What do you do?
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Heylel
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So I'm slated to talk with a recruiter tomorrow for regional tech jobs. This is very, very new to me. I've been in the same place for a while, and prior to that I haven't been in a job that used recruiters as a placement tool.
What should I be looking for here? I honestly reached out to him purely as a way of gaining some information.
What should I be looking for here? I honestly reached out to him purely as a way of gaining some information.
Depends on what your motivations are for looking for a different job. More money? Growth opportunity? Commute? New place to live? New challenges?
Heylel
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Money, financial stability while my wife starts a PhD, growth, new challenges. All of the above really, but those are the ones you listed that matter most.
I'm bored and feeling like I am reaching a ceiling where my choices are either move into industry/consulting, or get a PhD myself to open a few other funding sources. However, I am less committed to public sector research than my wife, for whom a PhD has always been inevitable. I just don't want to be on soft money while she's in school. That's a lot of financial risk for us.
I'm bored and feeling like I am reaching a ceiling where my choices are either move into industry/consulting, or get a PhD myself to open a few other funding sources. However, I am less committed to public sector research than my wife, for whom a PhD has always been inevitable. I just don't want to be on soft money while she's in school. That's a lot of financial risk for us.
Borzak
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Did some more interviews this morning. Taking the afternoon to clear my brain.
During an interview do you ask much about the company? So far only one person has really asked other than "What do you do/build here". Even when I was a peon at the very bottom I always asked questions about what they do of course, but what projects they are on/hope to get on, what common problems they encounter etc...
In my last two jobs I asked how much debt the company had and if they outright owned their equipment. I got straight answers both times and both times they seemed appreciative of the fact I asked (both were zero debt) and they seemed proud of that.
I guess I'm odd man out or something. I'd like to get some conversations going other than "I can start Monday". My last interview lasted 4 hours (part of that was a lunch) a shop tour and meeting some other people in the office, not including meeting him during the holidays for another 3 hours. I've never had a job interview outside of high school that didn't include a meal to sit down and talk. I was really open to taking some of these guys/gals out for a meal to "talk" but they really didn't seem open to the idea. Being from LA you can't order printer paper without having a meal to discuss it lol.
During an interview do you ask much about the company? So far only one person has really asked other than "What do you do/build here". Even when I was a peon at the very bottom I always asked questions about what they do of course, but what projects they are on/hope to get on, what common problems they encounter etc...
In my last two jobs I asked how much debt the company had and if they outright owned their equipment. I got straight answers both times and both times they seemed appreciative of the fact I asked (both were zero debt) and they seemed proud of that.
I guess I'm odd man out or something. I'd like to get some conversations going other than "I can start Monday". My last interview lasted 4 hours (part of that was a lunch) a shop tour and meeting some other people in the office, not including meeting him during the holidays for another 3 hours. I've never had a job interview outside of high school that didn't include a meal to sit down and talk. I was really open to taking some of these guys/gals out for a meal to "talk" but they really didn't seem open to the idea. Being from LA you can't order printer paper without having a meal to discuss it lol.
Heylel
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That's incredibly foolish. One of the most positive psychological bonding experiences we have as human beings is eating together. It's one of many reasons why "never eat lunch alone" is such common career advice.
Recruiter call never materialized. We confirmed a time after he had a chance to review my resume, but then I never heard anything. I sent a follow up in case he was expecting me to initiate the phone call, but that seems like it would have been really weird.
In other news, I've seen enough job postings now demanding a portfolio for research work that I'm starting to build one. It makes no goddamn sense why a non-visual profession needs a work portfolio, but I keep seeing it everywhere.
Recruiter call never materialized. We confirmed a time after he had a chance to review my resume, but then I never heard anything. I sent a follow up in case he was expecting me to initiate the phone call, but that seems like it would have been really weird.
In other news, I've seen enough job postings now demanding a portfolio for research work that I'm starting to build one. It makes no goddamn sense why a non-visual profession needs a work portfolio, but I keep seeing it everywhere.
Noodleface
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Is "never eat lunch alone" really a thing?
Now I feel weird because I eat lunch in my cube as I don't really want to sit in the cafeteria. Am I neutering my career?
Now I feel weird because I eat lunch in my cube as I don't really want to sit in the cafeteria. Am I neutering my career?
I can't imagine asking "what do you do here?" or any variant of that. I will either know ahead of time in full detail or I will pick up as much as I can from the interview/tour.
I always do ask what my day will look like and what I can bring to the table to move the company forward.
Turn down any meal? Not on my life. I know how to hold a fork though and order sensibly and eat with my mouth closed, some people might be worried they can't eat in a professional setting.
Heylel
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I do it all the time, and I've been told my several people it's a bad idea. Lunch is your #1 networking opportunity every single day. If any of my project partners were actually in the building with me, or even on the same campus, then I'd be more likely to schedule lunch meetings.
Noodleface
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I do lunch meetings and stuff all the time, and I go out on group lunches - I just prefer not to sit at a cafeteria table. I like to browse reddit or rerolled while i'm eating in peace as well.
Now that I think of it only me and the other weird guy that's worked here 15 years do this.
Asshat wormie
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My wife for years refused to eat alone. It took almost a decade of ridicule by me to change her mind.
