It's been seven months and something has to give. Since June I've been on the warpath, searching for a better way to fill the hours between 8am and 5pm without any luck. In fact today I uncovered a job opening at Adobe. With the help of an inside operative I discovered the status of the job: an offer was about to be extended and the person was going to take it. This is a common script, one that has played out for me over and over in the wake of my layoff.
So what's next? The MBA studies have keep my brain afloat and lent purpose to what might otherwise have been very aimless and purposeless days. Perhaps it's time to embrace that frame of mind to its fullest extent. Perhaps it's time I jumped off the weekend MBA train and went full time. It's something I'm seriously considering.
Honestly, I'm doing more than considering it—I'm going to do it; apply that is. Around five transfer spots are made available each year for evening and weekend students who for whatever reason would like to make the hop. Don't think of it as a sure shot, it's not. The transfer requires the completion of forms describing the reason for the request, explaining in detailed terms exactly what the prospective full time student might bring to the program. While the powers that be are considerate enough for forgo another round of GMAT examinations (rejoice!), the process is tantamount to a re-application. But I'll do it.
I'm not actually required to accept should I be offered the transfer, but at this juncture I'd probably take it. The tuition fees are significantly cheaper—I could claim in-state rates—I'd be out faster and the career launchpad provided by the program that much more lifting. With the rate at which I'm not finding any interest in my resume that last point is amongst the most attractive. Watching my limited funds dwindle away is far from pleasant. Retreating to the cloisters while the current financial tempest wreaks its havoc might be exactly what I need.
Monday, February 09, 2009
Friday, February 06, 2009
The Seventh and Deadliest Sin
I guess I'm allowed to swell with pride every once in a while.
I had the chance today to catch up with one of my former direct reports. He was laid off at the same time as me. Although nobody could ever actually prove this in a court of law, anyone considered to be loyal to my former manager was excised as part of the layoffs. This former direct report was one such person. We'd worked together for about 10 years. I'd in fact played a strong hand in hiring him back in 1998. He's good guy.
For Rocko—as we'll call him—luck appears to be swinging his way. After wandering for seven months in the unemployment wilderness he's throw himself at the depressed and depressing job market only to find that he's got a potential taker: Adult Friend Finder. It's basically a prostitution service with a bit of an extramarital twist thrown in for good measure. The good news is that they're hiring and Rocko's due to front up for an interview on Tuesday. He asked me to provide a reference and I'll be geniuinely honoured to do it.
You see, I get a kick out of doing that sort of thing. Another one of my former direct reports, who for identification purposes shall be referred to as Carne Asada, recently landed a web analyst position with the 9th Circuit Court in San Francisco. Carne Asada was assigned to my corporate care back in about 2002. With no college degree under his belt he'd been performing what amounted to clerical duties at the old company. He was a blank slate but he showed aptitude and enthusiasm and those characteristics are what I think really count.
Did he want to go down the path of becoming a back-end developer? Not really. How about front-end? No, not particularly. Ultimately Carne Asada took the path of web usability analysis and the kid's pretty darn good at it. He led the charge at the old company, shoving the web interface kicking and screaming out of the nineties and into the not-so-nineties. But let's not get ahead of ourselves, the site still needed a lot more work.
At any rate he was pretty good, but he had no college degree. The lack of a degree was always going to present a professional barrier, so I urged him to undertake a certification program offered by Human Factors International. He nailed the exam and got the cert.
Like the rest of us he got the chop back in June and I was kind of worried about how things might work out for him. I needn't have been too concerned. I provided a reference for him with the 9th Circuit and he's just wrapped up his first week. It makes me proud; proud in a kind of paternal sort of way. I had a long-term impact on someone else's life and that gives me the warm fuzzies. I'll gladly do the same for Rocko. Sure, he wasn't as much of a protege of mine as Carne Asada—I started managing Rocko much later in the game—but I derive an immense sense of pleasure from helping other people succeed. In light of that management's probably the right game for me.
Moreover, what goes around comes around. Even though I'm still thrashing in the open waters of unemployment, there might soon come a time when one of the people whom I helped to find work is in a position to return the favour. Should it come I won't refuse it. It's a tired old cliché, but you really do reap what you sow.
Wish me luck in my operations mid-term tomorrow.
I had the chance today to catch up with one of my former direct reports. He was laid off at the same time as me. Although nobody could ever actually prove this in a court of law, anyone considered to be loyal to my former manager was excised as part of the layoffs. This former direct report was one such person. We'd worked together for about 10 years. I'd in fact played a strong hand in hiring him back in 1998. He's good guy.
For Rocko—as we'll call him—luck appears to be swinging his way. After wandering for seven months in the unemployment wilderness he's throw himself at the depressed and depressing job market only to find that he's got a potential taker: Adult Friend Finder. It's basically a prostitution service with a bit of an extramarital twist thrown in for good measure. The good news is that they're hiring and Rocko's due to front up for an interview on Tuesday. He asked me to provide a reference and I'll be geniuinely honoured to do it.
