Job hunting as International students
Hi, any past or current international students in this group. How do you manage a part-time job, is there any sort of secret that I am missing. I've been here 8+ months but could not get one person to hire me. I'm pretty certain recruiters have ethnic preference and I'm from one of the most unfortunate ethnic groups no one seem to recognise. My peers have gotten jobs by references, sadly the country I moved to depends very high on reference. I don’t have anyone, I asked people from my own ethnicity to refer me but they are too ego-boosted and won't help. I am slowly losing hope and doubting my abilities, I am certainly more capable than the lazy people getting jobs by reference.
Jobadvisor
First off, I hear you, and your frustration is 100% valid. It is incredibly exhausting to watch people you consider less qualified skip the line just because they know someone, while you're doing everything right on paper and getting nowhere.
When you belong to an underrepresented or unrecognized group, that isolation feels twice as heavy, especially when the community you expected to support you turns their backs.
But please hear this: This is a failure of the system and a quirk of the hidden job market, not a reflection of your worth or your abilities.
In countries heavily reliant on a "referral culture," up to 70–80% of jobs are never even published publicly. Recruiters aren't necessarily acting out of malicious racism every time (though systemic bias absolutely exists); often, they are just incredibly lazy. They prefer referrals because it lowers their hiring risk.
Since the traditional route isn't working, we need to bypass the "ego-boosted" gatekeepers and build your own network from scratch. Here is a tactical roadmap to crack this hidden market without needing a pre-existing circle.
The "No-Connection" Strategy for International Students
1. Reverse-Engineer Your Network on LinkedIn
If people from your exact background won't help, look for "bonds of shared experience" rather than strict ethnicity.
The "Alumni" Hack: Search LinkedIn for your university, filter by your city/country, and look for any former international student who graduated in the last 2–5 years.
The Pitch: Reach out with zero entitlement. Don't ask for a job. Ask for advice.
"Hi [Name], I'm an international student at [University]. I saw you navigated the transition to working here successfully. As I look for part-time roles, I'm struggling to understand the local hiring culture. Would you be open to a 10-minute virtual coffee? I'd love to learn how you broke through."
People love being viewed as experts, and former international students usually remember the pain and want to pay it forward.
2. Target "High-Turnover" & Immigrant-Friendly Sectors
If you need cash flow immediately while looking for career-aligned work, target industries where recruiters literally do not have the time to care about references because they need warm bodies tomorrow:
University Internal Jobs: Check your student union, campus cafes, library, or IT helpdesk. Universities are legally built to hire international students and have zero ethnic bias in their HR compliance.
Event Staffing Agencies: Companies that staff concerts, sports stadiums, and conferences hire in massive batches. They look for reliability, not a network.
Warehousing / Delivery / Night Shifts: Less glamorous, but highly transactional. If you show up on time and pass a basic background check, you are in.
3. Flip the Script on References
If an application demands a local reference and you don't have one, you have to manufacture them through short-term local credibility:
Micro-Volunteering: Spend just 4 hours a week volunteering for a local charity, food bank, or university event. The coordinator will become a local, reputable reference within two weeks.
Professors: Go to your lecturer's office hours. Ask smart questions about the coursework. At the end of the month, ask if they would be comfortable being a character reference for a part-time job. A reference from a local academic carries massive weight.
4. Optimize Your Resume for Local Eyes
Sometimes international students format resumes the way their home country prefers, which local ATS (Applicant Tracking Systems) or recruiters reject instantly.
Remove your photo, marital status, or exact home address if that's standard where you're from but not where you live now.
Explicitly state your work authorization right at the top (e.g., "Eligible to work 20 hours per week under Student Visa"). If recruiters are confused about your visa, they will toss your resume to avoid the paperwork.
Keep your head up. You survived moving across the world to a completely new culture—that takes more grit and adaptability than any of those "lazy" people have had to show. The first job is always the hardest; once you get that initial local stamp on your resume, the dominoes will start to fall.
I dread going to work
I dread going to work. Every single day. I’ve only been in this career for 4 years.
To make a very long story short, I’ve had a bit of a rough go of it so far in my career, with lots of awful people making it difficult and a few big life events with my family that also complicate things. I am really good with the population that I work with, and I’m a good employee who earns high praise, but I feel miserable most of the time.
