How many disabled people are applying for a job and then following up with a phone call? How many disabled people are applying to hundreds of jobs within a week, right? I'm not saying that nobody does that, but how many people are like, "Well, I'm on SSDI and I'm comfortable." Or they count themselves out. "Well, I probably wouldn't be good at that." Well, how do you know? How do you know you wouldn't be good at that? - Josh Barlog, welcome to the see-through podcast. - Thanks, man. Happy to be here. I appreciate the invite. Thanks for the time. Like you said, my name is Josh. I'm a professional recruiter, which is a fancy title for just recruiter. I work in the IT space, so science, technology, engineering, mathematics, the STEM field, and I happen to be totally blind. - Totally blind. I love talking to totally blind people, man. 'Cause-- - Yeah, yeah, it's so crazy to, to explain because like, we can get into this right now. Like my condition is actually a pretty rare one that I don't see too many people with. No pun intended, but it's familial exudative vitriol retinopathy. So it's pretty rare. Fever for short. And the irony is I just kind of tell people you have totally blind. I know I didn't used to be totally blind. It's sort of gotten worse over time. And we can get into that too. But I just kind of love explaining to people who don't have a visual impairment, like why things happened or how it happened. 'Cause they're like, why, how did that happen? Then you tell them and they have like a deer in the headlights look like, I don't even know why I explained that to you. Doesn't matter. Kissy. - No, no, it's great. It's a new shiny card for my podcast collection. It's like, yeah, another eye condition checked off, you know. I'm going on the wall. - Yeah, I'm collecting all the blindness Pokemon cards, you know. (laughing) - There you go. No, I mean, so just for quick context for everybody, 'cause I know that some people are born blind, some people aren't. When I was 18, so my functional vision, I was 2,200 for pretty much my whole life up until 18. And then over summer, kind of got worse. Couldn't see out of my rod, my left eye. They did some testing and full retinal detachment. And then fast forward, 21, I was 25. Same thing happened in the right eye, but the right eye happened more overnight. So that was a super fun, jarring, terrible experience. But it led me to a lot of different things. So it's kind of like you look back with gratitude for it, kind of. - Yeah, yeah. And so how did you end up in this current job position, this job career that you have right now, or this whole world you're in right now? - Yeah, so before I lost the vision of my right eye, I actually, I was kind of a workaholic. I worked in commercial radio as a disc jockey. And I was a sales and marketing manager for just kind of a small local company here. And when I lost my vision and my right eye, I mean, I didn't know accessibility, right? I didn't use any of that stuff. So I didn't really know what to do. My bosses didn't know what to do. They were pretty gracious, but I went through four and a half, three and a half, four years of treatments and stuff that ultimately had me sidelined. I wasn't working for three and a half years. And then the treatments and stuff just kind of plateaued. It was kind of like, hey, we're kind of at the point of no return. We're not gonna be able to bring anything back with the treatments that we have access to. So I'm like, all right, well, I haven't been doing anything. So I need to get back to work. I need to make some money. So I just started applying to anything and everything. I actually had a job kind of before the one I have now, which we can get into, but ultimately what it came down to, we can reverse engineer it is, I had to focus on my strength. I had to ask people who I trusted their opinion of, of like, hey, I'm getting back. I feel like I have a clean slate. What am I good at? I don't wanna know what I know. I wanna know what you know. Maybe there's things that I'm ignoring. Maybe that, maybe there's things that I think I'm good at that I'm not. So I wanna hear from the people close to me of, hey, this is what I think you'd be good at. And then let's target that and see how that goes. And that ultimately led me to recruiting. I wasn't targeting the IT space, but it just happened to be, I actually applied for a trainee position because I felt like, hey, lowest barrier of entry. And it kind of led me to, to hear. So that was two and a half years ago. I'll be, I'll be with the company three years in March of next year. - That's interesting that you asked people around you. All right, like what's, what are my strengths? And then you kind of try to reverse engineer based on what your skill set was, what careers and jobs you might be good at. You know, I think that's pretty smart. It kind of makes sense that, you know, you would end up being successful in finding a job if you're thinking kind of outside the box of how to get a job, which is kind of a big point of what we're going to talk about and makes me excited to have this episode is, is you want to give, you know, you reach out to me and you're like, I have this, I have a lot of helpful insights that I can help, you know, share to help people who are looking for jobs, how to make themselves basically be a shining star. In the world of, you know, job recruitments in terms of applying for jobs, how to look on your resume, you know, how to carry yourself, you know, on phone interviews, follow up interviews, you know, being a good employee. Once you get started, when do you tell your employer about your visual impairment or disability, you know, there's a lot of things that go into jobs. And also to think about jobs in relation to blindness and disabilities is, you know, and this is a topic that gets covered on the C2 podcast quite a bit is, you know, there's a huge part of the blind population is unemployed, you know. The statistics vary, but one that I see over and over again is around 78% of, you know, the blind community is unemployed, which is way too high. According, you know, it kind of blows my mind because you need currency, you need money to, you know, live life, you know, unfortunately, I don't, sometimes I wish that wasn't the case, but it is the case and it's a reality. So sometimes I'm wondering like, well, how these people, if they're not working, you know, how are they living, fulfilling lives, you know, how, you know, 'cause it kind of carries over into other parts of your life too. Like if you're not employed, are you going to be able to be, you know, considered a person of value and like the dating market, you know. Also your, you know, your personal reflection of yourself, you know, like it's like, as much as jobs suck, they also do sometimes present you with a sense of fulfillment and that AI have skills and I get to bring this to the table. I'm helping people, I'm providing something to the world, you know, and just to kind of know that 78% of the blindness community doesn't get that fulfillment feeling, they're not getting income coming in. It just kind of makes me sad. And I think that's, if I had to identify one, if I had to identify the biggest problem that blind people face, it would be unemployment. And, you know, 'cause I think there's only one real freedom in life and I think it's financial freedom, I think that's the only real freedom that you can get. Yeah, so it's just kind of alarming to me and I would love to help anyone listening who's on the hunt for a job or maybe they want a better job, you know, it can go for either or, but yeah, I'm just very excited and I'm passionate about this topic. - No, 100% and I think you touched on the 78% statistic. We can talk all day about unemployment, which is not, it's obviously not ideal. It's a number that everybody wants to work on, but the question is just how do we work on it? And that's kind of what we'll cover today, but also under employment. I mean, there's people with jobs, but it's like, hey, I mean, cool. You know, money isn't everything, right? The love of money is gonna put you into some pretty bad situations. But at the end of the day, like the money that you make is the tool to live. It is the tool for housing, for food, for shelter, right? And for all of these things that are necessities. So I mean, I've seen post things when I was looking for work, it was like, oh, you could do this, 12 bucks an hour. And I'm like, who's gonna live on that? Like there's no like, this isn't a commission based, you make 12 and then you have an opportunity to make more. It's like 12 bucks an hour and like have a great day. So to answer your question is like, how are they living fulfilling lives? I mean, this was me for three and a half years. I was on Social Security Disability. I was on those things that, frankly speaking, like ripping the bandit off, they're not good. They're like, use them as a safety net? 'Cause I get it, right? Like sometimes you just have tough luck. It's kind of a part of life. Use those things as safety nets, but don't get too comfy. Because if you get too comfy, what I use the analogy that use it as a safety net, not a spider web. Because if you get too relaxed, it gets sticky. And it truly the system, the way that it's set up, it is difficult to get out. It's truly difficult to get out of it. I mean, I'm still battling with some of those things two and a half years later. - Can you explain that? - Yeah, so typically what happens with like, whether it's SSI or SSDI, some sort of disability benefit, you'll have income limits. So if you make more than 1,000 dot, whatever it is, they have their specific amounts, you then lose some or all of your benefits. Which, if you're ramping up trying to find a job or you're doing part-time work to see, like there's a ticket to work program for like the disabled community, if they're on SSDI and it basically gives you a nine month trial period of like, we're gonna keep you on your benefits and you're gonna make whatever you make, doesn't matter, for nine months. But then after that nine months, then those benefits go away. Now, the strategic perspective is you need to not only make the amount of money at the job that you're gonna make with disability, you need to blow that out of the water. Because what happens is if you go make the money, like here's my logic, let's say your disability is $1,000 a month and you're making $1,000 a month at your job. Which, I mean, that's a low paying job or your part-time something, that's some sort of scenario, when your disability ends, now you're spending eight hours of your day and you're making $1,000. So, this is where the tips that I have, that I wanted to talk about today, come into play where it's like, I get it. You know, there's not just blindness, there's other disabilities that kind of hinder you and that are out of your control for working a certain job. Like, I'm never gonna be a truck driver. Let's call that what it is. I'm never gonna be a bartender, although I'm sure there are blind bartenders, who knows? - Yeah. - You have to find a way to not only find your strengths and be realistic about your strengths and your weaknesses and then find ways to, okay, how do I scale my paycheck when I do start working? 