The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Just go rejected for a job... don't know what to do
Invisible
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So I just got rejected for a job. I job I put in over 3 months ago. I job that I had tons and tons of recommendations for from very influential people. A job that I missed a single question on during the aptitude test. A job that the interview went so well that they gave me their cell number afterward without any prompting from me.
This is was my one chance. My only chance to escape. I feel pathetic. I feel like a loser. I honestly don't know what to do anymore.
This was pretty much it for me. This was the first opportunity I've had in months. I just want to disappear.
It's easy to go, oh you'll find something else... but really now, how fucking likely is that? I've been looking since I graduated college two almost three god damn years ago and fuck me there's not a single fucking thing that has worked.
This is was my one chance. My only chance to escape. I feel pathetic. I feel like a loser. I honestly don't know what to do anymore.
This was pretty much it for me. This was the first opportunity I've had in months. I just want to disappear.
It's easy to go, oh you'll find something else... but really now, how fucking likely is that? I've been looking since I graduated college two almost three god damn years ago and fuck me there's not a single fucking thing that has worked.
Invisible on
0
Posts
It happens. I won't say you'll find something else, because I don't know that. I can tell you my story in a sentence or two, because you may find comfort that you're not alone:
Graduated honour's BA top of my class, won gold medal from the university.
Went to college after for a 2 year advanced diploma in Journalism, again top of my class winning several awards.
Spent thousands of hours of extra-curricular at the college in order to gain experience/contacts/network for when I get out. Got several contacts in the industry. They all email me asking if I've found a job, and they send job links from time to time.
So now, a year and a half after I graduated from the college, I'm still waiting tables.
I picked a dying field, unfortunately. I apply to countless jobs, although I'll admit lately that's tapered off as I'm getting extraordinarily discouraged. I've just finished applying for another school--teacher's college.
Shit happens, man. Everyone is feeling the hurt, and it's a terrible time to be graduating. Just keep applying to jobs and keep your eyes open for possibilities in other avenues.
Also, telling us your field would invite more specific advice.
Now she has two offers and the luxury of deciding between the two.
Things seem shitty until they don't. Just gotta keep trying.
Spoilered for *~MY STORY~*
Got the degree, had to wrap up a few units of GE before I was ready to transfer, so I got all ready to do that when I got laid off in August while the State was doing their budget thing.
Well fuck that I say, I'd recently started dating a girl in the Bay Area and I'd nursed several contacts in various companies around the Bay (Facebook, Yahoo, Google, etc.), there's more jobs down there, I pull up stakes and I move in with her and her mom, temporarily, while I look for work.
Things are pretty good, I'm getting a few interviews a week, looks like it won't be long until one of them pans out, do this for about a month, and then I have an interview I have a REALLY GOOD feeling about. It was with the DeYoung Museum. They really liked me and it was pretty much a "well we want to hire you but we've got a few more people we've already scheduled interviews with" thing. I got on swimmingly with the manager, their Network lead had taken basically the same path to his career that I had, things were gonna happen for me. The pay was excellent, benefits were great, they were even going to pay for me to finish school.
Then three days later the stock market crashed.
I called them, once a week, ask about the status of the position, they kept saying they'd call me back.
Said that once, said that twice, said that three times. Fourth time they said that they had changed their mind about needing the position.
Well shit.
Two, three months passed, girlfriend's mom took a dislike to me when she decided I wasn't looking for work hard enough despite posting fliers all over the goddamn place offering PC repair, gives me the boot and I start living off of friend's couches. I decided I was going to join the military. A couple months after that girlfriend cheats on me and a couple months after that we break up, and I find out that the entire time since I left her mom's been sabotaging my relationship with her pretty hard because she decided I was a good for nothing that was going nowhere.
I eventually move back home for a little while while I wait for the call from the Army. Unfortunately I had some stuff in my medical records that would require a waiver to enlist (ADD meds) and it slowed the process down. While I was waiting I continued to look for work. Have a pretty awful fight with my step mom which is a large part of what made me leave the first time, and I'm basically told by my dad I'm no longer welcome there. More living on couches, more awfulness, meet another girl and her family takes me in, again, supposed to be temporary, and it is, but it turned into a year and a half and I am endlessly thankful for what they've done for me.
During that time I worked as a Runner in a restaurant, a Bicycle Mechanic, a Painter, a Caterer, and did all sorts of computer work, both freelance and contract through a recruiting agency.
