Like a few other people on this forum, I've just come through my longest period on the bench since starting contracting 10 years ago. In fact, previously, I had only had one 4-week period without a contract in all that time. This time... three and a half months (albeit, with Xmas in the middle).
Yesterday, I hit the most bizarre jackpot... three job interviews - three immediate offers. This after months of endless calls, failed interviews, treks across the country, maddening demands for one little skill which I happened not to have, and "there was another guy who was just a bit better than you" (I so nearly went and bought a sniper rifle so I could take out that mysterious other guy).
Anyway, some observations:
1. This is the first time I've had extensive and long drawn-out dealings with agents and, on the basis of this experience, I have a lot of respect for a lot of those agents. In the past it's just been a case of them getting my CV, bunging it at the client, organising an interview and issuing the contract. This time, with the competition so extreme, I had agents feeding me every bit of information they could glean from previous applicants, talks with other contractors on site, grilling the client... any source. One interview, I went in practically with the script in my hand. It's a mug's game praising agents on here, of course, but my personal experience has been very positive, even while I was having such a frustrating time.
2. Even if you have a specific set of skills and years of experience, there are many different types of jobs and you will not be a guaranteed shoe-in for any old ad which matches your skill-set on paper. For the first couple of months, the tiny handful of roles which I got to interview for were all... how to put it... "ultra-technical". What I mean is, they wanted my skillset, but they wanted it to total expert level and paid no attention whatsoever to personality, experience, communication or presentation. Having an all round "valuable team member" history was of no interest to those particular employers. At first, that really got me down. I found that every interview I went in to, they would somehow manage to find a topic which I knew little about, or in a couple of cases had literally never heard of. That sort of thing gives you huge self-doubts. Over the last couple of weeks, however, I have found interviewers getting far more excited about the personality and communication skills and not requiring that total expertise (and in the majority of cases it is simply not needed anyway - most of these jobs follow a common knowledge requirement, and if something really unusual comes along then you just look it up ). These are simply different jobs with different types of employers, and fortunately there are quite a lot of employers who don't have the need for pure technical excellence, the rest of the package is at least as important.
3. Interview questions go in and out of fashion. As far as possible, listen carefully to the questions you don't know the answers to, and write them down as soon as you come out of an interview. Look them up, and learn them. There is a very strong chance that the same or very similar questions will crop up in other interviews you do around the same time. Almost every JavaScript interview I've done over the last couple of months has asked for an explanation of "closures", for example. I'd never once been asked about closures before in 13 years of web developing. Currently, it seems they are the most important thing to know about JavaScript, though I'll be interested to find out when I first have any need at all to use one. Hasn't happened so far.
4. You get the job you're not that bothered about and don't really expect to get. That's a common observation, I know, but yesterday I wasn't that bothered about any of the three roles I interviewed for. I came out of each interview feeling that I'd be happy to work there, but really not sure if they would want me, and all three made immediate offers. It makes you start believing in astrology and fate and all that. Maybe the trick is to not be bothered about any jobs you apply for, which probably applies to a lot of people here anyway - possibly the most successful ones.
Rambled on there, but just wanted to put a couple of those things down. For some reason.
Yesterday, I hit the most bizarre jackpot... three job interviews - three immediate offers. This after months of endless calls, failed interviews, treks across the country, maddening demands for one little skill which I happened not to have, and "there was another guy who was just a bit better than you" (I so nearly went and bought a sniper rifle so I could take out that mysterious other guy).
Anyway, some observations:
1. This is the first time I've had extensive and long drawn-out dealings with agents and, on the basis of this experience, I have a lot of respect for a lot of those agents. In the past it's just been a case of them getting my CV, bunging it at the client, organising an interview and issuing the contract. This time, with the competition so extreme, I had agents feeding me every bit of information they could glean from previous applicants, talks with other contractors on site, grilling the client... any source. One interview, I went in practically with the script in my hand. It's a mug's game praising agents on here, of course, but my personal experience has been very positive, even while I was having such a frustrating time.
2. Even if you have a specific set of skills and years of experience, there are many different types of jobs and you will not be a guaranteed shoe-in for any old ad which matches your skill-set on paper. For the first couple of months, the tiny handful of roles which I got to interview for were all... how to put it... "ultra-technical". What I mean is, they wanted my skillset, but they wanted it to total expert level and paid no attention whatsoever to personality, experience, communication or presentation. Having an all round "valuable team member" history was of no interest to those particular employers. At first, that really got me down. I found that every interview I went in to, they would somehow manage to find a topic which I knew little about, or in a couple of cases had literally never heard of. That sort of thing gives you huge self-doubts. Over the last couple of weeks, however, I have found interviewers getting far more excited about the personality and communication skills and not requiring that total expertise (and in the majority of cases it is simply not needed anyway - most of these jobs follow a common knowledge requirement, and if something really unusual comes along then you just look it up ). These are simply different jobs with different types of employers, and fortunately there are quite a lot of employers who don't have the need for pure technical excellence, the rest of the package is at least as important.
3. Interview questions go in and out of fashion. As far as possible, listen carefully to the questions you don't know the answers to, and write them down as soon as you come out of an interview. Look them up, and learn them. There is a very strong chance that the same or very similar questions will crop up in other interviews you do around the same time. Almost every JavaScript interview I've done over the last couple of months has asked for an explanation of "closures", for example. I'd never once been asked about closures before in 13 years of web developing. Currently, it seems they are the most important thing to know about JavaScript, though I'll be interested to find out when I first have any need at all to use one. Hasn't happened so far.
4. You get the job you're not that bothered about and don't really expect to get. That's a common observation, I know, but yesterday I wasn't that bothered about any of the three roles I interviewed for. I came out of each interview feeling that I'd be happy to work there, but really not sure if they would want me, and all three made immediate offers. It makes you start believing in astrology and fate and all that. Maybe the trick is to not be bothered about any jobs you apply for, which probably applies to a lot of people here anyway - possibly the most successful ones.
Rambled on there, but just wanted to put a couple of those things down. For some reason.
Comment