'Cause I think that if you're, being blind or being disabled is expensive. Like, I call it the blind or disabled tax. - Hmm, I've never heard of that. - There's just things that we have to pay for if you're blind or disabled that other people don't have to pay for, right? Like, it's like, if I wanna go to a restaurant and meet up with a friend, I have to either, they're either gonna pick me up, but what if they're not close to me? What if it doesn't make sense for them to come pick me up? Well, I'm probably not gonna wanna ask anybody for a ride because I don't wanna adhere to everybody else's schedule. I'd like to have some freedom. So I'm gonna grab an Uber or a Lyft or whatever. Okay, so there's an extra 10, 15, 20, 25, however far away it is, $25. Now you have to pay for the meal and now you have to pay to go back, right? So it's just simply more expensive. It's more expensive for me to go to work. People can buy a car with cash and pay for their car insurance and pay for gas and stuff like that, but they have the freedom to go not only to work and back, but they go anywhere they want it. Whereas for me, I'm paying simply to go to work and if you're not really close to work, it's expensive, right? So when you're talking about lifestyle with blind or disabled people, it is simply in certain areas more expensive. Okay, and a lot of that has a lot of that change now with the work from home kind of new workflow. Well, if you work for a company, because here's the thing, now we're getting into the job search sort of idea where who isn't looking for work from home jobs? True. I mean, everybody wants to work from home. Psycho pass, man. (laughs) Right, soon, I mean, yeah, like I'm stuck within these four walls all day long. So, but from a percentage perspective, it's gonna be even more difficult to set yourself apart because for a remote job, this isn't a legitimate statistic, but just for example, a remote job opens up, you're gonna have 200 applicants because you're not subjected to the radius of travel. You're all over the place. I mean, you could be in the entire state, the entire country. There's companies that don't care what state you live in. So, I mean, you open yourself up to competition throughout the entire nation, whereas if you get a job that's hybrid or whatever, like you're gonna heighten your chances to at least even get your resume looked at. So that's something to keep in mind. Personally, I think a hybrid or something, like go to the office, go to your workplace. I don't care what it is, but go because that's a necessity. Like, we need people interaction. We just do. And if you think you don't need it, you're lying. - Yeah, well, I'll tell you a little bit about my situation. So ever since COVID, I haven't been in an office since 2020. - Oh, man. - I work, and I work from home right here at this desk where I'm talking to you right now. And I'm a video editor. So, I'm just at my desk all day, every day. And then I also do this podcast for fun. And then that's also here at the same desk. So I'm at this desk probably 50 hours or over 50 hours a week. I'm sitting at this desk, staring at my computer screen. And my wife, you know, she works at a salon. She's a hair colorist. So she goes out, you know. So I'm here with me and my dog, Ruby. And that's been my life until, you know, she gets, my wife gets home from work. It's just me and the dog. Every day, day in, day out. And I'm not gonna lie, I get cabin fever. And I feel like in a weird way, I feel like my social skills have declined a little bit. Like 100%. I find myself when I hang out with friends, it feels kind of weird. It's like, oh my God, I'm talking to people in real life. Yeah, there's a lot of pros like I like it. Like there's a lot of things I love about working from home, but a hybrid job I think is, what you're describing makes to me the most sense because you get kind of best of both worlds. You get that like nice feeling of interacting with your co-workers, seeing them and being around them. And, you know, getting to know them a little bit more versus like overslack or, you know, that's what I use for work and email. And it's like, I've been working with certain people since 2020 that I've never met in real life. And I talk to them every day. You know, so it's kind of going off topic, but yeah, I just, you know, working from home is strange. It's very strange, and I get what you're saying with the hybrid thing, and just to recap, you know, if you do apply for a remote position, you're saying that your chances of getting the job goes down just simply due to math because more people are going to apply to those positions. 100% because I'll tell you a little recruiter secret. Not every resume probably gets looked at. Oh, I believe that. I believe that. Not every single one. And honestly, a lot of the, it depends on the company, but a lot of the application systems, they call them applicant tracking systems, ATSs, they don't actually like physically look at the resume. They use, you know, scanning software and things like that to look for keywords and highest matches get looked at. Right, so like, it's one of those things where not only are, not only do you need to be strategic about your resume, depending on what job you're applying for, but you also need to understand that your, you could fall victim to an ATS because your resume never actually got looked at unless it's a high map. Yes, see, that kind of thing I don't like to hear. No, it's, I mean, honestly, it's not. And I mean, here's the first pro tip. Work with a recruiter. Seems a little fishy that the recruiter wants you to work with a recruiter. No, I'm just missing. (laughing) No, like what I would say, because here's the strategic approach for anybody, really. If you see a job on LinkedIn or Indeed or a Zipper recruiter and you put your resume in there, it's very possible that you never talk to anybody. Your resume never gets looked at, nothing. I believed it and you have no advocate for you unless you do the due diligence of calling somebody because that's a good tip too is if you call, you know, if you, let's say you apply for, let's say you apply at like a restaurant or something down the street, right? And you drop off your resume or you email the resume, the next step for you is to call them and talk to HR. Okay. And just let them know, hey, you know, my name is Josh, I actually just sent over a resume to you. This is the job that I actually applied for. Do you have a second to just have a quick conversation? I'd love to get to know what you guys are specifically looking for, right? Because now you're connecting human to human. You're not a piece of paper anymore. Okay. And people like to vouch for people they like to talk to. 'Cause if I like you, I'm gonna vouch for you. Makes total sense. So yeah, so when you work with a recruiter, whether it's a customer service job, whether it's a sales job or whatever the field is, don't, and bolded, italicized, large font, don't work with any recruiter that claims to be like, I'm a disability-specific recruiter. And I'm gonna tell you why. Because I did that. And if you work through SSDI or SSI, and you do the Ticket to Work program or whatever, they will hook you up with a list of recruiters that you can talk to. And you're like, okay, I like this one, I'm gonna work with you. It's no cost to you, it's totally free. But this recruiter didn't specialize in any fields from a job perspective. This recruiter, which I should even use in air quotes, all they would do is send me job postings. And be like, if you like it, apply. Okay, so then what are you gonna do for me? Like, why am I using you? Oh, well, I'm here to help. How? Because I've been applying to these jobs. So how are you going to help me? And it was kind of, it was one of those things where it's like, yeah, I would get phone calls from this person and I'm like, I'm not even gonna answer. Because what are you doing for me? You're not, you know, you're giving me very, very basic resume tips. These aren't specific to the job that I'm applying for. These aren't specific to the industry that I'm trying to get into. You're giving me very, very surface level things that frankly, I don't need to fill out any forms 'cause you gotta fill out forms and do an interview with this person and you're like, it's a waste of time. It's simply a waste of time. So what I would suggest is let's just say you're looking for what I feel passionate about. You're looking for a sales job. - Okay. - The reason I say I'm passionate about sales is because if you're good at it, they don't care. If you're blind, deaf, in a wheelchair, have one leg, they don't care, you bloom purple, green, they don't care. If you can sell, if you can add value, here's your desk. - Okay, great to know. - So if you're looking, if you're looking for a sales job or really any industry, go on LinkedIn, make yourself a LinkedIn, make it all polished and even work with that recruiter once you find them to, hey, quick question. Not really good at this whole LinkedIn thing just yet. Can you give me some tips? It's the power of asking. You have to ask, if you don't ask, you won't get, right? So when you identify the industry and you literally search on LinkedIn, sales recruiter or sales talent acquisition specialist or whatever the industry is and then you reach out to these people and you don't need to tell them that you're blind or disabled. You just say, hey, I'm in the market for a job I'm looking to get into the industry. I'd love to be able to connect with you. So we can have a chat and maybe I can learn a couple of things from you and if it makes sense, I'd love to be able to work with you because then the value for them, the with them, what's in it for me, for them is if I place you, I make money. So why would I not? - Okay, all right, let's pause real quick. - Let's pause real quick 'cause I just wanna make sure I'm caught up 'cause this is all new to me. - For sure. - So you're suggesting to use a recruiter, specifically a recruiter who is tied to a specific industry and has kind of a niche and in doing so, you're gonna get more specific insights that'll actually help you get better access to those specific jobs that you're looking for in your market. Also, you can kind of take comfort in the fact like if my recruiter lands me a job, they get paid so therefore there's an incentive for my recruiter to help me. So therefore, you know it's not bullshit because you know they're getting paid. And money talks, I always think about that. It's like, okay, it's like you're selling a house and you hire a property manager. You have