d like.
The zero-hour role had an interview which was more like an informal chit chat. The second permanent job was one I found through teaching English as foreign language. One day at the end of the lesson, a lady told me that she’d actually been looking for someone to employ in her English teaching company and that she felt I was a good fit. The job involved writing little vignettes which included English idioms and phrasal verbs, as well as doing an audio for these pieces. I was praised for the entertaining quality of my stories and felt for the first time in a while that I was doing something useful, that my work was appreciated and that I was good at what I did. Unfortunately, the company closed down and I was left with less work.
The third job is an admin job which I’ve had for while and I got simply because the people running the business knew that I was looking for work.
With this job I use excel, and I do the accounts twice as fast as t