Nine months after I'd started the enlistment process I found out that the Army recruiter had lied to me about ever submitting the waiver for whatever reason. Another recruiter in the same office said that the Army wasn't accepting anyone that needed a waiver because of the massive amount of people wanting to enlist because of the economy. Military were the only people wanting to hire young adults with no experience, they had a backlog so long at the time that it took six months to get a new recruit to Boot Camp instead of two weeks. So instead of just telling me that he'd lied to me persistently for nine months while constantly making it sound like the waiver was right around the corner. I still don't know why he did it, just wanted to fuck with me I guess? During that time I'd stopped taking CC courses because I thought I was going to ship off to Boot Camp/Overseas in the immediate future and my Student Loans came out of Deferment because of that fucker.
Fast forward nine more months and I get a call back from a different recruiting agency than the one I normally work with. Lady tells me that a company I applied for literally in the first month of my unemployment really likes my resume and they want to email me. I don't know what black hole my email/resume got lost down but I say I'm totally still available and still very interested in the position. Interview goes well, a week later I hear I got the job. Pay isn't quite as good as the position at the De Young, but it's with an industry leading Web Application Security company, and I enjoy being here every day. I get to wear whatever I want, and hang out in a room with 20+ other dudes and shoot the breeze all day while I do my work. It's also a fairly new company and the advancement potential is huge, as well as the doors the knowledge I'm learning here will open for me in the future. I test websites and hack things all day, something that would be completely illegal anywhere else, and they teach me how to do it better and pay me for it. Been here for about a month now and I've been going all crazy buying shit for people for Christmas because I'm just so excited to have money to spend on that. In a couple months now I'll get full benefits, stock options, etc.
I still haven't moved out of my girlfriend's because she likes me there and she needs to finish up school, I need to pay off some debts, get a little nestegg saved up for both of us to move out with, etc.; but there's plans to do it beginning of Summer-ish, and I've bought her dad something really nice for Christmas since he won't accept rent.
I guess what I'm trying to say is I've been where you've been, I've felt like a miserable leech taking from my family, and my girlfriend(s) families and not being able to give enough back in return, I lacked employment from August 1st, 2008 - November 16th, 2010. It's miserable and awful, and a lot of people are in the same situation you're in. Keep trying and eventually you'll outlast these shitty economic times.
My girlfriend has a masters and a doctorate and had a hard time finding a job in her field (veterinary medicine) due to the economy. There are a ton of people with real, practical experience plus the education that are looking for jobs as well. She was often up against people who had either lost their own practices or had lost their job when their practice closed and had years more experience than her. It took her 6 months, 10 interviews in six states, and $5,000 in airfare to get a job in a small town 2.5 hours from where we live.
I've been where you are and I know how much it sucks to miss when you were so close. But, don't give up. You're only a looser when you stop trying, not when you fail.
Are you Seattle-ish? I'll buy you a beer.
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
The software they want to implement is Citrix. I use it regularaly in my current job and in my last job. However, it happens.
Out of college I had to go back to working in the produce section at Shaw's. I graduated with a BS in EE. 6 months later, I had to work as a secretary/service counter person/record keeper/accounts person for a local computer store. I was there for a about a year and a half before I was network administrator for a school district and making double digits an hour. 4 years after that and now I work with medical software and hate it, but it pays very well.
You have to have a job, even if it is a shit job, and build up from there. You're rolling on three years, but that's about when I got my decent break. You can either roll over and give up, or try again and then again after that.
Some time later I taught myself stuff and I now have a very great career making video games. Your life will not suck forever, a lot of people have a similar period to what you're going through now after Uni, many people I know are in the same situation you are in, it's very hard right now to get work reliably if you don't have a super specific skill.
Nobody here can help you get a job, but we can say you are not alone.
Also, I PERSONALLY had a very good experience with teaching myself a very specific skill, it only took 8 months to go from nothing to easily employable at a high level, so maybe don't rest all your ambitions on your degree.
I've been at it for 6 months and have only had a handful of interviews. I'm fresh out of college, and employers are looking for people with real world experience, not people they'll need to train.
If you're in the US, about 1 in 10 people are unemployed.
Spikes to more like 5 out of 10 for young (<25) adults.
This.
It doesn't matter how awesomesauce you were in school. You were a kid in school.
If you have zero real world experience, many companies will consider you a risk to hire because they're investing thousands of dollars into what is essentially an unproven commodity.
I graduated with a degree in "Network Administration" in 1999. It is 2010 and I have never held a job that let me anywhere near administrating a network. My path went a different way early on, but I'm fine with that.
I can tell you right now I'll never be a network admin. The only jobs I could get in the IT industry were basic desktop support work, and due to a number of reasons (many of them financial) I've never moved away from that. And I'm at the point now where I don't really want to.
I realize I may never get paid at the level of an admin, but I make decent money and most importantly I really enjoy what I do. I wouldn't want to change now because it would mean giving up something I like to do.