to assume that they're trying to sell your house because you know that they're gonna get commissioned so you kind of give them the benefit of the doubt. It's like, well, hey, they better be doing everything they can to sell the house because they're gonna get a commission so I don't see why they wouldn't. Same kind of deal with a job recruiter. So the only difference with hiring a recruiter is it costs money to use a recruiter? Nope, nope, didn't want, so how does that work then? Right, so the way specifically for me and the way that it works for a lot of other industries, when you talk about like pay to play from a candidate perspective, like if you're in the job search and you're the candidate, now you're talking about like a career coach or you know, resume coach or resume editor, like now you're talking about paid services for you. But if somebody reaches out to me, I get paid by the client. I get paid by the company because really what it is is whether it's full, 'cause some of these jobs you might run into, they might be contract rules. They might be 12-month gigs. They might be six-month gigs. They also might be full-time or contract to hire. But here's the point. Don't worry about that if you're looking for a job. Just get a job. Sure. Just get the job, right? So if it's a contract rule, you're gonna be more than likely, you'll be hourly. You'll be from an hourly wage perspective. And let's just say, for example, the client says, "Hey, this is the job that I need. "I need a customer service agent "and I'm willing to pay you once you make the placement "33 dollars an hour for your services." Now what the recruiter's gonna do is they're gonna say, "Okay, we're gonna make $33." But out of that $33 an hour, I have to pay the customer service agent. So they're gonna ask you what you're looking for from a compensation perspective. Always aim high and they'll be realistic because what they make is gonna be based off of the $33 minus what you're making. Okay. So if you're making 20 bucks, 20 bucks an hour, they're making $13 an hour off of you. Okay. And there's the incentive, so it's no cost to you. You're also, from a limitation perspective, if you wanna get technical, you will be limited to the jobs that they have access to. Okay. Yeah, I've used a recruiter before. I've had, when I was living in Raleigh, North Carolina, I had a recruiter reach out to me for a job at a software company for video production. And I thought it was fake. And I was like, "You're not reaching out to me." I just, you know, that's kind of, if I'm beyond this, like I feel like any time I linked on LinkedIn, like someone messages me or if I get a phone call and they say they're a recruiter, I'm like, "No, you're not, you're lying." Like for some reason, I just don't believe it. I'm like, "You're not looking up." I, we can talk about that a little bit, but anyways, I went through the process. I ended up getting the job. It was a contract position. And it was the, you know, probably the best, one of the best jobs I've had. And it was with a big corporation. But then I moved to New York City and I had to quit that job. But, but yeah, I, so that my experience with the job recruiter was nice. And it landed me one of the top jobs in, you know, Raleigh, North Carolina for the field I was in. So I can see the, you know, I have personal experience with success of that. And yeah, I just wanted to share that. But, 'cause how many recruiters are real? - Well, all of them, it's a matter of, it's a matter of how many recruiters are good. - Not at their real day, are real. - Yeah, they're real. Are they good or not? But, but no, I mean, it's a good, like your situation's a good testimony because I think that a lot of people have an opinion over recruiters of like, oh, they're just, they're just scam calling me. Like, they're just calling me for no reason. I'm gonna talk to them and then they're not gonna do anything for me. I'll tell you what, if you're looking for a job, everybody's my friend, everybody's my friend. Connections, connections and conversations lead to more things. If you don't take phone calls, even if they're a waste of time, if you don't take them, you're not going nowhere. You're going nowhere. Because as much as we wanna believe that you can do everything from your phone or your computer, we still value human connection. If you're not having conversations, you are going to be stagnant. That is a promise, and I've seen that countless times. If I get emails, I'll tell you right now. If I get emails from candidates, it is more difficult for me to feel bought in to help that candidate. But if they call me and I pick up, which is more often than not, 'cause why not? And they sell me on, hey, this is why you should work with me. Or this is why I'm good. Then guess what? I'm gonna hang up that phone. And not only did we build a connection from like, I know what this person is good at, but we built a connection on a personal level of like, okay, I heard that person's voice. I know their name. I know where they're from. I know what they're looking for. I feel kind of obligated to help them now. Like I just had this conversation, I wanna help them. Because as a recruiter, I should say, when working with a recruiter, the big value add for people who are blind or disabled is you now have an advocate. - Very true. - Because that recruiter might have direct manager access, but that recruiter might also work with an account manager. So if the account manager has access to the manager, what's the conversation if you show up well on a phone call or a video interview with a recruiter? The next step for the recruiter is to go, and if they really feel bought in, they like you, they think you can do the job or do a specific job they might have, they're gonna go to the manager or the account manager and tell your story. That's the value add. Hey, Scott, I know that we've been looking for this role. I got the perfect candidate. I got the perfect candidate. Here's the resume. Take a look at this. Maybe talk to Joe over at Xcorp and maybe let's try and get him an interview, right? Like now you're talking about, you're getting more people in your corner. So you're not the only one selling yourself because honestly, candidly, blind or disabled people, sometimes when we sell ourselves, it doesn't come from a point of confidence. It can come off as a point of desperation. - Okay, it's more of like a forewarning. Like, hey, by the way, you know, I have this thing and it's gonna make me slower in this. - Right. - So you're using language that is almost a warning. - Yeah, yeah, 100% and when people are warned, what are they skeptical? - Yeah, they're a little bit on edge, you know, a little bit unsure. You know, yeah, that's a good point. So let's back it up even more 'cause like you were mentioning a sales position is a good, you know, potential job for someone who's blind or disabled because if you're as good salesman, you're a good salesman and that's something that is a lot of just talking over the phone as it sounds like in just communications. Are there any other jobs that are, you know, you would suggest just for people who are on the hunt for a job, you know, and maybe they're more sales isn't their thing. Do you have any other, you know? - Sure, well, yeah, so if you Google, I'll give you a super quick story here because I think that there can sometimes be common misconceptions yet and you have to understand the way the industry works and you have to understand the tools that you might have to use in a job before you, before or after you apply, really. If you Google like what jobs are good for blind people or disabled people, a lot of what you're gonna see is like customer service. - Okay. - Well, I'm gonna tell you right now, the job that I kind of had before the job I have now was customer service, specifically retention. I don't care, I'll throw shade, it was AT&T. They hired me in October and this was like years ago, they hired me in October and they knew I was blind. I told them I was blind, very, very upfront, which we can talk about the strategy there too. They said you're gonna start November 14th. Okay, sounds good, got my equipment, got everything. November 12th rolls around, hey, you're not gonna start the 14th, you're gonna start in December. Okay, sounds good. December rolls around, hey, oh man. You know what, it's gonna be better if you start in January. Got it, okay. January rolls around, hey, yeah, really bad news. We can't actually hire you. I'm kidding, you did already, I'm confused, why? Well, the systems that you need to use for the job aren't accessible. Okay, well, whose fault is that? That's not mine. - Yeah. - That's yours, you need to figure it out. And ultimately, you kinda learn when to pick your battles in the disabled community. And this was one where I'm like, you know what, they don't care, right? So they strung me along for three months to tell me that they can't hire me for a job they hired me for. - Isn't that illegal? - It is illegal, it's 100% illegal, and that's why I said it was AT&T. Because if you look at AT&T and you do research, they are all over DE&I, they are all over accessibility. Oh yeah, they're all over the place. They're all over the place. I'm like, okay, so you can talk to talk, but can you walk the walk and the answer's no. - That's most people and organizations. - 100%. - 100%, I'll tell you right now, rip the bandit off again, DE&I went too far. - Okay. - It went way too far, it's too soft. Because what the DE&I counsel in a lot of companies, I'm not gonna say every single one, but for a lot of companies, it's more so about making people feel good. It's not about the actual realistic who is gonna be good for the job, because what going too far with DE&I went. - And you're talking about DEI diversity, equity and inclusion, yes. - Correct, correct. So what that did was that made people who fall in that DE&I category feel entitled. Well, then give me the job, hire me. I'm the DE&I, hire me, I'll do the job. Well, no, the fact of the matter is, is no matter what company you apply for, they're gonna look for the best person. - Okay, so you're saying-- - Point blank. - What you're saying is, with DEI initiatives, you know, let's say you are the disabled job applicant. You're going to feel more entitled, not every case, but you're more likely to feel entitled. - Sure. - To that job simply because you kind of understand that, hey, I am the disabled applicant here. Even if someone else is way more qualified. - 100%, because if you look on websites and you read their accessibility statements, or you read their DE&I employment agreement, equal employment opportunity, right? Like all of those things that sort of psychologically makes you think, well, man, I got a shot. - Yeah. - They're gonna hire, this is the job for me. And then you apply and no one ever calls you and you're like, well, what was that all about? - Sure. - Basically