I haven't updated on my job search progress, so here goes. As you all know finding a good job is a tedious process.
When I arrived in Australia I started travelling, when in Brisbane I decided to look on Monster.com.au to see if there were any good jobs in Sydney (where we were heading). I found one and applied for it. A few days later I had a phone interview and a few days after that i had the job… simple as that.. eezy peezy.
Now for some reason I was under the impression that that is how easy it was going to be when I settled in England… No Sir.
I have been searching all manner of websites/printed press and job centers looking for appealing jobs. There aren't many I can tell you. Most of them want .NET and C# and ASP.NET, which I could learn in a few days no doubt, but I don't want to. It's not what I would like to be doing in the future. I applied for a few anyway but of course it was mainly recruitment agencies that had advertised and as such either the advert was bogus (they do this just to get people on their books) or the job just never seems to materialise — quoting restructuring in company resulted in not needing any more staff.. A whole load of BS if you ask me and recruitment companies are not worth a flying donut.-[ If they did eventually get their act together and offer me a job, I probably would take it.. I never was one to stick to my beliefs].
I have applied for a couple of Graduate schemes as I see them as hugely beneficial to graduates wanting to start off as they introduce you to all the facets of the software/application development world. I was successful up to the 3rd round (3 of 4) with a company called Atos Origin. Pretty good company but I was interviewed by a HR person, something I had not adequately prepared for. They were looking for the elite.. It seemed I fit that mold technically but my interpersonal skills were lacking :(.
"An excellent level of customer
focus and interpersonal skills are key competencies in our recruitment
process and, while you did interview quite well and show some evidence of
this, we have very high standards and we have a lot of very high calibre
candidates who apply to us. Unfortunately in comparision to other
candidates, you did not quite meet the standard. "
That was a bit of a kick in the goolies but I have learned. I realised that you got to talk the talk when talking to HR and non technical folk. I bought a few recommended books and have started studying them in anticipation of more interview – I am awaiting response from BAE Systems.
The books I bought were " Programming Interviews Exposed" and " How would you move Mount Fuji?". They are really good reads and well worth it.
Yesterday though I had an interview with rippleffect.com which I knew little about but upon completing the interview I was extremely impressed and definitely want to work there. The pay is a little lower than that of a graduate scheme but I think working on something you enjoy and are challenged constantly by is worth the difference in salary ten fold. That previous conclusion was a difficult one to come to but I know in my self that I am happiest when I am doing something that I enjoy and especially when I am learning new things about something that I enjoy. I am waiting to hear from rippleffect so fingers crossed.
A good buddy of mine from Uni managed to get me some work on a project he is working on. It's a cool project using SVG and PHP. It'll tide me over hopefully untill I get something more permanent. Anyway in summation, I reckon doing something you enjoy is worth more than a bigger salary. Sya. When I bought the above books I also bought Jeffrey Zeldman's " Designing with web standards"
My Grandad (85) has just gone into hospital again with a massive heart attack. They are shocked that he is still with us. Must be the viking coming through in him I suppose. Anyway, this is probably his first mention online.