JobLink job fair brings over 200 open positions to Fort Myers

At Florida JobLink’s Wednesday job fair in Fort Myers, at the Drury Inn at 9950 University Park Drive from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., more than 200 jobs will be open, with employers offering perks to get you interested and hired right away.

Positions need to be filled in nearly every imaginable field. It’s more a question of what isn’t available. The jobs mostly come with all the benefits you’d expect: medical, dental, vision, disability and life insurance. But then there are some unique perks like a program called Daily Pay, which lets you access your funds to pay yourself before payday if you need to.

Another intriguing one was a corporate discount plan called World Perks, which gives you thousands of discounts ranging from your cell phone bill to your groceries. Southwest Florida has a surplus of jobs right now, and not enough people to fill them, so these employers are pulling out all the stops to reel you in. Most of them said a resume is a good start if you show up, but not a deal breaker if you don’t have it.

“Ideally, if they come with a resume, if they don’t have a resume, that’s fine, because we have everything: entry level positions up to very seasoned positions,” said Drummond Camel, vice president of human resources at Cypress Living. “We’re gonna have a team of people there at the job fair with tablets. And we’ll walk people right through the process to apply online. We’re going to be interviewing and making job offers right there on the spot.”

The companies hiring range from Amazon and Chick-fil-A to local groups like NCH and the Sundial Beach Resort and Spa. But the best part about this particular job fair is that it’s designed for on-the-spot hiring, which means that you could walk in unemployed and leave with a job. And even if someone may not have a spotless record, there are companies (the organizers say at least five) that are specifically looking to offer second chances.

Every employer WINK News spoke to said that even if you don’t have the training or education, they’re probably willing to take the steps to get you there.

“If we have a position for a given applicant that works for them, and they don’t have the experience, we absolutely can put them through the course,” said Mike Lowell, regional recruiter for Allied Universal. “We’ll take care of the fingerprint, licensing fees and all that, and get them brought onboard, you know, as quickly as possible. Experience is always a nice thing to have. But like I said earlier, it’s really looking for that customer service ability to smile and put people at ease.”

Pre-register for the event here.