I am waiting, waiting for my WorkKeys test scores, waiting for a class to begin on Job Applications & Resumé Writing. All of that waiting concerns preparation for the day my freedom arrives (read my poem below, “Waiting”).
The past prepares me for today. Today prepares me for tomorrow; and if given a “tomorrow,” I shall seek opportunities that prepare me for better days.
In preparation of the day my freedom comes, I continue to work on increasing my chance of success upon release, which may be as early as April 25th, 2018. Well, that is my “almost free” date; the date I may leave here for Dismas Charities (halfway house) in Atlanta, Georgia, my home town. I’d still technically be in federal custody while at the halfway house but will be allowed to go find a job to pay for my upkeep. Later on I’d be put on home confinement, where I will stay at home unless at work, always near a phone and monitoring device.
WORKKEYS: At the beginning and end of the class, we took the TABE Locator test for math. At the beginning I scored 12.1 out of a possible 12.9, the latter of which I scored upon completion. Now I am waiting to see if I succeeded at obtaining Platinum certification. I feel I did. By the next blog I will know and will proudly boast if I scored the Platinum. If I did not qualify for it in two out of three categories, I will be shocked. No doubt I will at least grab the Gold!
PLATINUM: A flyer about the National Career Readiness Certificate, shows those with Platinum certification (Level 6), are qualified for 99% of jobs; e.g., accountant, technical writer, registered nurse manager, elevator installer and repairer.
GOLD: those who bring home the Gold (Level 5) qualify for 93% of jobs; e.g., school counselor, pharmacy technician, semi-conductor processor, business executive, electrician.
I like the potential job categories for the Gold (as well as for the Silver or Bronze I do not list), but I prefer the Platinum; it will shine more when I apply for a job with an interested company.
JOB APPLICATIONS & RESUMÉ WRITING
OBJECTIVE: Secure entry-level position with innovative company and advancement opportunities; demonstrate ability to assist management at maintaining and enhancing customer satisfaction.
I signed up to take the class for one reason: to participate in a Mock Job Fair upon completion. As I wrote in “Seeking a Real Job,” June 7, 2017, I completed the World of Work program and worked in personnel at Bankhead Enterprises, Inc. I know how to complete job applications and how to write a Resumé.
I signed on as a student but when I went to show the instructor my Resumés so he can use them to show the other students how to overcome “missing years” from the workforce, I was asked to help with the class. I agreed. Our first class is this week.
EMPLOYMENT PLANNING
ISO 9001: 2008, QUALITY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM AUDIT: For the last few weeks, I’ve worked on revising the local Quality Manual (QM) used by my employer. This week, the factory will be audited for compliance with ISO 9001: 2008 requirements. We will be under close scrutiny by an external auditor from the National Standards Authority of Ireland (NSAI).
I control the documents and am intricate to the auditing process, as I am also an internal auditor for the Quality Management System (QMS), and am the longest-standing QMS employee at this factory.
Our Operations Manager, who began here in 2010 as a trainee for a Q.A. Manager position, upon completion of his training, relocated and then climbed the ranks. He is now over this factory and two others. He recently visited and said, “You’re still here? They need to make a monument out of you, you’ve been here so long.” 🙂
TECHNICAL INFORMATION: Each section in the local QM coincides with the ISO 9001: 2008, Quality Management System requirement; e.g., ISO 9001: 2008, sub-clause 4.3, Control of Documents, is Section 4.3, Control of Documents in the local Quality Manual. All ISO certified factories must be compliant with the ISO 9001: 2015 standard by September 15, 2018.
I am adding changes to the QM to ease the transitional process (listing parallel requirements, where the two standards coexist), and by adding any additional requirements to comply with the 2015 standard. Doing that will make the conversion process easier when I revise other associated documents.
My original plan was to retire before this NSAI audit. I changed my mind to honor my word. During the February 2017 NSAI audit, the external auditor wanted to know when we’d be ready to apply for certification under the new standard.
“Before I leave in April of 2018,” I said, since no one else answered. I have the skills and know the value of knowledge and experience that I’ll gain by helping to convert the QMS over to ISO 9001: 2015; I suspect it will boost my annual salary range by $10,000-$20,000, above the normal pay range for the type of positions I am seeking in the manufacturing sector.
