Twice a week we publish problems that will feature in a forthcoming Dear Jeremy advice column in the Saturday Guardian so that readers can offer their own advice and suggestions. We then print the best of your comments alongside Jeremy's own insights. Here is the latest dilemma – what are your thoughts?
My career ended with the recession in 2008. Since then, I have done occasional labour for Royal Mail. I am still hoping to resume the type of work I used to do, and this year I was offered work as cover for someone on maternity leave.
I gave a manager's name from my job in 2008 as a referee (I had been an auditor for a public body that allocated development funding). While we have not been in touch since that time, the job I had done had gone well and I had received a fulsome commendatory message from her at its conclusion. However, she declined the recruiter's request for a reference on the grounds of the time lapse and the different nature of the prospective work.
The consensus of advice about these circumstances seems to be that I should have requested a reference ahead of making the application. However, I have used this same manager as a referee in hundreds of applications over the years, and had I repeatedly checked her willingness to provide a reference I would have thought she would have long ago considered me a pest.
Unless I can somehow reconstruct this route to a reference, my applications for future work will be impoverished. As it was, this particular offer was withdrawn. Have you any suggestions?
Do you need advice on a work issue? For Jeremy's and readers' help, send a brief email to dear.jeremy@theguardian.com. Please note that he is unable to answer questions of a legal nature or to reply personally.