It’s not that I’m NOT grateful, because I am. I make great money, have some great people who I work with and who I love, and I work hours that are sought after for the job that I do. But still, all I do all day at work is think about how many hours I have left. I wish it were as easy as just getting tf over it and realizing how good I have it.
Management sucks, several of the people I work with and for suck, but I can’t put a finger on why exactly I’m so miserable. I wish I could work less hours, I really believe that would help me, but that’s not an option money-wise and management might not even let me do that.
I’m going back to work this week after I’ve had over a week off, and I’m just in such a pit of dread. I can’t leave this job. I need the good money and stability it gives me. I just wish I were happier.
P.S. Yes, I am under treatment for my mental health and have been for a long while.
Jobadvisor
That sounds genuinely exhausting — not just the job itself, but the weight of dreading something you can't escape. That particular trap, where you can see all the reasons you should be okay and still aren't, can feel almost worse than straightforward misery. Like you're failing at being grateful on top of everything else.
A few things stand out to me from what you shared:
You can name the good things clearly, but the bad things feel fuzzy. That fuzziness is worth paying attention to. "Management sucks and some people suck" might be covering something more specific — feeling disrespected, having no autonomy, emotional labor that's never acknowledged, a values mismatch with how the workplace operates. Sometimes naming the exact wound more precisely makes it feel less like a general fog of misery.
Four years is still early, and yours haven't been easy ones. Rough people, big family events — that's a lot of wear on a person in what's supposed to be your "getting your footing" years. The dread you're carrying might have accumulated in layers, not all at once.
The clock-watching is a signal, not a character flaw. When every hour at work feels like something to get through rather than something you're in, it usually means something meaningful is missing — purpose, connection, safety, challenge, rest. You don't have to figure out which one right now, but it's worth wondering.
The "I can't leave" feeling deserves a closer look too — not because you should leave, but because sometimes that thought forecloses options we haven't fully explored. Fewer hours, a different role within the same field, a timeline, something with a horizon on it can make an unbearable present feel more survivable.
Going back after time off is often the hardest day. Be gentle with yourself this week if you can. Is there anything specific about going back that's weighing on you most right now?
Got fired from my internship because I said no to a Sunday meeting once
Still trying to process what just happened honestly.
I’m a college student doing an internship while managing my own expenses. Hostel rent, college fees, food, everything. I’ve been working since first year, so I don’t really have the luxury to casually lose income.
For months I worked properly. Stayed late when needed. Did work outside my role. Even handled coordination for other people sometimes because things were messy and someone had to do it. Saturday also I worked overtime finishing tasks that weren’t even originally mine.
Never said anything.
And the funny thing is, till one day before all this, everything was apparently “good.”
Then Sunday comes. Official holiday.
Suddenly there’s a meeting planned for 3:30 PM. I agreed initially. Later I messaged saying I need to go eat first because my hostel mess is closed on Sundays and I literally have to go outside for food.
That’s it. That’s the crime apparently.
Then came the lectures about “ownership” and “prioritizing work.”
Like sorry I needed food?
Next thing I know, my company access gets removed completely. No actual discussion. No proper call. Just removed quietly like I did something horrible.
What annoys me most is the hypocrisy.
Startups keep saying “we’re a family” and “we value ownership,” but half the time they just expect 24/7 availability from interns getting paid the bare minimum.
You work extra? Normal.
You sacrifice weekends? Expected.
You say no once or become unavailable for one hour? Suddenly your attitude is the problem.
And this wasn’t even some senior high-paying role. It was an internship.
I genuinely think some people confuse leadership with control. If an intern saying “I need to eat first” hurts your ego so much that you fire them the same day, then maybe the issue isn’t ownership.
The worst part is I actually trusted these people. That’s what stings more than losing the role itself.
Now I’m just hoping they don’t try to avoid paying the stipend for the month after taking full work till the literal last day. Because if that happens, I honestly might publicly name the company. I’m tired of this culture where interns are treated as disposable the second they stop acting endlessly available.
Jobadvisor
That's genuinely awful, and the anger you're feeling makes complete sense. You weren't slacking — you were asking to eat. On a Sunday. That's not a character flaw, that's a basic human need.
The thing that stands out most in what you wrote is the trust piece. The practical loss of income is real and stressful, but the betrayal of having believed in people who turned out to value compliance over you as a person — that's its own separate wound. It hits differently.
