Dear J.T. & Dale: My employment history is a mix of survival jobs, retail and basic office. My liberal-arts degree has been useless. I’ve gone through skills/interests testing, but the results were far from interesting. I can’t afford the debt of school. I have no ideas or contacts except that I’d like to work in an animal-rescue sanctuary. — Linda

Dale: What you describe is a hopeless, impossible job search. You’ve come to the right place. That’s because all we need is one little lead — in this case, the animal sanctuary. We’ll assume you contacted all the sanctuaries in your area and heard they weren’t hiring. Typical. Now the research begins, and that’s where that liberal-arts degree will actually be useful. When your ideal job isn’t available, the question becomes, What are the semi-ideal jobs and the quarter-ideals? In other words, what are all the jobs that touch, or are related to, working at an animal sanctuary? When you can’t leap right to the ideal, you EVOLVE toward it.

J.T.: Yes, building expertise in a field doesn’t have to come via formal education. In your case, Linda, you might work part time in a pet store and part time in a vet’s office, as well as volunteer at an animal shelter. You’ll gain a lot of experience, and best of all, it puts you in the inner circle of contacts who could make you aware of full-time jobs. Most jobs — 80 percent, in most studies — come through referrals. Such jobs are never publicly posted; rather, they are mentioned internally and the job goes to a friend of a friend.

Dale: And that’ll be you, Linda, because you won’t just be hoping for that perfect job — you’ll be getting paid to become qualified while developing the insider contacts you’ll need. Said another way, you won’t be just surviving; you’ll be evolving.