Riding the Mobius

Bigger Bullets to Help With Your Job Hunt

2009-01-20T00:16:00.000-08:00

It’s no secret that the job market is brutal right now; at the start of 2009, the economy is the worst that it’s been in decades, and there don’t seem to be enough jobs to go around. Given the state of things, standing out from the sea of job applicants is more important than ever. Here are a few things to consider when you’re searching for a new job, especially if you’re a recent graduate or are changing fields.

Think about your online presence and how it will look to potential employers. Considering how connected (and in some cases, over-connected) today’s college students are, this one is a primary area of concern. Sure, social networking is fun and can be really useful, but think about what you’re actually putting out on the Net for anyone to see. Do you think it’s going to help you land a job if the HR manager you just visited finds pictures of you on Facebook or MySpace doing a naked keg stand or lying face-down passed out in a pool of your own vomit? Do your Twitter followers need to know that your toilet is clogged? I suppose it might depend on the job for which you’re applying, but my guess is that you’re not going to get an offer with that sort of stuff floating around in the digital ether. Take a good look at what you have out there on the Net and get rid of anything that might hinder your success. You might be surprised at what a quick Google search of your name will reveal.

It’s both what you know and who you know, so network intelligently. Sometimes being the smartest person in the room isn’t enough, especially if nobody else knows it. Despite what I just said about Facebook, MySpace, etc., they can be very powerful tools to get in touch with the kinds of people that you want to know and emulate. Remember, digital relationships can prove every bit as useful and powerful as those in the so-called “real world,” so take care to manage them appropriately and with respect; you never know where your next opportunity is going to come from.

Take all the help you can get from anyone who offers, but be wary of paying for it. Most, if not all, colleges have a career services department, which may offer placement assistance, internships, résumé editing, etc.; many will even provide these services long after you graduate, so use them. There are also plenty of commercial services that promise to help you get a job if you pay them a membership fee, but you should carefully consider if they’re offering you a service worth paying for. There are oodles of job boards on the Net, and you should take a crack at them before you start paying someone to look for you.

Job seekers are products, so pay attention to your packaging. Courting a new employer is almost like dating, where first impressions go a long way, and you need to think about what you’re saying without speaking. Do you have a professional-sounding email address? If you’re still using the same address you created when you were a teenager, chances are you should change it. Consider buying your own domain on the Net, which will allow you to create your own email address; it’s cheaper than most people think, and it will also give you a place to create, develop, and maintain your own personal brand. It doesn’t need to be fancy, but it should be professional.

Know your limitations and seek the help necessary to transcend them. Does your résumé sound like it was written by a second-grader? Ask a literate friend to help you, or hire a professional writer to write it for you. I’ve always been a writer, so I’m OK with that sort of thing, but I make sure I hire someone to do my taxes every year, take my car to a reputable garage when something’s amiss, and visit the dentist every few months. We all have a part to play, so do your best to play well with others.

Finally, and most importantly, be tenacious and don't get discouraged. It’s tough to get the job that you really want, especially now, but make getting that job your main focus until you get it. That often means spending hours writing the perfect cover letter, tweaking and re-tweaking your résumé, making follow-up phone calls, and countless other things that you’d probably rather not be doing. Remember, you’re not the only one who wants a particular job, and other applicants may be going after your ideal job with both guns blazing.

Good luck to you all, and here’s to a happy and prosperous year for everyone. Visit me on the web at www.jasondtremblay.com, and on Twitter at JasonDTremblay.

Wachovia and Wells Fargo Have Destroyed My Fiancee's Career Without Mercy

2009-01-14T16:08:00.000-08:00

Let me begin by saying that I am beyond angry. Livid. Enraged. Furious. These words don't even begin to describe how I feel about this situation, largely because of the fact that it adds yet another layer of uncertainty to the super-sized, high-calorie Desperation Sandwich that my fiancee and I are being force-fed lately.

My fiancee, Steph, has been employed by Wachovia (and its pre-merger variants) for over ten years. She's been the top performer in her department for the majority of those years, earning awards and a decent paycheck for her loyal efforts. The problem that she now finds herself faced with is the impending acquisition of Wachovia by Wells Fargo, a company that has no need for her specific job. This is unremarkable in itself, as the proof operator job that she performs has apparently been replaced due to advances in technology.

The real rub comes from the situation that has been foisted upon her, as well as everyone else in her department, in which they have been forced to choose between accepting jobs which, in my fiancee's case, will result in a pay decrease of approximately 50%, or becoming unemployed.

In a nutshell, she's been earning a modest hourly rate which is supplemented by a performance incentive based on her hourly productivity, similar to sales commissions that a car salesman might earn. Since she was so efficient, her incentive pay made up a significant portion of her earnings. The new job she'd be offered will only be paid a low hourly wage with no incentives.