what you're saying is DEI is only really realistic if it's something in your wheelhouse and experience. - Yeah, if you're not adding value, you're not gonna get the job. - Yeah, so you have to be realistic in the sense of like, all right, I'm applied for this job, but if I'm not qualified for it, then I shouldn't feel entitled to this job. - So DEI, to me, right, when you talk about, hey, we're inclusive, you know, we understand accessibility for these types of situations. To me, what that means logically is they understand, in this case, like they understand what JAWS is. They know what a screen reader is. They know what a cane is. They know all of these things. They know how to help somebody if they're in a wheelchair and there's like an alternative entrance and exit for the building, right? Like they know those things. But if you talk to people who preach all of those things, more often than that, they have no idea. - Yeah. - They have no clue. - It's just a buzzword. - It's just a buzzword. And that's what I'm saying, it went too far. It went too far. It went to let's make people feel good, let's get diversity spend, let's get all of these things that are like good on paper that we can advertise. - Well, yeah, just because you see it in the marketing for a company doesn't mean it's actually in the culture of the company. - 100%. - And that's the thing. Oh, yeah, you'll make the TV commercial and it'll have every, you know, box checked, you know, in terms of diversity, equity, inclusion. But then when you start actually looking at the company, culture who's actually hired and works there, it can tell a completely different story. - 100%. - So yeah, just don't believe the hype is, I guess what I would say and be weary of that. Also, and this is something I've said in the past, is like, I personally am a believer of meritocracy. That's kind of like my viewpoint on the world. The best person should get the job, you know? No matter, that's really to be the only qualifier is like who's best for the position. And in a lot of cases, but then sometimes it's like, sometimes I get annoyed because I'm like, all right, well, sometimes believing in meritocracy makes me feel like I'm discriminating against myself sometimes in terms of, you know, I have this visual impairment. You know, if there's certain aspects like of video editing that I have to do differently that make me a little more, maybe a tad bit more slow to do like some more fine, detailed work. You know, does that make me the less qualified candidate? Should I, do I need to work harder to, you know, it's kind of like an unfair kind of thing. It is what it is. I know there's a lot of, it's just something I think about actually a lot is meritocracy and is it fair to disabled people? You know, it's a deep question. - Well, let's think about it this way. When it comes to getting hired for a job and succeeding in the role, let's call it what it is. No matter what your disability is, more often than not, you're just gonna have to work harder. - Yeah. - Like it just is what, you have to go into a job just assuming that. I'm gonna have to be the hardest worker in the room. And a lot of success, truly, to just show up, show up because there's gonna be a lot more patience with, maybe you have to do something slower. Like there's things that I have to do differently in my job. There's things that I literally can't do. - Yeah. - But if I'm up front about that and I'm like, hey, I've exhausted some different options and I can't seem to find a solution here. What are your thoughts, right? Talking, talking with a manager. But back to the original question. When you talk about, is that discriminating against, people also in the disability community? I don't think it is. I think what it does is push people to be better. - Okay. - I agree with that. - I agree with that. - Because what happens is, let's say, again, let's say it's sales. Am I gonna be the best sales person ever? Maybe, I don't know. - Why not? - It's the goal, but why not, right? So what you just said is exactly what I was gonna say. Why not? - Yeah. - Why can't I be the best here? And you're right, maybe you will have to work an extra hour or two a day, right? Maybe, maybe. But it's gonna lead to more opportunity. It's gonna lead to more success. And then what happens is, this is what I've noticed, is you have to find the right people to give you the chance. You need the chance, that's the matter of fact. You need the chance, but then what you do with the opportunity is really, really, it's vital. But if you take that opportunity and you excel, or you at least show the effort and the desire and the grit to work and to improve, whatever manager you report to, whatever job it is, doesn't have to be at sales, there'd be anything. You've gained the respect and your lease gets longer. That's how corporations work. Like, there are people in work places that aren't doing the best job, man, they are such a good employee. So their lease is longer. And if they're desiring to do better and they're having these conversations, Lance, man, I didn't have the past, the past month hasn't been really great from a performance perspective. What can I do? What tips do you have for me that I can improve on? Let's have that conversation. Because what happens is, why people get fired way faster, or why people are like, oh man, I'm on the hot seat, I'm gonna have to look for a different job. Why that is a feeling that people get is because no one has those conversations, whether you're blind, disabled, or completely able-bodied. They don't have those conversations, they quiet quit. And they're like, well, it's not going well, I better start looking for a new job. Okay, well, if you don't like that job, then that's a different story. But if you desire that job that you have, then you're gonna have those conversations. Because, again, the more respect you have with the people you report to, the more honest conversations you have, and the more realistic conversations you have, you're gonna have more opportunity. But let's, a fair warning, that doesn't mean that if you have those conversations, they'll just let you work there and pay you for nothing. Yes, still have to add the value. That's a great point, you gotta provide value. And that's something I talk about too a lot, is providing value. It's like, even with the see-through podcast, it's like, I don't make any money off of this, but it provides me value in my life, I get a lot out of it. But I also love the fact that I'm possibly providing value with some of my episodes of my listeners get some nuggets of information that they wanna implement into their lives. Or they hear a story of one of my guests, and it inspires them to try something new. Like in this episode, maybe somebody will be like, hey, I should give sales a shot. You mentioned customer service, sometimes it doesn't quite work out. Going back to that before we transition, I definitely wanna get into when to disclose to possible employers about your disability blindness or visual impairment. But before we do that, let's just maybe quickly go or some careers that might be good for people in the blindness space. 100%. So, if you're from an entertainment perspective, you could be an audio engineer. You know, sticking with entertainment, I mean, you could honestly be, you could be a host. Like, there are truly, there are companies out there that need podcast hosts. And you will be paid for them. You, you know, it's the job, right? Going into radio isn't always bad. I was in radio, although it is more of a, I would suggest podcasting. When it comes to like more white collar type things, network engineering is good. A lot of that is imagining and visualizing things that you can't actually see because the wiring is in the walls and you're kind of mapping out how is this network infrastructure gonna run in this building? - Yeah. - You don't need a ton of sight to do that. You might, you know, there might be some intricacies, but that's another one. If you want, if you do get into customer service, I'm not saying it's impossible. - Yeah. - But we also have to think about upward trajectory. - Okay. Because you get into customer service, what's the next step? Senior customer service, maybe customer service manager, maybe lead, maybe director of cut, right? So there's a ladder that you can go to. Network engineer, senior network engineer, director of networking, director of engineering, right? Like there's upward trajectory, sales. You just, you can either stay in sales and stay on a ton of commission if you're good at it or you can lead a sales team. - Sure. - VP of sale, right? Like there's, there's ladders up. But when it comes to a couple more that I can think of, honestly, some of them could be, you know, you, from a conversational perspective, therapy, you could be a therapist. You could be a counselor. You can be from like, think about what's, I want people to understand like, the fields that I'm saying are going to adhere to people's strengths, right? I'm not saying like, oh, therapy's an easy end, go for it. No, if you're empathetic and you're very detail oriented and you can pick up on things that other people might not and you're good at directing when necessary, that might be something you could get into. Not like, I want to help people. Well, I want to help people too. I wouldn't be a good therapist. - Yeah. - So like, those are things you have to think about. And honestly, there's countless, there's countless fields that you can get into. You'd probably be a teacher. You could probably get into finance. I mean, like there's so many ends to opportunities, it just has to fit your strength. Like you have to be good. Pick something that you're good at. And then if you don't love it, then make a change. But you have to get into something that you're good at in order to show other employers. - Yeah. This is what I can do. - So all right, before we get into when to disclose it, I have to ask the million dollar question here is, okay, if there's so many job opportunities, then why is the unemployment rate so high in the blindness community? - I think it's twofold. I think it's a lack of education from an employer perspective. We talked about D&I just being like a fancy little buzzword, buzz term. But I also think that it's, I hate to say it, but some people in disability community don't try hard enough. - Okay. - All right, it goes back to like how many disabled people are applying for a job and then following up with a phone call? How many disabled people are applying to hundreds of jobs within a week, right? I'm not saying that nobody does that, but how many people are like, well, I'm on SSDI and I'm comfortable. Or they count themselves out. Well, I probably wouldn't be good at that. How do you know? How do you know you wouldn't be good at that? Why don't you start having conversations, start having conversations from a point of discovery, and that's