Tuesday 8 May 2007

"Only connect", Howards End, E M Forster

I have to admit it.
Nothing is cooking in my kitchen.
My boat is not afloat.
My flag is not up the flagpole though I am going to see the doctor about that.
After nearly eight weeks of unemployment there is no end in sight so I thought it would a good time to have a review of what I've done and how effective it has been. And with no end in sight the result would seem to be self-evident.
Goodbye.

Sorry there is more. I have been following the "get a new job recipe". There are a number of steps to take to getting new employment though I don't recall being taught this in school. All we were taught was Latin and, frankly, there is not much call for that around here though there is quite a lot of Anglo Saxon being used down the road as workmen repair a traffic light that was knocked down a few days ago.
It's a bit like the movie "Battle of Britain" where the Luftwaffe is throwing all its might against little besieged Britain on that decisive day in the second world war. The wing commander strides into the RAF Ops room where all the WAAFS are pushing those little corks with flags around the planning table like some demented Ouija board game. Taking his pipe out of his mouth he asks grimly "What are our fighter reserves?". "None Sir" replies a pert WAAF, "they are all up in the air". I feel like that with my job search at the moment. I've done all that I can. I have no reserves.
This is what I have done - points are awarded out of 10 for effectiveness.

On-line jobs. I have been auto-emailed hundreds of on-line jobs that "closely fit your criteria". Well the computers must be dyslexic then because they don't and that includes the intern job in Orange County Fla. and the other post in Ontario - a bit of a commute I'd say. If you are in IT or finance sales and you have, dare I say, relatively modest salary aspirations then these sites might conceivably work for you. They really don't work for me so as a tool for finding a new job I give them 1 point. For being unbearably perky and full of garish colours I give them full marks but don't rely on them for the job of your dreams (or nightmares come to that because they probably couldn't match the criteria for that either).

Friends and relatives. I've told everyone who will listen - the milkman, the local builder, the man who cuts my hair - you name them I've told them. People scuttle past on the other side of the road now with their coat collars turned up - a bit of a giveaway on a hot May day - to avoid being told. It's a bit like the so called witches house in the neighbourhood. "Dare you to knock on the door!" "NO - he might tell me how long he's being looking for work and it will bore me to death". Of course there is a natural compassion fatigue so others must go on and live their lives and deal with their problems and it becomes a much lesser issue for everyone. But I know where they live. For finding a new job - 1 point but you never know...

Emailing ex-colleagues and other work related contacts. No response whatsoever. My emails must be directed straight into junk mail. I have become invisible, a reminder that redundancy might taint them. Finding a new job, 0 points.

CV on the web. Yes it's there, nestling away in a tiny corner of the web with all its meta-tags snuggled up to it. And no I didn't really expect to get a job through it. It's more of a short cut to giving prospective employers a taste of just what they'd get with ME. I use it to point people at if if they say "Well, what do you do actually?". Finding a job 0 points, but part of the armoury.

Business cards. This was a recommendation from the States and who am I to ignore the sage knowledge of a guru in San Francisco? I found a web site that prints business cards for free. Yes free, all 250 of them. So I've now got some plain cards with my contact details and web URL to press into people's hands (they are just lucky I didn't order the 25 free fridge magnets as well). The plan is...well you know the plan. This is part of the "remember me" bit. Well it's free got to be worth a try. Points - 0 so far.

National newspapers. Good grief there are a lot of jobs churning around in the economy. Us job seekers know 'cos we look at every Anglo Saxon one. I've applied for three. One interview and subsequent rejection. Two outright rejections. The thing is, the one I was interviewed for was a "oh what the hell I'll send in a standard CV" via the web and one of the ones I had a straight rejection for was a carefully nuanced, weighed, strategically written CV based on every possible competence that they required. I was a perfect match. And I still got rejected because "they had a candidate that more closely matched their requirements." HOW? Did they make the candidate out of spare parts like Frankenstein's monster? Did they use a serif font and I used a sans serif? Did they use a slightly heavier paper for their CV? Did they want a signature in blue ink and not black biro? Once I had stopped sulking after the rejection (about three days) rationale took over and I realised that replying to ads in the newspapers is incredibly competitive, that there will be hundreds of candidates and, sad to say, there really is a candidate that more closely matches their requirements. Or they are mad. As a method for finding a new job 4 points, but the odds are massively stacked against you. Of course someone must be successful, just isn't me.

Networking. Well I've been unemployed for nearly eight weeks. Except that I haven't, because I've been working for six weeks with a part time job that I found, yes you guessed it, through a network. By using some contacts that I had actually kept up with for years, I found an unadvertised job. "Do you" they asked "have any experience with quantum physics, penguins and jacquard looms?" "I'm your man" I shouted 'for I have just woven an Emperor penguin and placed it in Schrödinger's box along with his cat." So I have a job for the next month or two at least (three days a week). And I met the Emperor Ming from Star sec 5/16 last week. OK, actually the MD of a large Group in the Middle East who may (emphasis on may) have some part time work sometime. Yes I know that is vague but I'm clinging onto straws here. Anyway the point is I got to meet him through a connection - another unadvertised post. So for finding a job I award networking 8 points.

Conclusion. So the award for the most effective way to find a new job so far goes to - networking. So why haven't I been networking like mad for the last seven years preparing for this very time? Because you are stupid I hear you say. And you are probably right. All the other things I have done may have had a teeny weeny impact but the only action that has even got me some work is networking. I suppose it's like advertising really "50% works - except we don't know which 50%".

Eight weeks. I wonder how many more? I have no more reserves. But then you only fail when you give up and I haven't done that by a long way.


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