Since the deal was sealed, the higher-ups have been promising Steph that she would get a reasonable severance package since her pay would be so drastically reduced by this new position and pay scale if she didn't want to take such a large step down. Having been through several mergers during my employment history, I was quietly confident that this wouldn't actually happen, since new owners don't ever care a whit for employees of the company being absorbed, and companies aren't in the habit of doling out large sums of money to employees who are leaving, regardless of why, but I had hoped that maybe she would be taken care of in some reasonable fashion.

Recently, I'm afraid that I've been proven correct. She was informed by the aforementioned higher-ups last night that she will, in fact, NOT be eligible for severance because the difference between her current base rate of pay and what she would be making at this new position is not greater than 15%, as Wells Fargo refuses to acknowledge the large portion of her earnings that come from the incentive program that has been in place for years.

Though it should be obvious, let me point out that it is unconscionable that employees should be expected to eat a 15% reduction in pay, a reduction in benefits, and a less desirable schedule if they want to keep a job that they've had for a decade or longer. Loyalty is rewarded with a kick in the teeth and the warning that you should be grateful for it. I suppose one could argue that Wells Fargo has no obligation, moral or otherwise, to people who are just joining their company, and perhaps this is correct; the culpability, and abject failure in protecting its loyal employees, belongs to Wachovia, who, despite their desperation thanks to their own inept management, should have made provisions in the deal to protect employees.

This is made all the more infuriating by the fact that this is a banking job, and America has just footed a bill to the tune of over $700 BILLION to help the banks, and I haven't seen one bit of good come to anyone but the banks from it so far. It's still hard to get credit, and I've even seen a reduction in previously available credit for no reason whatsoever. Instead, it seems like the banks are taking that money and sitting on it, saving for the rainier days that are almost surely ahead.

But back to the problem at hand... What are we to do about this situation? We haven't quite decided yet, since it seems that the policies being implemented in this deal are constantly in flux, as they always tend to be in situations like this. I'll tell you what we're not going to do: roll over and take whatever pittance Wells Fargo deigns to give the employees who have toiled at their jobs for years, renegging on the promises that were made to the faithful.

Steph isn't the only one being wronged in her department, though she'll feel it the most monetarily. I'm already researching legal remedies for this unacceptable situation, and I think there are plenty of lawyers who would enjoy a small class-action lawsuit to get American workers what they deserve, if only for the publicity of taking on a bank that has almost certainly benefitted from a bailout that most of us didn't feel great about in the first place.

Wachovia and Wells Fargo: do what's right, and save everyone a lot of time and heartache. You might even save yourselves some money.

Think we're bluffing? Try us.

Windows 7 Beta, Vista's Curse, and XP's Safe Harbor

2009-01-13T11:41:00.000-08:00

I am a technophile, there's no question about that. If there's a new gadget or super-cool new software on the horizon, there's a good chance that I know about it, lust for it, and am plotting how I will acquire it. Sometimes this "early adopter" mentality is OK, even if it's generally really expensive, as long as the item in question succeeds and is supported for a good time to come. My first CD player, for example, purchased when I was 15, was a single-disc Sony behemoth for which I paid $199.99; almost 20 years later, that player is long gone, but I'm still buying CDs. The same could be said for my first DVD player, which was a $299.99 (or maybe $399.99, I don't exactly remember) Panasonic single-disc player, also long gone.

Of course, things don't always work out so well. Want to buy a Sony Mini-Disc player (home component or discman version)? How about a Toshiba HD-DVD player and about 15 movies? I can give you a good deal on either of these ill-supported failed technologies for which I paid top dollar...

The point, I guess, is that I'm predisposed to jumping head-first into new technology and hoping for the best. This presents a bit of a dilemma at present, because I'm now doing my best to resist the siren song of installing the new Windows 7 beta on one of my PCs for a few reasons.

My trusty desktop, which is a very dependable, somewhat updated and reconfigured VPR Matrix (a short-lived Best Buy house brand, if I'm not mistaken), has been running Windows XP since it was born at least five years ago. I've changed the guts around a few times, added and removed probably at least 100 applications, and generally put this machine through the paces for a long time now. I'm not really keen on the idea of messing with success, especially with a beta release, so I think that idea is out.

My laptop, a Toshiba Satellite, was purchased a few months after Vista was released, and I hated Vista from the moment I powered up for the first time. Sure, it looked pretty in a cute-but-not-really-sexy sort of way, but I wasn't really impressed by anything it did to really enhance my user experience. To make matters worse, the first few days of use were spent trying to figure out how to disable all of the frequent and oh-so-annoying pop-ups. I think Microsoft could have saved themselves a lot of ill will if they'd simply asked if you were an expert user or someone who needed to be protected from yourself, and adjusted the security settings accordingly.

Anyway, I've had this laptop for about a year and a half now, and once I got past the super-annoying setup, Vista really hasn't been that bad. You get used to some of the things that seemed weird after being used to XP, and Vista has been reasonably stable for me, and I'm something of a power user. I will admit that the startup/shutdown times are truly awful, especially when I was trying to run it on my Centrino Duo with only the factory-installed 2GB of RAM. Once I bumped up to 4GB of RAM, things went much faster, but still take a lot longer than my XP desktop, which is only a single core 3.06Ghz Pentium 4 with 2GB of RAM.

