SPUG: Giving up on computer jobs

Marc S. Gibian marc.gibian at acm.org
Wed Jul 23 01:09:47 CDT 2003


Hi Chris,

I don't know you, so I don't know how long you've been out of school,
what degree you have, etc. But, I can make some general comments.

Job searches generally take more than a couple of months. This was true
even before the crash of the software industry, and even more true now
while its still in a depression. The more experience you have, the
longer you should expect a job search to take. This is simply because
employers want to assure a better match between the position they are
trying to fill and the long list of qualifications a more senior person
will have. I know that I first found this rather counter to "common
sense." I thought that lots of experience would mean I met more of the
requirements for a broader set of positions.

The single biggest hurdle in today's software job market is getting your
resume seen. It used to be that you spent enormous amounts of effort to
tune your resume so it was absolutely perfect. Even to the point of
fully customizing it for each specific position. This is pointless in
today's software job market. No one will even SEE your resume, except by
a very low probability chance, as every opening now see mountains of
resumes from applicants. Even cover letters have difficulty getting read
when there 800 or more for the poor recruiter to work their way through.

You should have heard what I'm about to say hundreds of times by now,
but I'll say it again because it is absolutely true, even more so in the
current software job market. The single best investment of your time is
in Networking! That is how you get your resume read. Yes, you should
have a solid resume, well put together, that accurately represents your
skills, knowledge, and experience. But, it is through networking that
you will get people to actually LOOK at it.

How do you network? Well, you talk to everyone you can think of, and
then lots of people you hadn't. Go to as many professional meetings you
can. Go to as many meetings of any kind, so long as you have an interest
in the topic. Do the things you like to do in life, but make sure that
while you are doing them you talk to the people around you. Not only do
they also like doing those things, which helps them relate to you, but
they also work (well, unless they are hunting for a job, in which case
they might be good to talk with as they may be using different
strategies than you, or know of different meetings, etc), and that means
they might know of an open position you might be a good fit for.

Before you say, oh, he's just read a lot of articles on this, let me
share my recent personal experience...

Not all that long ago I was laid off for the first time in my 24+ year
career. In the past I had always had a strong enough network at work
that I heard of any threat to my position long before action, and thus
was able to voluntarily make a move before it became involuntary. It was
a shock to me. I had just finished shipping a major project and had just
finished identifying the work needed to address all remaining issues in
that area of the business's systems. Of all the time I had worked at
that company, I was feeling as safe as I ever had, feeling I had finally
clearly shown my worth. Surely they wouldn't layoff someone with MY
record of high performance.

Well, I was laid off in February of 2002. I had no contacts in the
software industry here in the Seattle area at that time. My job had
consumed every waking minute not taken by family up to that point. I was
in shock.

I realized, and this took a lot of support from my friends, that I
needed to build a network ASAP. I started investigating the software
community here in Seattle to find what meetings took place. You'd be
surprised what I found, there is a LOT of activity here:

ACM - There is a very active and interesting local chapter of SIGCHI
here in Seattle.

IEEE - You'll find a wide range of local IEEE chapters, though if you're
a software person, you are probably far more interested in the local
Computer Society chapter meetings. People attending these have the
highest gadget rating of all the meetings. It’s the only place where in
return to offering up my card, the response was that they'd be happy to
"IR" theirs to me (sorry, I don’t have ANY of those fun gadgets... its
hardcopy for me, though personal business cards can be had for the price
of shipping and handling from www.vistaprint.com ... by the way, DO make
sure you have a personal business card, preferably with your three or
four strongest skills printed right there on the front along with your
name and contact info... when you meet all these people, and even your
friends, you want to give them a card. Say, why not two or three and ask
them to pass the extras along to THEIR friends).

WSA - Yeah, you probably think WSA stands for the Washington Software
Alliance. Well, it doesn't. It doesn't stand for anything. They want to
be a more general technology organization than simply Software. But,
they have lots of good meetings. Security, Software Development (usually
including an annual talk by Scott Meyers, always a treat... he's a very
entertaining speaker even if you couldn't care less for the topic, and
usually the topic is also interesting), even Wireless and Games! If
you’re a mid to senior level person, seriously consider the monthly
dinner meetings.

There are plenty of others... C++, Perl (yup, I haven't forgotten SPUG),
Extreme Programming... far more than you can even attend. So, how many
have you been to since you became unemployed? Do more.

I found a new job in roughly six months, about what my last voluntary
job search had taken. How did I find that opening? I started talking
with someone in the bar line at a WSA dinner meeting. They had heard of
an opening with some unique requirements that, even in our five minutes
of conversation, they felt I would match with well. So that person took
my card (well, at least two), and passed it along to the company with
the position. I got a phone call, and before I knew it I had a phone
interview and full interview not long after that.

Finally, I can't resist giving a friend a plug. One of the people I met
during my stretch of unemployment was like you. They gave up on their
software career. The difference, though, is that rather than wait for
their job search to bear fruit, even in non-computing jobs, they started
their own non-computing business, though with a strong high-tech twist.
They opened a hotdog stand. Well, a vegetarian hotdog stand... well, a
vegetarian hotdog joint & cyber café to be specific. The place is
Cyber-Dogs, which you'll find online at http://www.cyber-dogs.com. Go
visit them IN PERSON. Grab a dog (or something else), talk with them,
and make sure they know you are unemployed (there's a discount if you're
unemployed). You never know who you might meet. Maybe someone who is on
a job search and heard of just the perfect position for YOU.

While you're there, say hi to Tania and tell her Marc Gibian sent you.

So, that's more than I had intended to write. But, I hope some of you
find it helpful or useful. If not, then sorry for taking your time. But,
I know how hard it is to keep going when you are unemployed and things
just don't seem to be happening.

There ARE jobs out there. Jobs you are well qualified for that you will
enjoy. The trick is to get your resume READ by someone hiring for one of
them.

Feel free to contact me if you'd like to talk more or if you have
questions. There is much more I can suggest that I found helpful, but
I'm out of time for tonight.

Let us know how you make out. How many meeting did you attend last week?
This week? Next week? How many cards did you hand out?

Hang in there. We're pulling for you.

-Marc

-----Original Message-----
From: spug-list-bounces at mail.pm.org
[mailto:spug-list-bounces at mail.pm.org] On Behalf Of Chris Turan
Sent: Tuesday, July 22, 2003 7:04 PM
To: spug-list at mail.pm.org
Subject: SPUG: Giving up on computer jobs

Hi All,

I've been searching for jobs for several months now.  I've given up on
the
computer market and began looking for retail and restaurant jobs.  I've
found that many of those have been taken as well and the employers can
cherry pick who to hire.  Those jobs that aren't taken don't seem to
want
to hire me because I've over-qualified and am afriad I'll just leave
when
a good job turns up.

Has anyone had similar problems?  Any recommendations?  I'm keeping my
shoulder to the grindstone and am looking.  I was hoping someone might
have something to suggest.  I live in Bellevue and am looking mostly on
the Eastside.  I've been looking mostly in Bellevue so that if they
economic situation doesn't change, I can sell my car and still be able
to
walk to work.

Perhaps someone has some ideas I haven't considered yet.

Thanks,
-Chris






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