Australian that was planning to arrive on a working holiday to Canada this month and can't arrive until the lockdown's lifted. Looking to start my career after being caught in the 'no job, no experience' loop. Any advice would be appreciated.

Hi there, I graduated at University back in 2016 specialising in Games & Interactivity. I knew I faced an uphill battle entering the workforce in Australia but I didn't expect to still be struggling many years later. During my final year of Uni, I was working on a video game called Hyper Jam that recently released on the Switch, after being out on Xbox One, PS4 and Steam for most of 2019. The game managed to get green lit on Steam Greenlight during PAX Aus 2016, where I and the rest of the team were presenting the game in the Indie section.

During 2016, I got to briefly work full time for an Agriculture Analysis startup building a demo environment using Unreal Engine 4. The people there were very impressed with my leadership skills and the level of detail I provided when marking my changes in the git repository for other programmers to see. I'm not a programmer but I know enough about programming to know that adding comments for other programmers to understand what you're doing is expected and appreciated. Anyway, once the demo was done, it was a wait and see if Huawei or other investors would pick it up. The demo went well but the CEO of the company decided to move onto a GIS platform and didn't have work for me.

At the start of 2017, I left working on Hyper Jam as the Directors (also lead software engineers) were having a tough time securing funding. I left to pursue other opportunities.

When I graduated, I planned to explore similar fields such as digital marketing, PR, UI or anything to do with digital media or the design landscape as the opportunities in the Games Industry are very hard to come by. However, navigating the job market in Australia has been exceptionally brutal, demoralising and honestly confusing. I've had plenty of interviews, but I tend to get knocked back for not having enough experience.

I secured in 2017 a 2 month internship with an International eLearning company. I largely did QA for the content team and prepared courses for translation. I also had a project working with a client in Myanmar, preparing a sort of example course for ESL students to assist the company to secure new clients.

2018 was a disastrous year where I got even fewer interviews and at this point was basically constantly going through cycles of unemployment and short term positions. I had many interviews where I was shortlisted but then told that they were looking for someone Senior or someone who had more experience.

The beginning of 2019 looked hopeful when I got a job as a camera operator filming live TV for the Australian Open. This was a great opportunity to interact with some of the people who were in similar situations to me. I also finally broke the cycle of short term gigs then back to unemployment by getting a supermarket job. It's a massive step back but at least I'm getting something consistent on a weekly basis. I'm still underemployed but it's at least kept me somewhat more sane, hopeful and feeling more productive.

The decision to leave Australia came when I didn't make it to the 3rd interview for a Studio Coordinator position for a post production film, tv and sports company. The feedback I got was I had a "terrific attitude, transferable skills but not enough office experience". I would've left Australia at this point but I was invited back for the Aus Open in 2020. One of the supervisors selected me as 'the most likely to be CEO'. He and the other supervisors recognised my commitment to finding improvements in the broadcast setup and valued my feedback.

I was planning to arrive in Canada this month but obviously can't. What I'm hoping for by writing this detailed post is to help focus what industries I could work in and if there's any freelance remote opportunities that would be available. I would like to find opportunities to specialise in UI/UX design as I really enjoy research based design. I fell into 3D modelling when I worked on Hyper Jam and have had a hard time convincing people I'm not just an artist (I don't consider myself an artist at all but it's hard to break the label).

TL:DR: Aussie that was hoping to come to Canada on a working holiday but obviously can't come until further notice. Looking for remote opportunities and to build a network before I arrive as I've been struggling to get a proper start in my career. Would appreciate some direction in UI/UX or the Games industry. Thanks for anyone reading this and I'm really eager for a new start.

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