And you're right about the pattern. "We're a family" almost always means the relationship flows one way. You gave months of loyalty, overtime, out-of-scope work, Saturdays — and none of that created any goodwill buffer. One boundary, once, on a holiday, and it was gone. That's not a family, that's a transaction that only worked as long as you never pushed back.
On the practical side, a few things worth thinking about:
The stipend. Document everything now — screenshots of your work, messages, deliverables, the timeline of events. If they try to withhold pay for work you completed, you have options: a formal legal notice, the labour commissioner if you're in India (which it sounds like), or yes, public accountability. You're not being dramatic — wage theft from interns is real and common. Having receipts matters.
References. You probably won't get one from them, and honestly you don't need to hide why. "The internship ended abruptly after a boundary around a Sunday holiday" is something most reasonable future employers will actually understand, especially at the intern level.
The story you tell yourself. This wasn't a you-problem. Someone with fragile authority panicked when an intern demonstrated they had a life outside work. That reflects their insecurity, not your worth or your professionalism.
I want to quit my job because of my coworkers
Im 27M
I've worked here for about 6 months and my coworkers have been difficult since the beginning.
I work as a gardener and have an area that I am responsible for maintaining. My coworkers that I'm talking about: M and P work in a different area and buddy up together.
P (33M) tried to get very close to me straight from the beginning. Adding me on Facebook. Wanting to drive me home from work even though it takes me 2 minutes to walk home. Weird stuff like that. It gave me weird warning signs but I brushed it off and just focused on my work. One day there were some plans for my area of work and P said he would come over and help me. Sounds good. He came over and watched me do 99% of the work breaking my back while he stood there making undermining comments about how I worked. I made a mental note to never accept help from him again. A few days later I'm busy in my area and P comes strolling over and starts lingering around me, asks if I need help and I tell him no. He doesn't leave and starts making stupid comments about my work again.
I spoke to a manager about this and it did actually help a little bit.
M (53M) is a compulsive liar and very shady person in general. The kind of person that things go missing around. He makes very strange jokes towards me that he's gonna beat me up, hit me over the head with tools, put bleach in my coffee. I brushed this off in the beginning as a bad attempt at banter.
Lately M has been including P in these jokes, the two of them come into my area to eat their lunch a couple times a week. So now M's jokes are that he is gonna hold me down while P beats me up. Also now P feels comfortable making these jokes towards me too and said that he's gonna stick me in the ground to use me as a scarecrow.
I let my manager know that I want to speak to her again and she ignored the message, to which I sent another message asking to speak to her and she ignored that too.
I could manage the weird jokes in the beginning because it was just the one guy and it didnt really bother me. But now that it's both of them and they're encouraging each other its a lot more stressful and i feel like its just gonna escalate from here. Its even more stressful that my manager is just ignoring me.
I feel like quitting with no notice. I also feel like punching them both in the face.
Jobadvisor
That sounds genuinely exhausting and stressful — six months of this, and now your manager is ghosting you on top of it. Your frustration makes complete sense.
Before you quit or throw a punch (understandable impulse, bad outcome), a few thoughts:
What they're doing is actually serious. "I'm going to hold you down while he beats you up" and "I'll put bleach in your coffee" aren't just bad banter — these are threats. Even if they mean them as jokes, a pattern of this directed at one person is workplace harassment and potentially threatening behaviour. That changes what options you have.
Your manager ignoring you is a problem you can go around. She's not your only avenue:
- Go above her — her manager, an HR department, or whoever handles personnel issues
- Put it in writing (email or text) so there's a paper trail. "I've tried to speak with you twice about a serious concern and haven't heard back" on record matters
- If your workplace has a union, this is exactly what they're for
Document everything now. Dates, times, what was said, who was present. Even just notes in your phone. This protects you if things escalate and gives weight to any formal complaint.
On quitting — you're not wrong to consider it, and if this place is genuinely making your life miserable, leaving is a valid choice. But quitting before at least escalating past your manager means they face zero consequences and you lose any leverage. If you're going to leave anyway, you have nothing to lose by raising hell on the way out through the proper channels.
The manager ignoring you twice is arguably the most concerning part of this. It suggests either she's already decided not to deal with it, or she's closer to M and P than she is to you. Either way, going over her head is your next move.