Job thread XXMCIV

[Provost Harrison]

Good insight Pekka, I like your four points listed in your latter post. Well if for any of the companies I am applying for I get this kind of reply without significant remuneration I will just laugh at them. I am not desperate after all, and I certainly would not accept entry-level pay with my experience. But I think the problem with these big companies (I had the same issues with my previous employer) is that you just become a number and they couldn't give a sh*t. I have, for these reason, enjoyed working for a smaller company. And hence why freelance is appealing as I can please myself, but there isn't the same level of security there on the other hand.

But yeah, I am young, free and single (although the first is dimishing) so I do have that flexibility. That has served me well recently but there will come a time when I want to be more settled. Or at least I think such a time will come, but it hasn't so far alas.

[Provost Harrison]

Well it looks like I am going to be made redundant from my current job in the next couple of weeks which sounds awful at face value but may work out very nicely for me. There are plenty of jobs in my area on the go and it may just mean a relatively short period of unemployment with a payout for the notice period they have to give (they said they'd pay me that/redundancy money but not make me work out the full 3 months). So it could be just a wad of cash in my hands and then onwards and upwards to another job. All helps with scraping together my deposit for when I buy a place.

[Pekka]

Well it looks like I am going to be made redundant from my current job in the next couple of weeks which sounds awful at face value but may work out very nicely for me. There are plenty of jobs in my area on the go and it may just mean a relatively short period of unemployment with a payout for the notice period they have to give (they said they'd pay me that/redundancy money but not make me work out the full 3 months). So it could be just a wad of cash in my hands and then onwards and upwards to another job. All helps with scraping together my deposit for when I buy a place.

One thing I've learned, and I think this would apply to you as well, as you are an expert of your field. Which is different, some people are managers, leaders, have general tools and skills that are really important and they land on their feet with them and get good jobs, for me and perhaps for PH, we have a very specific thing we do, of course we know our own field widely and would not like to think it as a narrow thing but at the end, it's still different type of thing you run with. So what I've learned is that many times when something happens, new doors open, and they just seem right and better.

And I just learned to trust more to my own instincts... if it doesn't seem right, it probably isn't. And it isn't fair for the employer either, recruiting people is difficult. So if you have a bad feeling about it, let's make it easy for everyone.

I'm now broke as hell, as I've gotten a lot of "surprise bills", and the IRS wants a lot of money from me as well. After completing these payments, I'm really really broke. Rent and food covered though, but today, I had all the energy in the world at our new office. All the guys there are just cool. We're like minded people, it's just a lot of fun and we have more people coming over next week. Get this - we have experts from other companies coming over to our place to work just for fun. They're like buddies with us anyway, but that's just the kind of thing we can do and that never really happens in other organizations when you have to sell your soul and they own you.

[rah]

All organizations suck. It's the people that make the difference. An ******* can make any environment poisonous. A good group can make any situation good.

[Provost Harrison]

That's good Pekka, I think a great environment is important to a job. I've done the same job in a sucky environment and a great environment (I am saddened to say that the sucky environment has been in my own country and the great environments have been overseas, I hope that is an anomaly) and it does make a lot of difference.

But yeah, I am an expert in my field and it is a bit of a niche, but I seem to be seeing a few jobs out there after what I have, so I shouldn't have any bother.

Well I hope you get your financial stuff sorted out, the taxman is always a blight on us all.