Job fair draws monster crowd

The federal government reported today that the number of people receiving unemployment benefits topped 9.1 million, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise the lines were long outside the Westin South Coast Plaza Hotel in Costa Mesa for a job fair.

Eager job seekers got there early before the doors opened at 10 a.m. By the time the job fair closed at 3 p.m., the job fair had attracted 1,718 job seekers. A total of 28 companies were represented.

“There were a lot of people here that I was surprised to see looking for a job,” said Jason Sarkozi, who was looking for a summer job. “Orange County’s job rate is supposed to be better than that of other regions, but there’s still lots of competition here. There aren’t 1,400 positions for the 1,400 people who have been here so far. Not everyone’s going to get a job.”

Monster.com sponsored the job fair because of the slumping economy, said Phil Cavanagh, a senior director for the site.

“People don’t know which local companies are hiring,” Cavanaugh said, “and it’s our job to show them job opportunities they might not have otherwise looked for.”

The event was part of Monster.com’s nationwide Keep America Working Tour, which started in March. According to Cavanagh, the demand for jobs has increased even since the tour began.

As the job fairs have attracted more people, they have also drawn in a more diverse pool of people, Cavanagh said. “It’s not just kids out of college,” he said. “We are getting people with postgraduate degrees and sizable work experience, too.”

Most job seekers at the event soon realized that they were up against hundreds of other well-qualified applicants in their same position.

“My job search has been going OK, but there’s a lot of competition,” said Hardik Shah of Long Beach. “I got here at 11 a.m., and it was pretty crowded. A lot of people have lost their jobs in the banking and finance industries, so there’s a lot of competition in those fields.”

Laura Muscianese of Irvine echoed Shah’s sentiment.

“I didn’t think that I would have trouble parking, nor did I anticipate that there would be over 1,400 people here,” she said.

Although Muscianese is studying biology at UC Irvine, she hopes to find a way to make money in the meantime.

“Ideally, I’d like something in the field of biology or health,” she said. “But right now, I just want to see what’s out there.”

According to Cavanaugh, not all the attendees were seeking immediate employment. Some were currently working, he said, but anticipated losing their jobs in the near future.

Although a sizable number of companies came, not all careers were equally represented. Jordan Funes came from Los Angeles with his wife, who had a degree in social work.

“There are a lot of people here,” he said. “It’s kind of depressing. I didn’t know this many people were looking for jobs. A lot of people are having a hard finding work — especially people looking for jobs in social work, and in the government.”

Officials at Monster.com did their best to tailor the job fair to the specific needs of the area.

“The kinds of jobs that are available in each area depends on employer base in each community,” Cavanagh said. “When the stimulus [funds] came through, it was important for job seekers in each state to know what it meant for their particular state. In this area, we see an increase in job postings in the areas of sales, education and training management, and health care [among others].”

Officials at Monster.com gave job-seekers helpful hints regarding the etiquette of job hunting. For example, they advised people to make sure their answering machines had an appropriate message for employers.

According to Cavanagh, the goal of Monster.com was to put people back in the job market as quickly as possible.

To that end, they made sure the companies at the job fairs were all in need of workers right away.

Officials have already started planning for next year.

“We’re looking for what we need to do for next year as job the economy changes, and the needs of job seekers change.”

Cavanaugh hopes that the Keep America Working Tour will help the economy rebound quickly.

“It’s Monster’s effort to rebuild the American workforce,” he said.