It took me a lot longer to reach this point (personally as well as professionally) than I thought it would when I was a young, inexperienced, and clueless college graduate.
TL;DR version: Set your sights lower, do any work you can until you find an entry level job, then grind that experience ladder like your favorite MMO.
Hell, 2 years ago? I was almost out. I was right there. I had a great interview at a really cool place. They told me they had been interviewing people for 6 months and I was by far the best they had talked to. They had 1 or 2 more interviews already lined up, so they wanted to do those just to be certain and then they would call me back, but I was I assured I all but had the job at that point. Then for the next 3 months I was told they'd get back to me within a week. Eventually they did so... they decided they didn't need someone with the experience I had and instead wanted to pay about $30k/yr less than they told me the job was paying. Again, that was just over 2 years ago. They JUST hired someone for that position a month or two ago.
This shit happens. It's hard, but try not to let it get you down too much.
The job that I currently have? Nearly 300 miles from where I used to live and they took several months between having my resume and calling me for an interview. I called several times within that time period to follow up, but unbenownst to me they had a momentary hiring freeze as they weren't even sure they could stay open throughout the year. So dude, this economy? Its a pile of shit. Even worse for the fresh out of college crowd. Can't even get unemployment if you weren't already employed, its such a fucking mess.
The truth of the matter is, you might as well just apply to the position especially if you qualify for everything besides the experience. You never know.
This is super common. Most companies want someone that can hit the ground running and be revenue/productive. That or they expect you to work as an unpaid intern even if you're in your late 20s and have a mortgage.
One thing I've always found that helps land a job is who you know. If you're internally referred you start off ahead of other candidates. If you have other friends from college or elsewhere I'd hit them up and ask them to keep an eye out for openings for you. Now is the time of year where budgeting is decided and how much growth is anticipated in the coming year so they should hear about openings before you do.
It's better than potentially sitting on your ass looking for jobs for another two, three years.
It's just uh... I went through 3 rounds of interviews. I had letters of recommendation from congressmen and a police department detective. I was significantly overqualified for the position and nailed every question they asked.
This actually could have been your problem. Sometimes over-qualification is just as bad as under-qualification. If you're overqualified, there's the assumption that they're going to have to pay you more and still worry about keeping you from moving elsewhere to a position worth your qualifications.
Something everyone should learn about job postings, is that all kinds of shit will be put in there just to discourage applications so the hiring people are not overwhelmed.
If you can tick off 75% of the things a posting is asking for, you should apply.
You also should not be relying solely on job postings in order to find a job, since it is the single worst way to actually get one.
But I have excuses for my lack of boot strap pulling, and they all reside in my Xbox.
Some people interview extremely well.
My general advice for people when applying to jobs: Only put relevant experience to the job. If you start listing all your general qualifications and it appears to be you're extremely talented you may be put into the overqualified pile. Once you land the interview you can embellish and say "I'm talented and in my free time use xyz skills and I think that'd be helpful here."
If you get your interview face down and learn how to smooth talk, you can practically get any job you ask for.
So you have to be likable.
Last year I was unemployed-ish, I pulled myself out of a sinking company and worked freelance for them. I then looked for work. After a month of half-looking but working 40 hours a week freelance, i decided I hated freelance and moved onto the job hunt big time. I landed two interviews, and got two offers. I am not super qualified or special, but I am a good interview.
So, I guess my advice is, if your landing interviews, you are setting yourself up for success, you just need to seem like someone theyd enjoy working with a bit more. Even if that means faking it.
Less than 2 months after we relocated to a more rural region where less than a third as many people have college degrees I had a good entry level job (especially relative to the cost of housing) in my field with a supportive employer...and was offered two others. If you're not really, really tied down I'd definitely widen the search net.
[edit]
and on what Kobi said, one way to avoid that is to have a 'master' resume, especially if you have a work history or are establishing one in the field. I have one that lists basically everything I might want to have from any given position - achievements, duties, utilized skills, etc and then just add to it as I go along at my current job. That sucker is a monster - something like 4 or 5 pages at least.
Then I look at the job I'm applying for and select the most relevant lines for that job from each position. It's more targeted so you're more likely to hit the boxes the reviewer is looking for, and you don't ovewhelm them with irrelevant info (whether too advanced or padding).
There's the problem. You did everything right, but if you're just way too overqualified they know you'll be able to just get the fuck out later and getting a higher paying job, leaving them again with the problem of trying to hire another fuckwit. Which in this economy is pretty much a guarantee once things start picking up again.
You must never be over or under qualified. Just be qualified.
I'll be working harder in school in honor of all of you guys that have graduated and are jobless. We'll all get through this; we're at the bottom of the valley and the only way forward is up.