Borzak
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Fork lol. I'm not talking a great fancy meal. Many times in the past we would go eat a po-boy at the greasiest place in town (with the best po-boys) and just talk or whatever. We're a small office, I have to make sure you will fit in and not be on a crusade to put oil companies out of business like one person I interviewed who wouldn't stop talking about the evils of oil and coal. Ummm that's our two biggest customers. NEXT.
Well they would know we are a fabricator but not really what we are working on, petro chemical, only in refineries, or power plant work etc...Hopefully they know enough to google us and find out we don't do commercial which doesn't pay squat.
Right now I think the right answer would be "talk to idiots who submit a resume".
Borzak
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I had plans of talking and getting to know them a little outside the office. We're pretty laid back and no BS. Normally what I have always done is talk about my background then we BS about people/companies in the same industry we know and/or similar projects then just BS some more about what they are trying to accomplish then go eat.
I never got to the "go eat" part.
I eat alone about 1 day a week and on Fridays we don't work that long. The rest I eat out with someone else from the office. Normally the VP or operations which basically runs the place. Work really doesn't come up a lot.
Just like a kick off meeting, face time. Put a face with an email and work goes much better/faster/easier in my experience.
Borzak
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At my former work most of us in the office ate together, the boss ordered out lunch and paid for it everyday or you could bring your own. I was out of the office 2 days a week at least and just stopped and ate and the boss reimbursed me for it.
Mainly they/we talked about the boss since he wasn't in there eating with us.
But in south LA it's hard to conduct real business without a meal even if you order po-boys for the office and have one there. Apparently it's the same in TX because the 2 jobs I interviewed in TX they took me to lunch and they weren't upper management jobs. The job I have now was a $70k job as a PM. That's what I interviewed for.
Mainly they/we talked about the boss since he wasn't in there eating with us.
But in south LA it's hard to conduct real business without a meal even if you order po-boys for the office and have one there. Apparently it's the same in TX because the 2 jobs I interviewed in TX they took me to lunch and they weren't upper management jobs. The job I have now was a $70k job as a PM. That's what I interviewed for.
Cad
scientia potentia est
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I don't really like eating out but I go eat out with co-workers maybe twice a week. It's a good bonding time. I also go out to eat with people from other firms just to meet folks and network. It's good. But god damn it it is a waste of time, money, and makes you fat.
Eomer
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It totally depends on what you do specifically, what industry you're in, what your goals are, etc. I eat 80% of my lunches alone, just grabbing Subway or whatever. Otherwise most of the lunches I do with business associates are people taking me out for lunch, because they're trying to sell me something or do business with me and fuck it I may as well eat a free meal. Rib eye please. I could eat out every day and golf once a week with someone trying to blow me if I wanted to. Both my brother and I do not go out of our way to wine and dine developers, general contractors and so on (the people that we work for). Yet magically the work keeps coming. On the other hand, my two uncles who own nearly identical businesses, spend 50% of their time wining and dining clients. All of us do about the same, as far as I know, and if anything my bro and I have the most profitable business.
Do you have to be constantly networking to get ahead? No, absolutely not. But you never know when some chance meeting or someone's recollection of a pleasant lunch could turn in to a huge opportunity.
Heylel
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It's all of those things, but eating with another human being is just one of those things that makes you more inclined to like them. It's like the old trick about asking someone for a small favor to make them more positively inclined towards you. Doesn't work all the time, but it leverages ingrained group behavior.
Borzak
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Not a fan of recruiters. I guess it varies by the industry and the recruiter. The ones that have contacted me in the past ask dumb ass questions like "They said they need someone with petro chemical experience, do you have any". No fucking Exxon is not in the petro chemical business and neither is Dow, BASF, etc....One last told me she didn't know what petro chemical was.
The last job I talked to a recruiter on they didn't know either. After I talked to them I printed out my resume and sent it via snail mail. It didn't take 5 seconds to figure out which company it was when she named the town of 20,000 lol. I got a call from the president of the company saying he got the resume and we talked for about 2 hours. By the time I started they had ended their dealings with that company. They never got my resume thru the recruiter they were dealing with.
Borzak
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I guess I'm lucky. When my boss gets to work at 7am the first thing he ask is "where are we going to lunch today". He's told me several times he starts thinking of lunch when he drives to work. He's not fat (and neither am I) and he's in very good shape.
I got tickled when we took the IT guy I finally fired and he told me he was picking a place I had never heard of. Cane's chicken. Umm OK. I ate at the original in BR for years and drew many of them when they were first starting out. How have you not heard of Cane's in 2015? The other guy who went laughed since his wife is also from BR. Moron.
For years I only did contract work with a few shops. Every time I went down there to pick up drawings (pre internet days for the most part) once a month it was take someone out to lunch. Nothing fancy, just a quick meal.
My dad did the same. The general manager of where he retired (he worked "full time" for one company at home but was allowed to do side work as well) told me "Your dad will drive 100 miles for a free hamburger". Truth to that.
I got tickled when we took the IT guy I finally fired and he told me he was picking a place I had never heard of. Cane's chicken. Umm OK. I ate at the original in BR for years and drew many of them when they were first starting out. How have you not heard of Cane's in 2015? The other guy who went laughed since his wife is also from BR. Moron.
For years I only did contract work with a few shops. Every time I went down there to pick up drawings (pre internet days for the most part) once a month it was take someone out to lunch. Nothing fancy, just a quick meal.
My dad did the same. The general manager of where he retired (he worked "full time" for one company at home but was allowed to do side work as well) told me "Your dad will drive 100 miles for a free hamburger". Truth to that.