gonna lead you to the next thing. So from an employer perspective, I 100% agree. We need to stop having these like very cute and fun D&I council meetings and presentations, and we need to start legitimately educating. Hey, if you hired a blind person, this is the software they would need and this is how that works. Hey, if you hired someone in a wheelchair or another disability, this is how that works. I don't want any more of these conferences that like you check a box. We attended the Diversity Equity and Inclusion Conference of New Jersey and you're like, great. - Yeah. - And then you just have for PR, right? So like, give me the, like get, we need to get real from an employer perspective and we need to have, we need to have like workshops really where like you don't go and present to tens and twenties and thirties of companies, you need to go in and have shoulder to shoulder conversations with hiring managers, with leaders that say, hey, I just want you to know you're missing out on very, very qualified candidates that might need some extra support, but this is how this works, right? Because if you go into an interview from a candidate perspective and I'll tie this back to the candidate side, but if you go and do it to an interview as a candidate and you again start to tell them how it works and show them, it can come off as desperation. - Yeah. - Hey, hire me, please hire me and honestly, from a recruiter perspective, you can sometimes, not all the time, but you can sometimes be skeptical. Well, are they just trying to really sell me, like really hard to try and get in? Like what are they, you know, what are they doing? Is this legitimately possible, right? So having those conversations from the top down, one on one, knee to knee, it's gonna be far more beneficial than presenting cute little words in nice colors and here's a giveaway, here's a pen for coming to our conference. Have a great day and nothing ever changes. So need any shoulder shoulder conversations, one on one from that perspective. Now from a candidate perspective, again, we need to just think about what we're good at. We need to have conversations with friends, family, who are going to be honest, don't have a conversation with a friend who's just gonna tell you what you wanna hear. Like you gotta have these conversations with an open mind and a patient ear, because you just gotta know the truth. Like if you're not gonna talk on the phone, probably not gonna be on the phone. Like you're probably gonna be behind the scenes. Maybe you're doing payroll, maybe you're doing data entry, maybe you're doing something else. Now, if you're looking for jobs and you kinda keep hitting walls, maybe you've done phone screenings and you're not selected and maybe you didn't disclose anything, which again, we'll get to. So what that tells you is that that was a skill. You were lacking something. So the next step for you is to don't email, don't text, call the recruiter or the hiring manager or the HR person that you worked with, that passed on you and call them religiously until they answer. And don't accept that, well, we just decided to move on with another kid. No, no, no, no, tell me why. And I'm not coming at you from a, I'm upset. I'm coming at you from a seek to understand. So the next conversation that I have, I can improve on what you're telling me I need you to improve on. Because everybody's afraid to get sued. - Yeah. - Like that, we'll talk about this in a second, but I have a very strong perspective on how I frame me not being able to see. But if you have something that you need to work on, work on it, right? Like if you're customer service or sales, if it's something on the phone or it's something maybe it's writing or you can be a copywriter, like there's a lot of things that you can do if you're blind or disabled, work on it. Hey, would it be okay if I, if it's copyright? Would it be okay if I continuously kind of write samples and send these over to you? I would love to gauge like my improvement. That way maybe you can take a quick look and help me out. And you might have to do that with 10, 15 recruiters. Because recruiters are busy. They might not want to provide you that time. So you need to play the numbers game. Okay, I'm going to continuously reach out to people until I get a couple that actually give me the time of day and want to talk to me. And it's hard, you have to be okay with rejection. You have to be okay with the work that you're putting in. But you also have to understand that the work that you're putting in is going to pay off. It will pay off. Like that is the attitude you need to have. What am I doing this for? This sucks, I hate this. That's not the attitude. The attitude is I'm doing this and whether it takes a week, a month, or a year, it is going to pay off. And there's a reason for every rejection. Oh, for sure. Yeah, I think self-awareness is key, you know, with anything in life. And especially with putting yourself out there as a potential employee. You need to know what your strengths are, your weaknesses are, and how to advertise yourself, you know. Which again, I think makes total sense. And then I agree. I think what I worry about sometimes too, in terms of, you know, why the blind population is such a high percentage of unemployment, is I hope this is going to sound bad. But I hope it's more so because, you know, blind people are not trying hard. Then it is, they're getting discriminated against. Because if that's the case, then there's a lot of jobs that can be filled. You know, because I feel like you can actually change that behavior easier. It's like, oh, well, it turns out that, you know, we're not, the blind community is not getting discriminated against. It's just that the blind community just doesn't know how to market themselves in the job world. They don't know how to follow up correctly. They don't know how to create their resume correctly. They don't know how, they don't know what their jobs to apply for. Or they are hesitant to apply for a certain job because they don't think they're eligible for a specific job. You know, there's a lot of things that factor into it. But my fear always is that blind people could do everything right. And an employer is just unsure, you know, of the process of, you know, working with a blind employee that a great candidate gets overlooked. And that bums me out. That's what really bums me out is the idea of someone who's good at their job not getting the job because someone's just unfamiliar with disabilities or blindness. That's what bums me out. So in a weird way, I hope that I hope that it's, you know, more so on the blind and disabled communities and why that number is so high because that can be changed easier, you know? Well, I mean, let's talk about it, right? Like that's the key is if you've never done it before, you're going to be hesitant. Like my employer right now, they were hesitant, but they were like, you know what, let's do it. Because we were realistic. I'm like, listen, if I'm not good at this job in six months, you're just going to fire me. Yeah, yeah. So, right, so it's like, you might like, why not, right? So like, but that's the thing. You have to align yourself with a hiring manager who's like, you know what, let's do it. Let's give it a shot. Because you've got to get someone who's willing to give you the chance and you're correct that there are probably more often than not employers and hiring managers who don't really want to take that chance because they're unfamiliar. But guess what? People get passed on with jobs for various reasons. Yeah, he came in and he sat down and I don't know, I just didn't like the way you looked at me. That's real. No, I'm not even kidding, it's real. Or I said, bless you. And he didn't say, yeah, I said, bless you. He didn't say, thank you. Or, you know, whatever the case is, or he shook my hand almost in like an unprofessional way. There's so many different things people get passed on because they are unsure. Well, this person's behavior in the interview was this. I'm not sure how they're going to behave if they're on my team. So let's kind of talk about, let's talk about how to frame those things. Because I think it's important to know what works best for you and to also read the room. And what I mean by read the room is when you're doing a phone screening or when you're doing an interview virtually. Who are you talking to? What's their personality? How do you think they're going to take something? Because there are situations where I think it's important to say it right away. To say, hey, I have this disability. There are other instances where it's important to not disclose it right away because you can tell that this person isn't really bought into the conversation. - Okay. - So for me, the tip that I can give is what I do is I like bad news first. - Okay. - So I jumped into the conversation with the recruiter that I was working with for the job I have now is, hey, I just wanted to disclose to you real quick because I don't like any secrets. I consider myself a man of integrity and honesty. I am totally blind. Because if you say visually impaired, they're like, I don't know what that means. So you just say blind or whatever. - Let's actually, I hate to hit pause in your story, but I think that's a big point to make is - Sure. - Language around it. So let's say you're legally blind. So you have some vision remaining, but you're not able to drive. Would you describe that as legal blindness or should you just straight up just say I'm blind? Like, how do you market that? - You know, I might be overthinking this, but I wouldn't throw the word legal in there. - Okay. - Scary, scary, it sounds heavy. I'll throw it in there. 