The acquired knowledge also opens the door for freelance opportunities of going into businesses to help prepare them for ISO certification, or simply going in to set up an internal auditing program (several years ago the going rate for setting up an auditing program was 30K). I can do that!
TECHNICAL WRITER: Officially, UNICOR does not have a technical writer position; however, I have done and do a lot of it. While doing an internal audit, I made a finding about the factory not having a manufacturing instruction for a new process. Because of my superb technical writing skills, and the factory’s lack of qualified personnel in the production department, I became the one to write the needed manufacturing instruction.
I love showcasing my skills by creating visual art with the Microsoft Word 2010 computer program, so I added illustrations to show users how to perform the task. Years ago, after seeing my work on manufacturing instructions, an external auditor was amazed that I had done it in Microsoft Word.
Now I have more to add to my portfolio. In many companies these days, employees just take photos and write a brief instruction. That doesn’t work well for all the other forms of technical writing I do; e.g., writing and editing other administrative documents for my superiors to approve.
AGE BARRIER: My age was one of my former concerns in finding suitable employment; however, on July 29, 2017, I listened to a portion of a segment on CNN that relieved my worries. The caption read: DRUG USE IMPACTS BLUE COLLAR WORKFORCE.
Even though I plan to be a White Collar employee, when I heard that “Four Out of Five Job Applicants Fail Drug Screens,” it convinced me that living clean and sober gives me an edge. Ironically, the problem that once defeated me in the pursuit of a promising career, has now become a factor to rocket me into a promising future as a productive member of society, as an older and wiser person.
A POEM: This poem captures the reality of prison living. This is an existence I eagerly await passing, with no intention of ever returning, other than as a visitor to show others that there is hope of better days. I wrote Waiting while living with a difficult cellmate, while I practiced humility, breathing in, breathing out; changing my karma. Instead of getting physical to show my dominance, I stayed composed and effectively resolved the conflict without picking up a new case or causing injury.
It is easy to come to prison and spend the rest of your life for having to resort to violence to deal with a knucklehead. I make better choices today by responding to conflict rather than reacting, and will continue to do so upon release.
WAITING
Light streams through bars and screen,
Illuminating the gray of a gloomy place.
A place where people weep and pray,
Making way for another day.
Another day confined in a bathroom;
Another day held with another person,
In an overcrowded prison, celled together,
Saving tax dollars, space, fighting hate.
Hate seeping through pores, poisoning the soul,
Creating a recidivist with its venom;
Venom eating the soul, leaving a shell.
Hate I leave behind today in search of serenity.
When will the day come without bars and fences?
Will I walk away upright, proud, free at last?
Will I be rolled out, en route to mortuary?
Will I walk freely, no chains or cuffs, mortified?
“Waiting,” copyright 2011, Wayne T. Dowdy, ESSAYS & MORE STRAIGHT FROM THE PEN.
*****
CONCLUSION: When I do enter the job market, I will succeed at whatever field I choose. I am also a qualified Q.A. Inspector. Another field I may go into is counseling drug addicts and alcoholics, helping the mentally ill and others to find an acceptable way of life. My long-term plan is to create my own company. Only God knows what I will actually do or whether the day will come that I do walk out the doors as a free man.
Today (August 8th), I will attend a Memorial Service for a friend who could not conquer his addiction and died in a prison restroom. He also had heart problems and I do not know what he actually died from, but do know he only had sixteen months to walk out the door as a free man, after having served over twenty-three years.
Tomorrow is not promised to anyone, but IF I do see the day I anticipate, I will make a difference on many levels, including the creation of StraightFromthePen.org and StraightFromthePen.net. Click here (gf.me/u/ba6xjn) to see my GoFundMe page for more on my plans for both websites.
Of course, the old saying is if you want to hear God laugh, tell Him your plans. This time, I hope mine and God’s plans coincide.
______________________________________
Support the author’s writings by purchasing ESSAYS & MORE STRAIGHT FROM THE PEN ($8.95 USD) from your favorite bookseller; available in eBook and paperback. Visit StraightFromthePen.com and Https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/WayneMrDowdy for other writings by Wayne T. Dowdy. If you prefer to buy direct, purchase his novels and essay collection from Midnight Express Books, P.O. Box 69, Berryville, AR 72616 Email: MEBooks1@yahoo.com. Midnight Express Books helps prison authors to achieve their publishing dreams.