You see, I get a kick out of doing that sort of thing. Another one of my former direct reports, who for identification purposes shall be referred to as Carne Asada, recently landed a web analyst position with the 9th Circuit Court in San Francisco. Carne Asada was assigned to my corporate care back in about 2002. With no college degree under his belt he'd been performing what amounted to clerical duties at the old company. He was a blank slate but he showed aptitude and enthusiasm and those characteristics are what I think really count.
Did he want to go down the path of becoming a back-end developer? Not really. How about front-end? No, not particularly. Ultimately Carne Asada took the path of web usability analysis and the kid's pretty darn good at it. He led the charge at the old company, shoving the web interface kicking and screaming out of the nineties and into the not-so-nineties. But let's not get ahead of ourselves, the site still needed a lot more work.
At any rate he was pretty good, but he had no college degree. The lack of a degree was always going to present a professional barrier, so I urged him to undertake a certification program offered by Human Factors International. He nailed the exam and got the cert.
Like the rest of us he got the chop back in June and I was kind of worried about how things might work out for him. I needn't have been too concerned. I provided a reference for him with the 9th Circuit and he's just wrapped up his first week. It makes me proud; proud in a kind of paternal sort of way. I had a long-term impact on someone else's life and that gives me the warm fuzzies. I'll gladly do the same for Rocko. Sure, he wasn't as much of a protege of mine as Carne Asada—I started managing Rocko much later in the game—but I derive an immense sense of pleasure from helping other people succeed. In light of that management's probably the right game for me.
Moreover, what goes around comes around. Even though I'm still thrashing in the open waters of unemployment, there might soon come a time when one of the people whom I helped to find work is in a position to return the favour. Should it come I won't refuse it. It's a tired old cliché, but you really do reap what you sow.
Wish me luck in my operations mid-term tomorrow.
Thursday, February 05, 2009
How Many Recruiters?
Here's a cultural subset who've become a somewhat regular part of my life since being given the chop at work: recruiters. They're a strange breed, collecting resumes and frantically doing whatever they can to add that one extra contact to the LinkedIn profile. Some are good. Some will take the time to actually read a candidate's resume and attempt to come to a set of reasonable conclusions about what that person has done and most likely wants to do in the future. They're kind of rare. The majority simply run a few quick keyword scans, leap at any matches, no matter how tenuous, and start making calls.
Well I'm glad they call. It's good for the ego. When the days at home alone grow long it's kinda sorta nice to get someone on the other end of the line asking if you're interested in a position, even if it's something that's totally orthogonal to your current career direction. At least you feel loved.
Well, this morning I received a call about a web development manager position. The scenario went something like this.
The phone rings. It's not a number I recognise but it might be about a job. I answer.
"Hello sir, is now a good time to talk?"
The voice is accented and female. By the sine curve intonations my guess is that she's calling from India. A lot of recruiting companies are now located there and use IP phones to obtain US-based area code phone numbers. I think that's a decent strategy. I really don't care where the recruiters are calling from. All that matters is whether or not they've done any work before they call.
"Sure, now's a good time."
"I wanted to find out if you're interested in a web development manager position in Mountain View, California."
Ah, yes, the Mountain View job. I know all about this job and how to end the call quickly.
"Is this position at a company called Skyfire?"
"Yes, sir, it is."
You see, most recruiters don't like to tell you which company they're representing when they first call you. For whatever reason, the big reveal isn't executed until some further sign of commitment has been made. But in this case I knew what was coming my way.
"Yeah, I thought so. My resume was sent to them a couple of days ago by another recruiter. They took a look at it and apparently thought that my skills tend too far towards management. They wanted someone with a more hands-on coding background."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
"No, no, don't be sorry. They're well within their rights to pick and choose."
These conversations are pretty commonplace. More to the point they've happened nearly a dozen times over the past week. Skyfire, is a company that produces a mobile web browser—I used it for a while on my shitty, old Windows Mobile 6 phone while it was in beta—that tries to bring a fully-fledged browser experience to handheld devices. It's actually not a bad product. The company might actually have some legs. They're obviously on a bit of a hiring spree and in order to meet their needs they must have reached out to every recruiting firm in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. Within the span of a day I fielded multiple calls and emails all asking the same thing, all pushing the same position. Therein lies the sad jaundice of our ailing economy. When every starved, bony-ribbed lion pounces on the lone carcass in the desert, fighting for the scraps, you know that times are tough. Skyfire is one such carcass.
At any rate, they didn't care for me so what does it matter? I'll must mosey along and seek love elsewhere. Any takers?
