When I was 14 and 9 months, I found a part-time job in a deli in a market close to home. I sliced mortadella, salami and half my finger too when I forgot to drop the safety guard over the blade.
I was paid $2.50 an hour and I can still remember the first thing I bought with my own money. It was a pale pink coat, as soft as a cloud. Each time I wore it, I swelled with pride that my Friday night shifts had earned me such independence over my wardrobe.
My son counted down the days until he was 14 and 9 months and he too could find a part-time job. But when we checked the Victorian government website, we discovered that the employment laws had changed a long time ago. Businesses can still employ children under 15, but they need a child employment permit. My son decided to wait it out, and weeks after his 15th birthday found his first job to apply for.
I grew up away from shops and public transport, so teenage employment for me meant a parent had to play taxi. In contrast, my son has endless employment opportunities within walking distance from our house. It’s one thing to want your kids to learn work ethics and make some pocket money so you aren’t always paying, but it’s not necessarily easy to find a job that works for them.
Retail jobs are often customer-facing, which can be daunting for the average teenager when much of their time is spent communicating via different devices. Even answering the phone in a workplace can be anxiety-inducing. I still remember the pressure of serving customers, quickly adding up their purchases and then trying to work out the change in my head. It was often overwhelming, and my employers were generous and patient. Many are not so forgiving.
I helped my son write a CV. He’d never done one before, so we cheated a little and used his older sister’s as a template. It was short and sweet because he didn’t have endless references or work experience that he could list, but he did have some skills we could flesh out. He wrote a short cover letter explaining why he wanted to work at the fast-food chain; namely that it was close to home, in his community and somewhere he thought he’d learn new skills. We uploaded it and waited.
Within a week he had an interview. We talked a little about the sorts of questions they might ask and how he could answer them, and he went off on a Saturday morning in clean clothes with recently brushed hair, while I sat at home nervously wondering if he’d be OK. He came home about 15 minutes later, and I thought he must have bailed. But he laughed and told me that it was possibly the world’s fastest interview, and he answered the questions as well as he could and he wasn’t sure if he had the job or not.
I tried to reassure him that it didn’t matter, that even the process of applying was a learning experience. But I remember going for jobs, and not feeling confident about the interview, wondering how I could have presented myself better, done more, been prepared – and sinking when I received the phone call telling me I was unsuccessful.
Days later, my son had an email saying he had the job and asking if he could come to training. I was trying to resist my usual controlling-mother tendencies and encourage him to navigate the processes alone. Then when he missed several weeks of emails because they ended up in trash, I realised that being too hands-off with a 15-year-old isn’t the right way either. I didn’t want to overstep and hover because it was his attempt at moving towards adulthood, but in fearing that, I’d obviously backed off too much.
We struck a balance, and I helped him sort through the emails and explain what had happened. He went to training, learning an overwhelming amount in one night. Now he works three or maybe four shifts a week. They are short. Some are on weekends, some after school. He must negotiate having days off, look after his uniform, make sure he’s washed his hair, turn up on time (even early on a Sunday) and deal with different managers and co-workers. Each week when his pay comes in, he checks his account and tells me how much he has now. I tried telling him it’s not all about the money, it’s about learning to work, and he laughed.
He’s not saving for anything special, unlike me and my pink cloud coat. He wants more savings than his older sister by the time he finishes school. And at this rate, he just might.
• Nova Weetman is an award-winning author of books for children and young adults, including The Edge of Thirteen, winner of the Abia award 2022