'Cause what does it matter? Like, it's like, whether I'm blind or legally blind, I'm still blind. - Yeah. - So it's like, what you want to do is frame your, get down to their level. Not that the people on the other end are incompetent or lacking of understanding, but you want to make sure it's oversimplified so that they can acknowledge what you're actually saying. Totally blind. Oh, okay, you can't see anything now. You're totally blind. - Yeah, I think that's why the distinction is needs to be made because, for example, if you're legally blind, you could still look at a computer screen, like, you can still look at a phone, you know, those types of things. You might need higher contrast. - Well, then you can say, yeah, but I mean, then you can say, you know, hey, I do have, I do have, you know, I am blind. Not totally blind, I can still see certain things. And these are the tools that I use. - Okay, so just be specific, explain it to them as if they, do you just-- - As if they don't know. - They don't know, just dumb it down, basically, to a simple one. - Yeah. - Yeah, because what you don't want is you don't want the screening call or the interview to become, let's talk about my disability. You want to talk about what I'm good at. You want to talk about, hey, this is a value I'm gonna add, this is why you should hire me. Which is what every interview is revolved around, where it's like some people have the thought of like, yeah, me and the hiring manager went to the same college, we're just gonna talk about the same college for a half hour, and it's like, cool, but you're probably not gonna get the job because they didn't even know what you could do. So again, back to the how to frame it. For me, it was, hey, man of integrity, honesty, totally blind, I don't want to hide anything from you or make you feel like I'm keeping information. So I just want you to be aware, but I'm looking forward to our conversation now. Boom, get you into it. Now let's talk about the real stuff. And if they have questions, it's important. Leave the door open. Hey, you know, I know before you jump into the call and stuff, totally blind, da da da da. If you have any questions around that, listen, I know that there's, you know, all these, and be humorous, that's my style is, I know there's like these crazy ADA compliance and HR laws and stuff like that. I can tell you in complete transparency, I'm not here for that. If you have any questions, I don't want you to think about how to frame them. I don't want you to think, is it okay to ask? I want you to ask whatever your curiosities are. - Yeah. - And that makes them feel comfy. That makes them feel like, oh, okay, cool. Like this person's cool, all right? Like I can ask. - That's a great point because I feel like, what you even said earlier, people are afraid of getting sued. And people are afraid of, you know, it's kind of like this thing, you know, and I don't want to go too deep into it, but it's like, people are kind of afraid to hire, you know, people who are specific about like their gender pronouns and things like that, because it's like, you kind of can assume that if they're particular about their gender pronouns, the employees around them are going to be nervous to make a mistake and it might cause riffs and problems and it might just disrupt the working environment that's already working and it might put a new pressure on certain employees to kind of walk on eggshells and you know, can't talk about this, can't talk about that, you know. And, you know, that's just one example. And I feel like that's what you don't want. You don't want to be to come across as someone who's going to need special attention and special language and special treatment and hey, don't offend me or else I might sue the company, you know, like, you know, that I feel like if you project at all a little inkling of trouble in that regard in terms of HR, you just will probably get passed on. - Yeah, and that's just the hard truth. I mean, it sounds kind of harsh. I know some people probably didn't like that I said that, but you don't want to present yourself as someone who's going to be annoying, basically. - Yeah, because when you're hiring somebody, it takes so much work and so much, so many resources to hire anyone. So they don't want to make a mistake. They don't want to work with somebody who's going to be hard to work with. A lot of hiring managers are okay to work with someone who maybe they need support, right? But it's all about your attitude and it's all about, you know, your understanding of, hey, I want to work with you. I want to work with you to solve these issues because tying it back to how to frame it, when you start talking about things that you need right away, it's a turn off. - Hey, yeah, so totally fine. I'm going to need JAWS. I'm going to need some sort of screen reader software and I'm going to need to be, it's like, well-- - To overwhelm me. - What? Yeah, it's overwhelming. So a good way to frame it is, instead of saying I need JAWS, you know you need JAWS. Like you already know, right? As someone who's blind or disabled or like, I might need to be aware of a separate entrance if I'm in a wheelchair or whatever. Like, whatever the resource that it is that you need, instead of saying what you need, ask them about their environment. Hey, I'm just curious, I know that a lot of companies use a lot of everyone's software. What would be the main couple pieces of software that I'd be using here? You know, is it, you know, are you guys using and educate yourself, right? I think if it's a CRM, like a customer database, maybe try to find a couple different ones and throw them out there. Now you're speaking their language. Hey, are you guys using Salesforce? 'Cause I did some research on Salesforce, actually, and it seems like a really great tool. Don't talk about accessibility, you don't need to scare them without that, they don't know. As it goes back to the D&I, they have no idea. So now, here's your value add. Once you have that conversation and you know, a good way to follow up is make a phone call. Hey, recruiter or internal HR or whatever. I appreciate our conversation the other day and I actually took some of the tools that you guys use and I went and made sure that they're actually accessible. That way you guys don't have to do that legwork. It turns out Salesforce is actually accessible with JAWS, which is, you know, I did some reading on it and it, I mean, it's awesome. Like there's a lot of things that are gonna be no, absolutely no issue navigating through Salesforce. And then there's this tool that I'm still looking into or maybe you look into it and it's accessible. It's work. It's a lot of work if you have a disability to make sure that whatever job you're applying for is gonna work. And it's your job to make the company feel at ease. Because what you wanna do is frame everything and bring everything to the table so they don't have any questions themselves. And then the last question for them is gonna be, well, should we hire them? Yes or no? And that question's easy. For a hiring manager, that question's easy. So it's frame it as a, hey, it's no big deal. Like this is something that's just different. And don't identify yourself as I'm the disabled candidate. Hey, the followup conversation. Hey, I'm so and so we had a conversation on Thursday. We talked about my time at Exxon or whatever the company was. We talked about my desire to help out the team in these specific ways. And then later down the road, you can continuously help them understand the accessibility things that you might need. Because the fact of the matter is Lance, people are more willing to help people who they've spent more time with than the people that they haven't. Oh yeah, that makes total sense. Yeah, I feel like another great probably point to just make is like, for example, with me as a video editor, I use specific software. I use Adobe Premiere, Adobe Creative Cloud products. You know, a lot of job applicants or job postings will say in what they're expected, experience in this and this software. So you can kind of, if you're interested in a specific job field, you could just simply go on LinkedIn indeed and look at jobs that you want. And then kind of take note of what are basic on average expectations in terms of software being used, experience they're looking for. And then you could potentially, if you're not familiar with a certain piece of software, you could potentially, you know, get classes and training on those specific things. And then whenever you apply to those and you get your foot in the door and you get that first phone call, you know, once you bring up your blindness, you're like, you know, but you know, I use this software and I know how to make it accessible and it won't be an issue to me. And then basically, you solve that problem. And so yeah, it's going to require, some things can require a little bit of foresight. You can have wins before you even get started, you know? And then, you know, if it's a new position, and then there's some, let's say it's a job that you're trying to level up and you've been working on a job for a while and you want to get a better job, you know? Then you're going to be able, it's going to be a lot easier. The more deeper you get into career, the easier it's going to be to sell yourself because like for example, with yourself right now, use you as an example, you know? You have a proven track record. Hey, I work in this job recruiter space in the IT field. I've been doing it for this long. I place this many hires. This is a software I use. Boom, it's easy sell now. So it's kind of just like once you get in, it's hard to get in, it's hard to get in and that's going to require the most effort. That's going to require the most grind, you know? But once you're in and you start getting some momentum, you become an easier sell is basically what I'm hearing, you know? - 100, 100%. And then the other thing too is as you go along, like let's say you get the job and everything is all good. It's continual education. It's continual education of like, okay, how can I use the software more efficiently? Or how could I, you know, put my boss at ease in certain situations like, oh, I could tell he felt a little, he or she felt a little bit funny about, oh, we're going to use this tool for this. Is that going to be something? And then you just, hey, I'm happy. - I'll put in the extra work. For example, we did, at my job, we did a software, a new software implementation. We completely switched systems. - Which happens, yeah, which happens. I had some long days. Just testing, just testing. Like it's just, you have to be willing to put in the work and this just goes back to like, what kind of employee do you want to be? What kind of employee do you want to be? Do you want to be the employee that people look at and they go, I don't even care that they're disabled? Whatever the disability, I don't even care. They're awesome. They're great to work with. They show up every single day. They give 150% every single day. And guess what? It's exhausting. Like neither one of us in this entire episode said this is going to be easy. But it's better than being confined to government programs that you will never level up your income. You will never wake up with that sense of purpose and that little chip on your shoulder that drives you through a lot of adversity. A ton of adversity. Because an important trait that disabled people have, no matter what nature of disability. I have noticed in numerous companies I've worked for, a big value add is being able to handle adversity. Being able to stay steady when things are breaking. And frankly, a lot of people who are completely able-bodied, maybe they didn't have any adversity in their life. They don't know how to handle it. They get stressed out. They lack professionalism sometimes. Again, not everybody, but I've seen it. And that makes hiring managers really uneasy. That makes leaders really uneasy. So think about, I mean, think about those things of like, man, it's gonna be a lot of work, but think long-term here. Think long-term of like, you wanna wanna house? You wanna