Job Seeker Blog #1

I am going to label posts mostly about the job searcharama as "job seeker blog" for a while, I think.

Yesterday was the first post-holiday job seeking day. Things sure started off with a big bang. Beginning at 9 am, emails and calls began, and the last one came in just before 9 pm! Not all the places I talked to previously contacted me, but most did.

Here’s a summary so far:

1. The fun place with the gongs in the office, where I’d be a person who supports clients using the product sent me email instructions for a rather complicated presentation they want me to do on Friday/tomorrow. I am to analyze a company’s use of their software and make recommendations for getting more product reviews for the company’s products. Of course, doing this has been hampered by all the other calls and interviews, and the fact that the kids have oral surgery today.

2. The first place I talked to during the week before Christmas also wants a presentation, this one on “email marketing best practices.” I sure hate the phrase “best practices,” because I am such an anti-buzzword gal. But, I know how to use the Internet and I will go make something for them. That won’t be until next Wednesday, so I have time.

3. I got a call from a recruiter about a contract job at a place where things are usually the color of the sky and are very big. If I went there, I’d have hit the three biggest conglomerates in town, all in a row! On this one, of course, the pay is really good, and I’d work with someone who used to be at ALE in the next department over, which would be nice. The job sounds much like the one I just left, with better equipment—creating e-training. He’d put in a good word for me, which is always appreciated. I go there tomorrow, after the big presentation. Luckily it’s right across the street. In another irony, I’d be working on the products that XH moved us to Austin to work on in the first place, which was at a once-fun startup that got bought and made extra-corporate.

4. I talked to the HR person at a job that originally sounded sorta dull, but once she described it, became much better—a nice variety of writing tasks and at another place with fun and nice people. It might be somewhat far away, but she said they have VERY flexible hours. I could leave later and miss some of the nasty ole traffic that way. I go there this afternoon. Lee’s gonna come home and watch the kids sleep or heal or whatever it is they will be doing.

5. And lest we forget, the company that supports nonprofit organizations, where I interviewed last spring, has asked me to come in next week on Tuesday to talk to them about a position that sounds even better than the other one. I’d still really like to work there—I do understand nonprofits and their needs—just have to do a better job convincing them of it than I did last time.

That’s a lot of possibilities, not to mention the one I interviewed for at ALE before Christmas, which I hope to hear more from (the one with the best compensation package of all the jobs so far) and the video game place that still never managed to contact me…and the places I applied to in the meantime!

PS: More in the morning, an interview report and kid tooth fun. Not fun.