It took Dara Parvas six years, 10 English language exams, and a pandemic to move to Australia from Iran. A highly skilled Mechanical Engineer, Dara thought his biggest challenge was behind him, until he started looking for a job.
“I had really high hopes when I arrived,” said Dara. “I thought it's going to be super easy. I had permanent residency. I can speak English. But it was difficult. I struggled for almost nine months to find a job. I went to university and I had prior experience and it was still a very long process. I had so many interviews, most of them decided to move forward with the candidate who had some local experience.”
Deflated and stressed by the emotional and financial pressures of moving to Australia, Dara had to try to remain positive.
“It did affect me at some points,” he said. “It's just very difficult because there are a couple of things that you're going through when you come here as an immigrant. You're out of your comfort zone. You don't know many people. You don't have your friends or your family. I tried to raise my hand up for every possible situation and I tried to keep talking to people. I engaged in conversations with everybody I met, and I started telling them that I was looking for a job.”
After applying for hundreds of jobs and multiple interviews which didn’t lead to an offer, Dara was lucky enough to come across The Mentor Program at City East Community College. He was paired up with UGL Senior Manager Business Development & Strategic Growth, Mark Flint, to help him with his job search.
“I wanted to be a mentor because I could relate to how Dara was feeling,” said Mark. “I moved to Australia from the UK. It was about four months before I managed to find something, even though I was skilled. I also went through the frustration that migrants go through.”
Mark helped Dara refine the area of Mechanical Engineering that he was applying for, helped him with his CV and interview skills, and importantly gave him the confidence he needed.
“A mentee certainly needs some initial confidence, and you're there to build that up,” said Mark. “It’s so rewarding if you’re able to do it. As a mentor, I think you learn to see things differently and you learn about the culture of the mentee that you have. In our multi-cultural society here in Australia that’s so exciting and it’s who we are. The feeling of success that you get from helping to change somebody's life permanently is just incredible and working with Dara was such a pleasure. We still keep in touch on a personal level to this day.”
After Dara applied for a job at Ricardo, Mark realised he knew someone at the company and helped make a supporting introduction. Dara landed the job working in asset management and maintenance advisory.
“I got the call and they said they sent me the job offer,” said Dara. “I was with my family. My father was crying. My sister was crying. I was crying. My wife was crying. It was probably one of the happiest days of my life in Australia. The support of a mentor was really, really helpful. Mark supported me finding the job, doing the interviews, getting rejected and how to deal with that, improving my resume, improving my interview skills. I can’t thank him enough.”