Houston man lands his dream job as an electrician...on the side of a highway

Deandre Matthews' hand-lettered sign was a game-changer for his job search.

September 19, 2018, 6:40 PM

Deandre Matthews of Houston always wanted to be an electrician, so he studied hard, he said, graduated from an electrical trade school and became an electrician's apprentice earlier this year.

But after 30 job applications for work as an electrician led nowhere, Matthews decided to take his message to the streets.

“I want to work with electricity," Matthews, 21 told ABC News. "Anything that works with electricity I want to do. I just love electricity, and I want to be around it.”

Fed up, but inspired by a man he saw holding a sign seeking work two weeks earlier, Matthew decided to take a similar step.

I want to work with electricity. Anything that works with electricity I want to do. I just love electricity, and I want to be around it.

Earlier this month, Mathew took to Houston's streets with his sign, which read: “I am a electrical trade school Grad with no job experience please take a resume and help this electrician apprentice out. #Striveforgreatness.”

Matthews said that in just a few hours his efforts paid off.

“Three hours after I stopped holding the sign, that’s when people started contacting me,” Matthews said. “That's when Channel 13 News, ABC News Houston contacted me and we did an interview out there on the street.”

“Seriously I thought, nobody was going to take my resume," he told ABC News. "I honestly thought that I was going to stand outside looking stupid basically holding a sign.”

On Tuesday, Wood Electrical Service in Houston contacted him and hired him as electrical apprentice," he said.

Contacted by ABC News, a spokesperson for Wood Electrical Service confirmed that Matthews had been hired.

“It's been a lot of calls back to back, back to back,” Matthews said, calculating early Wednesday evening that he had received 81 calls since he took his sign to the streets.

A proud Matthews said that he will be apprenticing for journeyman electricians.

Equally proud was Matthews’s father, Ronnie Matthews, who called his son “smart and dedicated son.”

“I’m always proud of him,” Ronnie Matthews, 42, told ABC News.

Inspired by his success, the younger Matthews has a message for those who are in a similar situation.

“Don’t think you can’t! No! You can!”