employment

[Rob]

Well, it has seemed to me that, with some 2 yr ET colleges going corporate
they have diluted the education of a 2 yr ET degree, and some of the ppl who
I have seen graduating some of the more corporate ET programs shouldn't
have. The same thing has happened here in Indianapolis. When I started my
ET, there were tons of ET jobs.. But, after working in the field about 3
years I have gone back for my BSEE because I *know* if I ever lose my job or
am laid off for whatever reason that I will be lucky to get an 8 bux / hr
job with this completely lousy and now extremely undervalued ASET.

Mind you, every subsequent job I have had since I started work with an ASET
has had lower and lower wages. First job was about 38k, second job, 36k,
next job, 35k... The market is wierd right now.

Its tough to be a tech.

I looked for tech jobs in Seattle and was shocked to see not even ONE tech
job in the few weeks I was there!! Thats really when I decided I *needed* a
BSEE.

Well, FWIW, I know a guy who lied and said he had a BSEE, but he was a good
enough tech that when they asked him the *money* questions during the
interview he answered with authority so they never even bothered to check
his references.  ; ) He is now a program manager and no one except me and a
select few know about it.

Honestly, too, after the fact the higher ups will not want to admit they
were duped and will prolly not attempt to follow-up on the guy. As long as
you can do the job, I really think mosts execs do not care enough about it
to go through the trouble.

But, getting your foot in the door these days *requires* at least a BSEE,
and its starting to look like an MSEE is starting to take the place of the
BSEE. Of course, what kills me is when I see a guy with an economics degree
or something bumped up to Engineer or Program Manager while the rest of us
techs and engineers plug away day after day waiting for a position like that
to come open only to interview and be trounced by someone who didn't have to
go through the weed out courses like Diff Eq, Thermodynamics, RF circuit
analysis, etc. I guess drinking beer and playing golf with the right ppl has
a lot to do with it too. Seems that the workplace gets more and more
corrupted like that too unfortunately. They *want* a BSEE, but will *accept*
their buddy who doesn't know much about circuits period, but needs money to
buy a new house. ugh!

So, such is the market world. My advice: Get your piece of the pie anyway
you can, be willing to *elaborate* a bit (just be sure to know your limits),
and do anything you can to get a piece of the pie. The work enviroment IMHO
is extremely hostile. If you treat it like life or death, you will generally
do alright, because it *is* life and death, but on a very subtle scale.

Also, too, make sure you are familiar with the terms in which the company
does business in. IOW, if you are itrying to get a job,  find out what they
make, how its made, how your position fits into it, and how the corporation
as a whole did last year. Word your resume in a manner that would be
appealing to someone who is a manager the division you are looking to get
into so that you will actually have something to talk about that the
interviewer is interested in. I have found that you interviewing the
interviewer is far more pleasurable to the interviewer than the other
option. Remember, the easiest way to make someone favor you is for you to
favor them first and give them ample opportunity to talk about themselves.
Just shows how 2 dimensional most ppl are if such a simple thing an lock in
a job interview. Although I have had quite a few jobs, I was awarded every
job I interviewed for by using this technique. Good luck.

Rob

From: farky <farky at ix.netcom.com>
To: <synth-diy at node12b53.a2000.nl>
Sent: Friday, September 22, 2000 6:10 PM
Subject: OT: employment


> Hey folks:
>
> Why is it so hard to get entry or nearly-entry level work as a tech?  I'm
> in the Seattle area, and it seems kind of weird that hardly any jobs are
> listed anyplace.  I've got a little experience and a 2-yr degree, but I
> never get responses to my resumes.  Anybody have any anecdotes about the
> business they could share?
>
> muchos gracias
> toby
>
>
>
>