The search for work continues. Besides rubbing more polish on your resume, what can a work-hungry American do to get a job? If you know which career interests you, you could consider volunteering in your chosen field. From networking and skill building to resume improvement, the benefits of volunteering seem endless.

Job Title: Assistant Branch Manager
Where: Montreal, Canada
Years of Experience: 2 years
Education: Bachelor of Commerce
Related Experience: Financial Service Manager for 3 years; Customer Service Manager for 2 years.
Salary: Use the PayScale Research Center to find median salaries for banking and finance jobs, including an assistant branch manager salary.

Banking and Finance Jobs - Assistant Branch Manager

With the banking industry still in recovery mode, many recent graduates are wondering if a career in finance is the best choice. For those interested in banking jobs, there's good news from the Bureau of Labor Statistics - although banking and finance jobs are expected to grow more slowly than jobs in other industries, the number of local branches is expected to increase along with demand for more branch managers and tellers.

In this Salary Story, we get to hear first-hand from an assistant branch manager about what banking jobs are really like. If you're interested in a career in finance, this interview provides a banking job description and describes some of the challenges and rewards of working in a banking career.

Name: Valerie Garrett, LEED AP
Job Title: Coordinator, Regional Green Building Hotline and Green Building Specialist
Where: Portland, OR
Years of Experience: Two years at present job; 18 in career
Education: University of Houston Bachelor of Architecture with Honors, Architectural license, LEED Accredited Professional
Employer: City of Portland Oregon Bureau of Planning and Sustainability Green Building Program
Salary: See the PayScale Research Center for median salaries in the green building industry.

Green Jobs - Green Building Specialist

Green building. Green energy. Green products. Green is the eco-friendly catchphrase of the century and multiple industries are adopting it as their own. Demand is slowly increasing for both greener products and building design as consumers become aware of the importance of sustainability. This shift toward environmentally friendly consumerism also means the creation of more green jobs.

The following Salary Story provides one example of what a green job can look like. Green building guru Valerie Garrett describes the multiple facets of her job - from education to outreach to marketing and more. As a green building specialist and coordinator of a regional green building hotline, Valerie helps local residents and business owners make their lives and work more green. Keep reading to find out if this green job would be right for you.

Name: Karen Martel
Job Title: Administrative and Marketing Assistant
Where: North Battleford, Saskatchewan, Canada
Years of Experience: 5 years
Education: Lampeter comprehensive, Cardigan College FE, SW London Poly: STEC VIC
Employer: Battlefords Tourism
Salary: Use the PayScale Research Center to find the average salary for marketing assistant jobs.

Marketing Assistant Job - Travel and Tourism Industry

Marketing for people’s tourist dollar can be some of the hardest marketing around. Creating effective communications and promotions for tourism requires a talented assistant with great customer service skills. Karen Martel has the qualities of a marketing assistant needed to do the job. She works in a relatively small travel market, so the advantages of developing a tourism marketing strategy are not lost on her. In this Salary Story, Karen describes the different aspects of her job, from customer service to office management and marketing. Find out why she loves being an administrative and marketing assistant within the travel and tourism industry.

PayScale: What is expected in the job of administrative and marketing assistant?

Look after phones, all office duties, all administrative duties in running the office, and assist callers and visitors with information on the local area. Compile stats, assist with marketing projects for the city, town and municipality. Assist my boss with projects, such as the AGM, tourism awareness week, summer projects requiring supervision of students. Compile and work on the visitor guide for the area - including advertising, editorial, events and who to send it to - and send it out world wide. Keep comprehensive databases of the distribution for literature, upkeep of website (including a travellers' blog), and many other duties.

As the ice begins to thaw – just slightly - on our frozen, recession-era job market, opportunities are popping up in some cities at a faster rate than others. A recent article written for Yahoo! Hotjobs by PayScale titled, “10 Great Cities for Salary Growth” offers a list of cities that, against all odds, saw a growth in job opportunities in 2009, some at a rate of nearly 10 percent.

Are you open to living in Orlando, FL, McAllen, TX or Salt Lake City, UT? If you’re having trouble finding work in your town, you might want to consider places like these, where jobs in hi-tech, health care and telecom are available.  The next questions to ask are: what kind of money could you make in your line of work in that town and how does the cost of living compare to where you live now?