By Noah Graff
For the upcoming issue, I interviewed Daniel Seddiqui, a 27-year-old native of Northern California who recently completed his quest to work 50 different jobs in 50 states in 50 weeks. Before he started his journey Seddiqui had been unsuccessful in 40 interviews for finance related jobs (his college degree was economics) and had several jobs in various states he hadn’t found fulfilling.
For his 50-50-50 quest he tried to work a stereotypical job for each state. In Maine he was lobster fisherman, Mississippi (the state with the highest obesity rate) he was a dietician. He was a surfing instructor in Hawaii, a bartender on Bourbon Street in New Orleans during Mardi Gras, a border patrolman in Arizona and worked in the machine shop of a medical device maker in Minnesota.
Seddiqui claims that in his job search he was rejected over 5,000 times, yet 95 percent of the time the people who did hire him wanted him to stay. He is now going on a lecture circuit, writing a book and producing a documentary film sharing what he learned on his quest—the power of thinking outside of the box and being willing to step out of your comfort zone, the opportunities which do exist in America.
He shared a story about when he was working in Kansas City as a boilermaker. A dentist who had been out of work for three years saw him on the news and said, “Wow, this guy is going around showing he can do anything, showing he’s an asset to these companies. I have welding skills, why don’t I go in and apply for a job there tomorrow?” The next day the dentist showed up at the company and got hired right on the spot.
Question: Do you feel a lot of unemployed Americans could find jobs if they were more open to different occupations?
Seddiqui Working at Medical Device Plant in Minnesota