like have a husband or wife someday? Or like, what's the long-term goal of your life? And reverse engineer it. - Oh, 100%. You know, I think, you know, having a career, you know, I recently did like this little video where I was trying to give tips on how to make yourself more, it sounds kind of douchey to say, but how to make yourself more marketable in like the dating world. - Oh, yeah. - You know, and one of my tips was, you know, you need income, but a career is better than a job. You know, I think, you know, people of the opposite sex or same sex, whatever you're going for, it's like they want to know that you're on a trajectory, and I feel like a career is more of, you're gonna feel more secure with someone who's kind of aiming for a career than someone who's aiming for a job, you know. - Just the theory? - What's the first question? I mean, what's the first question when you're getting to know somebody? Hey, what do you do? - Yeah, what do you do? - What do you do? And then your confidence is gone. She's like, well, I'm in between jobs right now, or I'm on this program, I'm on, you know, whatever. And then you're like, well, this sucks. Like, I met, not to go on a crazy tangent, but just an example, I met my wife. And like, we started our conversation was like, so what do you do? And like, it gave us more substance to talk about. And it's just the truth, man. Like, you need money to live. So it's like, you don't, you said it in one of those episodes. Like, you don't want people don't wanna be with people they feel like they have to be a caretaker for. - Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And yeah, I think that's the thing is like, if you can't, you know, provide financial freedom from yourself and you, you know, and you know, you live at home with your parents and you're, you know, you're not gonna be, I hate to, I hate to say it, but you're just not gonna be the biggest catch out there. You know, it sounds harsh, but it's like, oh yeah, I'm blind, I live with, I'm blind, I don't have a job and I live with my parents. It's not the best look. - It's like cool, so. - You know, like, it has to be said. You know, it has to be said. Because I, in a way, I, you know, going back to DEI, you know, you can, you can feel good, you know, you can, you can be on social media all day long and everyone's telling you how you're perfect and nothing's wrong and, you know, you got this and all that and that's great. But, you know, that's just kind of a facade, you know, social media really is very surface level and, you know, a lot of influencers, you know, they're just blowing smoke up your ass and if you want my opinion, and especially in the blindness and disability space, it's like, you know, 'cause like, for example, like people like you, yourself and people in a blind who are blind in a work full time, they're not on Instagram all day. Nope. They're not making reels, you know, they're, they're, they're, they're making deals. I was just gonna say that. Yeah, it rhymed, it just had too much of a flow. I had to say it and it sounds harsh, but it's like the people with real jobs, you know, they're not, you know, content creators. And it's like, I would love to do this podcast more, more than I do, but, you know, I squeeze it in when I can. You know, I would love to actually only do this, but, you know. Well, I think you bring up a, you bring up an important point though, because sometimes when I look at the, like the entrepreneurial people in the disability community, like you have to understand that there are, like it's not, like it's not very probable that you're gonna make a living being an influencer. It's just not. So you have to, like, it kind of goes back to like, you know, what you're good at, because it's like, it sounds cool to be like, I promote certain brands and products and I make videos and I make money and that's, you know, that's, that's cool. Like, this is a great thing. But like, what if I'm not good at it? I suck at making videos. So I'm not gonna do it. Like, I'm just not gonna do it. I had multiple podcasts. I did them for a while. They didn't pan out. They weren't, you know, they, of course, like, I was like, this is good, but people weren't, I wasn't getting that type of feedback. The numbers weren't growing to a point where I'm like, this is actually marketably good. - Yeah. - So you pivot. There's nothing wrong. Like that's a big lesson I want people to take away. And I guess before I say that, there's a lot of harsh, I think harsh and brass language that I'm using and I want everybody listening to this to know, dude, I fail like every day. Like, I'm not saying the poster child for full-time employment, right? Like, you, you simply, what's important is you fail and you get up and you try again and you take lessons from things and you lean on people that you need to and you keep trying. Like, I'm not perfect. I'm not the perfect employee. Right? All of these things. Like, these are just things that I'm giving you from and everybody listening from experience. And some people need like a kick in the butt. Like, get off the couch, go, go try things, go do things. When you're talking about like the entrepreneurial and everything like that, it's just, you just gotta understand like, it just goes back to realistic. Just be realistic. And it's okay. Like, if you're working nine to five, it's cool. It's all good. There's a lot of people working nine to five and they retire and they're happy. - Yeah. And you just, like, you have to know yourself. - Yeah, I think in this, just kind of modern times, it's like, I feel like everyone wants to be. Like, if you ask like kids these days, they wanna be a YouTuber, you know? - Mm-hmm. - And it's cool. You know, I get it. YouTube is sick. (laughs) You know, that's like my favorite thing ever, you know? - Yeah. - I spent so many hours on YouTube and YouTube helps my podcast, you know, 'cause it pushes it out. To people. And it's nice. And I've been able to grow like a small audience, you know, using, you know, social media and YouTube. But that being said, with all that, I mean, this is gonna be episode 119, you know, at all, I've been doing this for almost five years. I'm not even close to making money off of this thing. (laughs) You know, and that's just the reality. So it's like, you know, people, and I think people think that I'm like this, I think people think like this is my job. - I thought it, when I first thought it, I was like, God, it's sick. (laughs) - Yeah, it's, and that's cool and I'm tricking people, but it's not. - Yeah. - And, you know, it's kind of, I have the skill set based on my job. You know, as a video editor and I've worked in marketing that I kind of know how to, you know, produce it and market it in a way that seems more polished and put together than it probably is. But, I guess I'm just saying that, not to be boastful or anything, I'm just saying that I put a lot of effort into this and I've put a lot of time into this and it's still not in a profitable, you know, space. And that could be-- - Yeah, but the important thing though, the important thing though, is your mindset is like, you do it 'cause you love it and you're not ignorant to the fact that you have to also have a job to pay bills. - Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And also, you gotta change, you can't, you know, you gotta look at data and the same thing that you were talking about where if you have a weakness, you gotta try to improve it, asking, you know, follow up, you know, if you applied for a job and you had a phone interview and you didn't get, you didn't get to the next round, you know, try to follow up with your recruiter or the employer. Hey, what was I lacking, you know, what can I improve on? It's the same thing with anything else, you know, you know, like I look at, you know, data of my, you know, numbers and viewership and what episodes do better, what topics do better? And, you know, how can I improve the structure of things and everything can be improved, everything can be worked on. And like you said, failing every day. The only way to get better is the fail, you know, you know, fail upwards, you know, fall forwards, you know, that kind of thing. And I think the only way for my podcast to get better is for me to get better at podcasting, you know, is for me to get better, you know, making, you know, so it's just kind of like, Elon Musk had a quote and I'm butchering it, but it was just like, instead of having all these meetings about how to market a product better, have meetings about how to make the product better, you know, that kind of mentality. It's just like, you know, you can have a, you know, a fancy resume that looks modern, but like, is it, does it have the right words on it, you know, you know, is that gonna, are you gonna be good on the phone whenever that happens, you know, your resume may get you in the door, but you know, your conversation skills have to take it into the next level, you know, so it's just like, I'm rambling, right, at this point. - No, I get like, 'cause I know exactly what you're saying, it's a blend and a mixture of self-reflection and self-improvement. - Self-awareness, too, and being hard on yourself, being hard on yourself, and don't be, you don't, you know, it's okay, you know, we were talking about if things getting soft, I think that, you know, you should be hard on yourself, to a certain degree. - No, I agree, I agree, because if you, if you fail, it's okay to fail, it's truly, like, no matter what, how big the mistake is, it's okay to fail, but if you simply just accept the failure and you're like, "Oh man, that's okay, I'm still, you know, that's all right." Then, you're like, there's no drive to improve. Like, one of the biggest tips I can give truly is after you get the job and you're in the door, if you fail, whether it's because of your disability or not, go own the failure, go own it, go, like, before your manager or supervisor finds out, go tell them, hey, this is what happened, I messed up here, but I also want you to know that, not only did I rectify the issue, I've also been kind of engineering some ways to not make that mistake again, right? So it's, but it goes back to, like you said, your conversation skills. Did you show up well in the interview, how's your resume? After a conversation, sit and think about, don't just move on to the next thing, think about, take some notes, think about how that went, how did that go, did I say, what did I say there? I made that awkward. Okay, no, I'm, okay, I gotta switch that. And guess what, maybe you practice, like, hey, you know, I'm gonna talk to one of my friends, can you, like, can you interview me? Like, like you're hiring me for a job. 