Apparently no decision has been made on the job I interviewed for last week, people were out of town, etc., so it may still be alive. And now, the question becomes: If they do make me an offer, "WHAT DO I DOOOO????"
I think it will all come down to money. (Doesn't everything?) If they pay me what I asked for and don't try to lowball me, it would otherwise be a very good opportunity. A job of this caliber is damn hard to find in this or any market, and the reality is that I could move to the DC area and not find anything this unique, and I would still have a long commute. So we shall see if 1) they make an offer; and 2) if they are willing to pay the perfectly reasonable salary I have requested. I know I'm not asking for the moon here, so we shall just wait and see.
I spent the morning at the mandatory job search assistance session required by unemployment. It was quite depressing to look around the room at all the silver-haired executive types who are out of work, and still more depressing to realize that but for the hair dye, I'm one of them. 95% of the presentation was as I expected - they walked us through the online tools I'd already discovered on my own, and didn't have anything very helpful to say about the market. They do offer some useful (and free) job search assistance, and I was pleasantly surprised that they did have a couple of services I will use. Like, I need to take my resume down a notch or two - that sounds awful, but I mean I need to take what I have done and craft it to show more general, less industry-specific useful experience and skills. I can keep the current versions for the very few jobs for which they would be appropriate, but do a rewrite that would be useful if I broaden my job search into many different fields, so I will ask for their assistance with that task.
Being unemployed is damn hard work.
It always comes down to money. In my previous job I was searching as a new boss was making my life a living hell. I found another job in the field with fantastic benifts - it was a great fit. They were asking for a ton from me but it sounded unique and challenging. Then they offered me the job and I about choked on the salary they gave me. No way in hell. It was less than what I was making already and they were asking me to take on a ton more work. Ha! About 2 months later I landed my current dream job. Which required a move but included a doubling of my income.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I have in the past taken a signifigant pay cut to escape a horribly stressful situation. Sometimes money isn't worth the crap that comes with it.
I'll wait and see if they offer me the job, whether I will choke at the salary. The HR guy has already tried to lower my expectations, and I did come down because I'm not an idiot and I know the market does suck, but I am already at rock bottom, lower than this and it makes no sense.
ReplyDeleteI just sat through a presentation where the presenter was showing us job options on their online service, and said, "$14 an hour - that's actually a GOOD salary!" You can imagine how the gray hairs in the room felt.
They must have felt horrible. $14 an hour is pathetic. It's approx $26,880 per annum, which is actually a little less than double the poverty level income for one person. The working poor make roughly $8.13 an hour.
ReplyDeleteWe can all hope that they make an offer you can live with until the house sells and you find a nice little apartment to regroup in. We've been through three down-sizings and none of them pretty. May all things go well for you Catherine from now on.
I had a piece of advice from a colleague with 30 years of experience in a very specific field (oil & gas joint interest billing). Her very good resume was getting no bites until she scaled back her "30 years experience" to "over ten years experience". Age discrimination or fear or a too high salary requirement? Dunno, but the change brought her lots of action and a job. Good luck on your search.
ReplyDeleteI have three or four variations of my resume on my computer (or did, till they went somewhere). It's very handy. You see a job you want to try for, and then go fiddle with one of the existing resumes. It would probably work great if I lived somewhere else.
ReplyDeleteI have two variations of my resume, but both are chronological because that is what every employer I've dealt with wanted. In the paralegal world "job hopping" is the sin that is on everybody's resume, because you can't make more money unless you hop a bit, so they do look for it. I am not sure how I can shift it to a different format to conceal "Damn, she's Old and Expensive!" and also flex it to cover jobs outside the legal world. I will throw this on the nice people at the employment office - they did seem bright and personable, and if nothing else, I will have the satisfaction of stumping them. :-)
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