Since my desktop is a safe haven, the real question is whether or not I should take the plunge and nuke Vista out of my laptop, which is something that I've dreamed of doing since getting the thing; if I'd been presented the option of downgrading the laptop to XP for free, I would have jumped on it. The problem with rolling the dice on a beta version of Windows 7 is that I presently use the laptop to earn my living as a mobile DJ, and I can't have an unstable or incompatible OS mucking things up while I'm trying to throw down my DJ mojo in the middle of a party or club night with 400 guests. Virtual DJ, which is by far the best affordable pro DJ software out there, runs reasonably well on Vista, and that's fine with me. It seems like Microsoft doesn't get even most of the problems out of an OS until at least the first service pack, let alone a beta release, so I don't think it'd be a wise move to try it out just yet, despite my strong desire to do so.

Has anyone else tried it out yet? I'd be interested to hear how it's working out for you.

Rest In Peace, Electronic Gaming Monthly

2009-01-07T09:30:00.000-08:00

Since I've recently begun to succumb to the whole Twitter phenomenon, I've gotten a few useful tidbits of information from the select few people who I follow. One of these is Larry Herb, a.k.a. Xbox Live's Major Nelson, who is a fairly prolific communicator of all things nerd. Thanks to the Major, and later in greater detail from Gamespot, I got a shocking bit of news before I could even have my first cup of coffee this morning: Electronic Gaming Monthly is no more.

Apparently, EGM's parent company has been acquired by a company called UGO Entertainment, which doesn't seem to care that EGM has been the premier gaming magazine for almost 20 years. For almost as long as I can remember, I've wanted to write professionally for this magazine; the motivation to do this was one of the main factors in my decision to return to college to finish my B.A., which I completed this past May. Thanks in part to EGM, I'm now a college graduate. Thanks entirely to UGO Entertainment, I'm now a college graduate with a smashed dream of writing for a gaming print magazine.

While the news is still too new to have many details floating around, I'm going to guess that the main argument for this tragic news will be that Internet gaming sites have rendered print gaming mags obsolete. Indeed, the Net has been eroding traditional print media audiences for years now due to the convenience, low cost, and agility of "virtual" media; being a technophile in the extreme, I can absolutely see this, and in most cases, embrace it. The problem with this, however, is that any d-bag with a little HTML knowledge and a basic command of language can put whatever they want on the Net (look at me, for example), while publishing a magazine like EGM (last reported total copies printed per issue: 780,711; previous year: 806,791) requires a serious amount of money, time, and effort, which theoretically should lead to a higher quality publication to ensure a sound return on the company's investment. Print mags still command greater respect than web sites, at least for the time being, and as the videogame industry seems on the cusp of gaining the popular respect that it has so long deserved, the death of its premier print magazine is all the more unfortunate.

On a more selfish note, that also means a few dozen more writers with professional experience and contacts who are looking for jobs in the same field as me during the worst time in decades to do so. Thanks again, UGO!

Seriously, though... Thanks to everyone at EGM for years of great coverage in my favorite industry. You will be sorely missed. Good luck to you all.

Salutations and Warnings

2009-01-06T16:08:00.000-08:00

Hi there, Internet...

It's me, Jason. Yeah, I know... For a writer, I'm terrible at keeping up with blogs and correspondence in general. Truth be told, this is yet another blog that will compete with several others that are strewn about you for my attentions. That said, Internet, I just want you to know that it's nothing personal; I'm just a man of many divided attentions, not the least of which is an increasingly manic focus on finding gainful post-graduate employment in an abysmal economy.

You see, Internet, I spent the last three years finally finishing the degree I started back in 1992, only to graduate at the worst time since the Great Depression, and now nobody seems to care that I earned my B.A. in Professional Writing from the Penn State Schreyer Honors College, or that I graduated with honors and a 3.81 GPA. Indeed, the general hiring population seems indifferent to the fact that I have layout experience, know Adobe Creative Suite inside and out, that I can do audio production, and a host of other things besides write better than most English-speaking humans. No, Internet... Graduation hasn't quite yielded the bounty of riches that I had anticipated, so I guess I'll just keep casting my talents thither and yon (though mostly yon, because it's easier to spell) until someone realizes that I'm simply dripping with Awesome Sauce and decides to give me a chance to kick some ass for them.

Internet, you know I love you, but just in case you don't, let me put it to you in a way that you'll understand:

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01000110010100100000011011110110111000100000011011110111010101110010001000
00011011000110111101110110011001010010000100100000010000100110010101100111
011011110110111001100101001011000010000001101110011001010111001001100100001
0000100100000010100000111001001101111011100000111001100100000011001100110
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10110111001100111001000000111010001101111001000000110010001100101011000110
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With that, I leave you, Internet (and any humans who happen to be reading this), with the promise that I'll at least try to try to write an interesting blog forthwith.