Well I'm glad they call. It's good for the ego. When the days at home alone grow long it's kinda sorta nice to get someone on the other end of the line asking if you're interested in a position, even if it's something that's totally orthogonal to your current career direction. At least you feel loved.
Well, this morning I received a call about a web development manager position. The scenario went something like this.
The phone rings. It's not a number I recognise but it might be about a job. I answer.
"Hello sir, is now a good time to talk?"
The voice is accented and female. By the sine curve intonations my guess is that she's calling from India. A lot of recruiting companies are now located there and use IP phones to obtain US-based area code phone numbers. I think that's a decent strategy. I really don't care where the recruiters are calling from. All that matters is whether or not they've done any work before they call.
"Sure, now's a good time."
"I wanted to find out if you're interested in a web development manager position in Mountain View, California."
Ah, yes, the Mountain View job. I know all about this job and how to end the call quickly.
"Is this position at a company called Skyfire?"
"Yes, sir, it is."
You see, most recruiters don't like to tell you which company they're representing when they first call you. For whatever reason, the big reveal isn't executed until some further sign of commitment has been made. But in this case I knew what was coming my way.
"Yeah, I thought so. My resume was sent to them a couple of days ago by another recruiter. They took a look at it and apparently thought that my skills tend too far towards management. They wanted someone with a more hands-on coding background."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
"No, no, don't be sorry. They're well within their rights to pick and choose."
These conversations are pretty commonplace. More to the point they've happened nearly a dozen times over the past week. Skyfire, is a company that produces a mobile web browser—I used it for a while on my shitty, old Windows Mobile 6 phone while it was in beta—that tries to bring a fully-fledged browser experience to handheld devices. It's actually not a bad product. The company might actually have some legs. They're obviously on a bit of a hiring spree and in order to meet their needs they must have reached out to every recruiting firm in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. Within the span of a day I fielded multiple calls and emails all asking the same thing, all pushing the same position. Therein lies the sad jaundice of our ailing economy. When every starved, bony-ribbed lion pounces on the lone carcass in the desert, fighting for the scraps, you know that times are tough. Skyfire is one such carcass.
At any rate, they didn't care for me so what does it matter? I'll must mosey along and seek love elsewhere. Any takers?
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
Anatomy of the Day of an Unemployed Man Part 1
Being unemployed can really suck. The bank account is ever dwindling as the sum total of your life's work slowly ebbs back out into the economy from which it came. Unemployment checks help stem the losses but there's an itchy feeling under the skin that receiving a dose of cash injection from the EDD tends to leave. I think it's got something to do with the stigma of being a leach on society. Sure, I know, I put into the system for over a decade so it's only fair that I be allowed to draw something back out, but it's still not the sort of thing that generally boosts one's ego. Quite the opposite, in fact. It would be a mark of shame if only there weren't so many others drawing from the same communal largesse.
Nevertheless, my impecunious predicament is gradually spiralling downward, compounded by a bleak job market punctuated by layoff after layoff after layoff. Like I mentioned, I've got plenty of friends in the EDD club. Despite the overall shittiness of the employement landscape I've thus far remained resolute in my efforts to find work. Word to the wise, the resolve is beginning to crumble, but that's a separate post.
So how do I go about accomplishing this commendable goal of rejoining the work force? How does an unemployed man's day get filled? Surprisingly easily. Shaking off the effects of a night's sleep interrupted repeatedly by feline shenanigans usually starts at about 8am. Then there's more coffee from the magical siphon and the "productive" part of the day begins. Honestly it's productive. There's less Guitar Hero involved than one might think.
A good chunk of my morning was spent tracking tailoring my resume for a job I found posted on McAfee's site. The job involves serving as a Web Marketing Manager; a role similar to what I did at my former place of employment. I could probably run rings around the job, but that's now what really matters. What matters is getting access to the right people. Submit the resume without any target softening at the intended company and it disappears without any word or trace. Trust me, this is how the job market currently works. Fortunately a former direct report of mine, someone whose career I had a strong hand in developing, picked up a contract job there about 6 months ago. He's my mole in the organization. I'm relying on him to ensure that my cover letter and resume find their way to somebody who might actually care.
But there's a snag, and it only dawned on me when I was at the gym a little earlier this evening. The cover letter is a revision of a cover letter I used for a cold-call job submission at Hotwire, a job for which I actually received a kindly worded "piss off, you suck" response. Even getting a "no" from a submission should be chalked up in the success column. Ninety percent of the time I don't even get that. The snag in this instance is that I forgot to change the reference to Hotwire in the first paragraph. Visions of the recruiter or hiring manager barged into my brain. His or her eyebrows twist and furrow while my hopes of gainful employment are tossed into the "not on your life" pile. Quickly phoning my mole I discovered, as I expected, that he'd not really done much to shop the thing around, so time was on my side. I've got the chance to put the right name in the letter.