'Cause I don't have to be good, you do. Yeah. Right? So it's practice, it's being hard on yourself to the point where it drives you, not deters you. Mm-hmm, yeah, I take a lot of inspiration from, I like to think of how comedians bomb sometimes and how they have to be comfortable bombing. And that, for some reason, gives me a lot of, like, comfort, the fact that, like, a comedian to become a good comedian has to bomb. It's just inevitable that, you know? So like, even your favorite comedian who you think is, like, you know, larger than life has bombed hundreds of times. And, you know, and that should make you feel cool. It's like, all right, wait, and they had a bomb to learn like what material wasn't working. They had a bomb to, you know, get their set right to where you end up do liking their comedy. And it's just like, you know, it's like public speaking. I recently did my first, like, presentation. And I did okay, I did okay. But I'm like, I was all, at the end of it, I was like, well, I definitely need to improve this and prove this and prove that. And I wouldn't have known what to improve if I wouldn't have taken that chance to, you know, basically not do well. And yeah, I think what I like to do and what I try to live by is like, and it sounds kind of intense, but it's like you don't want to not do something out of fear. That just, you know, that's what a true regret is. It's like, say you're on your deathbed and, you know, you really, you wish you had children. You know, but you didn't have children because you didn't know if you could financially support them. You know, so out of fear, you never had children because you're like, I don't know, things aren't that right. So it's like, or getting married or having a dog or whatever it is, you know, it's just like a responsibility. You avoid responsibility out of fear because you might fail or it might not work out. And I think that's where regrets come from. And I think jobs and employment and just having a good income just opened so many doors for people and their lives. And it just can be a life changer. And I think the fact that going back to that statistic, I think the fact that there's 78% of the blind community unemployed and not even talking about what you said, underemployed, it's like, it just seems to be the source of, the most obvious source of most problems that the blind community faces is just money and employment. - It's money, yep. - Who would have thought, money, money is the... (laughing) - So the currency of our life, unfortunately. - No, man, I think something I like to think about, and I still struggle with it, to be honest, depending on what it is, but things are scary until you do them. Like, it's scary to like learning how to use a cane, scary until you do it, to get used to it. Like things are more, I've learned that things are more scary when you, like, because of how you think about it, than the actual thing. - Yeah, yeah, well, there's like that famous quote, "You suffer more in your imagination than you do in reality." - Yeah, I am a warrior. - Oh, me too. - I worry, but how do you use it? You gotta let it drive you, you have to let it drive you. And you can, dude, you could be nervous the whole way through, but do it. - Oh yeah. - Do it. - I'm a warrior, too, and I think a lot of anxiety is just your brain trying to keep you alive and thriving. So in a way, anxiety is kind of a tool to keep you on track, which, sometimes I'm like chill. - Yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, and another thing, too, is like having a chip on your shoulder, you know, think about all the people who are like, "You can't do this, you can't do that." And, or even yourself, prove yourself wrong, have like an enemy, you know? You know, use that to fuel your efforts. Um, you know, use that to be like, "Oh, you don't think I can work this job? "All right, I'll show you." Or, you know, or-- - Competition support. - You know, "Oh, you think that I'm not gonna be, "or that last job passed up on me?" "All right, well, fuck them, I'll show them." You know, when I, you know, I'll show-- - Yeah, I think AT&T every day. - Exactly, and I think it's good. - I do. - It's good to have, it sounds another crazy thing I'm saying is, it's good to have a little bit of anger in you, a little bit of, a little bit of hate in you. 'Cause it can fuel you, you know, it'll be like, "Oh, I'm gonna prove that I'll show them. "I'll show them," you know? You need a little bit of that energy in your life, I think. So, a little bit of anxiety, a little bit of bitterness and just kind of fuel to want to prove people wrong, yourself wrong, most importantly, can go a long way. And, yeah, I just, we kind of got a little off from the job thing at the end, but I think it all ties in to the kind of mentality of you having to grind and work hard to get your foot in the door. And I think a lot of valuable information was said in this episode, and is there anything we missed? I'm sure there's something-- - I don't-- - That's a loaded question. - I mean, yeah, it's a loaded question, but I mean, honestly, if you can put everything that we talked about into a very concise, maybe three bullet points, is bullet point number one, you just need to accept the fact that it's gonna be hard work. Bullet point number two is you need to be honest with yourself and find what you're good at. At first, not what you love, 'cause of what I've noticed is you, once you do what you're good at, so you can get, you know, continue to gain that experience. And honestly, no matter what job you have, there's gonna be things that you love, there's gonna be things that you hate, right? So just, it's gonna be more important to, in this context, looking for a job, know what your value is, and add that value. And bullet point number three, never let go of the fact that you're just gonna have to continue to improve. - Okay. - Because sometimes what happens is, it never ends, it never ends, and like, you can call what it is, life is exhausting, you pay taxes and it's exhausting. But don't get too comfy, don't get too comfortable. When you get the job, don't get too comfy. And it's okay to fail, and it's okay to acknowledge what you're not good at, and it's okay to ask for help, and it's okay to say, I didn't do that very well, I suck. I'm gonna do something different. And I will say this, just while I have the opportunity, if people do have questions and they wanna reach out to me on LinkedIn, or something like that, feel free to connect with me, send me a message on LinkedIn. I'm clearly very passionate about this, and I think that sometimes people just need different perspectives to open up their own perspective. So, if anybody need, like, I'll jump on a phone call, I'm happy to help whoever I can. Even if it's, they wanna complain to me about an interview they went on, and they passed. Like, that's what I feel like I'm called to do, because I've experienced it, and thank God I'm in a position that I'm in. But I also understand that some people are not. So, again, send me a connection request on LinkedIn, whatever, however I can help. More than likely, if you're not in the STEM field, I'm probably not gonna be able to help you find the actual job. But I can at least help from a skills that are needed for the job type of thing. - Oh, 100%, and I'll make it simple for everyone. If you wanna hit up Josh, just look in the episode description, and I'll have links where you can get in touch with him via LinkedIn. I'll put, do you want me to put your email in there, or do you want me to just keep your link on them? - Oh, yeah, I mean, let's just do LinkedIn, 'cause honestly, my email gets pretty bogged down. - Yeah. - But yeah, let's just do LinkedIn, that way I can look at the LinkedIn, and provide any tips there, but yeah, LinkedIn will be a good start. - LinkedIn, and then I also have your Instagram on there as well. - Cool. - Yeah, it never ends, it never ends, it never ends. And it bums me out, but it is what it is. And I think if you're on the job market, we're coming towards the end of this year. Next year, there's a lot of changes, 2025, there's a lot. So there's a lot kind of going on in the world, and you might wanna change up your job, so I hope this episode was helpful, and I hope you got some tips out of it. Not reach out to Josh, and maybe we'll do another episode down the road where we dive deeper into this topic, 'cause it's a topic that you could go on and on and on and on about in terms of tips. But I think more importantly, I think it's nice to just, if I had to add something, it would just be, don't be afraid to apply to jobs, even if you don't feel you're qualified for them too. And just put yourself out there, have some confidence in yourself, and just keep trying, and if you can get qualified on certain things that you know you need to get qualified on, do that, and just put the effort in and keep working on it slowly, slowly, slowly, inch by inch, and you never know what can happen, you know, but the opposite of just sitting around, and having limited financial situation based off of what the qualifications or of SSI and SSDI are, you know, just know that there's a ceiling to those benefits, and you just gotta be honest with yourself, and all right, what kind of lifestyle do I wanna have, what do I, what do I want my life to look like, and you just gotta make those decisions for yourself, you know, on what you want for yourself, you know, but I hope that, you know, the blindness community can prove the world wrong, and we can lower that 78% number, and we can prove all the employers wrong who doubt, you know, the community's skill sets, and we can have true progress, not under DEI, but under a meritocracy where the blind candidates are simply the best candidates, you know, be the best at your job, you know, be harder on yourself and strive to be better, and also remember just if you didn't get the job, don't simply go straight away to, I didn't get it because I was the blind candidate, you know, it may not, it may be other reasons, you know, so, you know, there's a lot of gray area out there, it's not all black and white, you know, it's complex, and then that concludes my lecture. (laughs) - I appreciate the opportunity, man, like I said, I'm super passionate about it, I'd love to do another episode down the road, even if it's not job related, I love chopping it up too, so, you know, again, I just appreciate the opportunity, I hope through all the ramblings on my end that people got something, you know, at least one thing from the episode that I provided, yeah. - Sure they did, I know for a fact they did, man, it's gonna be a great episode, thanks for sharing everything, and I'm very appreciative of you and your time, and if I'm ever on the job hunt, I know who to hit up. (laughs) - There you go. - Yeah, but again, I have Josh's information in the episode description, don't be afraid to hit him up, he's a super nice guy, and he's not lying to you when he says he wants to hear from you. Well, that said, I think that wraps up this conversation, and thanks for coming on a C-2 podcast, man, take care. (upbeat music) [BLANK_AUDIO]
