Jonathan's Universe

Archive for November, 2009

Some readers might be aware of my future loss of employment due to decisions made by my employer to essentially outsource what my current responsibilities are. Obviously if a third-party company is hired to do what I do, than I am no longer required to be around. Since I was made aware of this issue (not by my employer, but my hearsay and rumors of co-workers) I have been on a job hunt.

I’ve been all over the market. I really needed to stay in the technology field, specifically PHP programming. This was for the most mandatory for me. I didn’t want to go elsewhere (let’s say retail or customer service) and then lose my spark and enthusiasm for what I have loved doing for now more than half of my life. I’ve been on Monster.com, been on CareerBuilder.com. But there was one constant issue I kept running in. They all wanted a degree-holder. No if, ands or buts about it. Unfortunately, the little piece of paper signed by an accredited institution (or rather lack of it) caused many loss of opportunities. Many potential employers wouldn’t even speak to me once they found out I didn’t have a degree. It’s not like I didn’t want to go to college.. it’s just because of a certain set of circumstances, I was prohibited from doing so.

But then recently, I started to get a little lucky. I started getting calls from recruiters about job openings and I was really excited. My first interview was with the technology division of the staffing firm  Robert Halves. It was for a contracted term for one of their clients. I really wanted to be a permanent employee, but my time was running short and this could hold me over for the term of the contract. I went in and the interview went mediocre. The guy said that he wanted URLs of my projects that I’ve done for my current employer. Only problem is that 90% of the projects I’ve done are either intranet (locally accessible only) or are password protected. I never really followed up on this. Even before I went in for the interview they had me doing lots of paperwork. Tax forms, I-9 identification, even a consultant contract. I wasn’t a fan of this.

So the journey goes on. I’m really close to giving up hope. My time is running short at my employer (January 1), and I’m literally living paycheck-to-paycheck.

But then I get a call from another recruiting firm, Workbridge Associates. They told me that they were seeking a PHP developer with exactly my skill-set for a client in the Philadelphia area. I started looking into this right away and was very excited about this. I made sure they were aware I didn’t have a degree of any sort, and they told me that’s not a big deal. They were specifically looking for some at my experience level and my age bracket. Man, this is too good to be true!

I went in to the staffing agency for the interview. It was me and like four other guys on this day (there were others on the other days too). I connected really well with the president of the client company. He reaffirmed to me that they didn’t require a degree. He said his view on that is that “some programmers start early and know programming their entire life and they know just as much as a programmer who went to school to get a degree.” That is quite the truth and I am glad that an employer actually sees it that way. Okay, this is SERIOUSLY starting to be too good to be true. Everything’s melding and meshing just perfectly. I have bad luck, this can’t be happening can it?

I start calling the staffing agency every day and they give me new information about the client’s interview schedule. After about the third day, the agency tells me the client’s president really liked me and wanted to bring me back for seconds. They also liked another guy who they’d be bringing back. Not only that, but they feel 2 people aren’t enough, so they want to find at least one other guy to interview, so they hold another round of first round interviews. Now I’m starting to worry.

But here’s where stuff really starts turning against me. The public transportation system that I’d use to get to both the client and to get to the staffing agency just went on strike. Oh my god. I knew it. I have bad luck, of course it couldn’t be this easy to get a nice job. Well the good news is, a very good friend of mine took time out of his day to drive me to and from the interview. This man is my Non-Jesus personal savior!

Anyway, back to the second interviews. I made sure to schedule that I was the last on the list to get a second interview. I did this for two reason. First, my staffing agency contact could give me feedback on the other interviewees  and second, so I would be freshest in their minds when it came to decision-making time.

I went to the interview and felt like I knocked it out of the park. I was answering all the questions with the right answers. An example, “What Javascript libraries have you worked with?” my answer, “JQuery.” Their response, “That is exactly what we use.” Repeat this conversation a few times with a few different experience niches, and you have that interview. Suffice it to say, the interview went REALLY well.

But then some bad news came down the wire. I was told by my staff agency that the team that interviewed me were really excited about me and loved my resume and how I interviewed, but they had just one more interview to do. Except this interview wasn’t being done through the staffing agency. So now I’m starting to worry — this isn’t be done through the agency? My logic was that it could have been an employee looking to transfer positions or a relative of an employee. Uh ohhhhhh.

At this point, my hope dropped and the staffing agency did find me another prospective job that paid less than the initial company, but still well above what I’m making currently. They set up an appointment the next day for me to come in for an interview.

But as I am stepping on the trolley (SEPTA’s off strike at this point) I get a call back from Del, my staffing agency contact. He says “Hey, I know you’re on your way to the office for an interview with another of our clients.*dramatic pause*.. but would you be willing to cancel that interview if I give you a job offer with [prospective employer I was most hopeful about]?”

Of course, my answer was heck yes. I accepted the job where I receive a 106% salaried pay increase (relative to my current employer) and benefits. Wow, seriously? I’m a 20 year old guy making a fairly-low hourly rate at a school district, and I’m about to make a salary that many people in this economy will be envious of. Oh my God.

So essentially, that’s that. I’ve accepted a position as an associate web developer. It’s for a privately-owned company within the education sector, still I’m moving vertically. Sweet. My last day at my current employer is this coming friday, November 20, 2009. It’s going to be a sad day. I’ve spent just about every week day for 2.5 years as an employee and just about every week day for 3 years as a student. It’s going to be really tough saying goodbye, but It’s how this game goes, I guess. Many of these people have been mentors to me and I’ll likely never see them again. It’s all part of growing up, I guess.

My plans on my new salary is pretty much save, save, save. I plan to treat myself to new things very rarely. The only thing I can see treating myself to is the Droid phone that just came out, but that won’t be until my T-Mobile contract expires in march, so there’s still some time for that. I want to save up for a car so I can stop having 1-hour-eachway commutes to my new job, and change to 20-minute-each-way commutes. Additionally, I do want to start going to school next semester. I want to go to night classes at a local college and get my associates degree.

My career will have officially started as a web developer on Monday, November 23rd, 2009. I’m excited.