To be honest I don't expect anything to come of my efforts. Just last week I went through the depressing agony of finding a job at Apple that was appropriate for my background. Kicking my intelligence network into full gear I wheedled my way into a phone screen—which went exceptionally well—only to be told via email, after a too-long wait for a good response, that the hiring manager was opting for an internal candidate. "He quite liked you," the email read, but that doesn't really count for much when there isn't a job hanging on the end of that stick. The hiring manager got a "gee, you're a nice guy, perhaps you'll give me a job later" email that will never illicit a response. It's good to feel loved.
These experiences temper my expectations, and with McAfee it's no different. They lack the glamour of Apple. They lack the Jonathan Ive shininess and rabid fan base, but they're hiring and they've got a revenue stream. Perhaps they'll take me on.
How else does a bum pass his day? Getting his homework done. I'm taking two classes for this supposed part time MBA that's bleeding me about $4,000 per month. One of which is Operations. Unlike the rest of my class mates I've got ample time to study the living shit out of the subject. People want me in their study groups since they sleep assured at night that when they show up for the meeting the next day they can feel confident that at least one of the team members has made some decent headway with the problem sets. My GPA rises up in testament to the power of having more time than the rest: 3.925. There's plenty of time for that number to drop. And in the meanwhile, as the layoff announcements keep flooding in, the ranks of students suddenly exposed to too much time continues to swell. I'm not so lonely anymore.
Nevertheless, my impecunious predicament is gradually spiralling downward, compounded by a bleak job market punctuated by layoff after layoff after layoff. Like I mentioned, I've got plenty of friends in the EDD club. Despite the overall shittiness of the employement landscape I've thus far remained resolute in my efforts to find work. Word to the wise, the resolve is beginning to crumble, but that's a separate post.
So how do I go about accomplishing this commendable goal of rejoining the work force? How does an unemployed man's day get filled? Surprisingly easily. Shaking off the effects of a night's sleep interrupted repeatedly by feline shenanigans usually starts at about 8am. Then there's more coffee from the magical siphon and the "productive" part of the day begins. Honestly it's productive. There's less Guitar Hero involved than one might think.
A good chunk of my morning was spent tracking tailoring my resume for a job I found posted on McAfee's site. The job involves serving as a Web Marketing Manager; a role similar to what I did at my former place of employment. I could probably run rings around the job, but that's now what really matters. What matters is getting access to the right people. Submit the resume without any target softening at the intended company and it disappears without any word or trace. Trust me, this is how the job market currently works. Fortunately a former direct report of mine, someone whose career I had a strong hand in developing, picked up a contract job there about 6 months ago. He's my mole in the organization. I'm relying on him to ensure that my cover letter and resume find their way to somebody who might actually care.
But there's a snag, and it only dawned on me when I was at the gym a little earlier this evening. The cover letter is a revision of a cover letter I used for a cold-call job submission at Hotwire, a job for which I actually received a kindly worded "piss off, you suck" response. Even getting a "no" from a submission should be chalked up in the success column. Ninety percent of the time I don't even get that. The snag in this instance is that I forgot to change the reference to Hotwire in the first paragraph. Visions of the recruiter or hiring manager barged into my brain. His or her eyebrows twist and furrow while my hopes of gainful employment are tossed into the "not on your life" pile. Quickly phoning my mole I discovered, as I expected, that he'd not really done much to shop the thing around, so time was on my side. I've got the chance to put the right name in the letter.
To be honest I don't expect anything to come of my efforts. Just last week I went through the depressing agony of finding a job at Apple that was appropriate for my background. Kicking my intelligence network into full gear I wheedled my way into a phone screen—which went exceptionally well—only to be told via email, after a too-long wait for a good response, that the hiring manager was opting for an internal candidate. "He quite liked you," the email read, but that doesn't really count for much when there isn't a job hanging on the end of that stick. The hiring manager got a "gee, you're a nice guy, perhaps you'll give me a job later" email that will never illicit a response. It's good to feel loved.
These experiences temper my expectations, and with McAfee it's no different. They lack the glamour of Apple. They lack the Jonathan Ive shininess and rabid fan base, but they're hiring and they've got a revenue stream. Perhaps they'll take me on.
How else does a bum pass his day? Getting his homework done. I'm taking two classes for this supposed part time MBA that's bleeding me about $4,000 per month. One of which is Operations. Unlike the rest of my class mates I've got ample time to study the living shit out of the subject. People want me in their study groups since they sleep assured at night that when they show up for the meeting the next day they can feel confident that at least one of the team members has made some decent headway with the problem sets. My GPA rises up in testament to the power of having more time than the rest: 3.925. There's plenty of time for that number to drop. And in the meanwhile, as the layoff announcements keep flooding in, the ranks of students suddenly exposed to too much time continues to swell. I'm not so lonely anymore.
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