[TriLUG] A job that was passed to me, out of my area, some of you may want to try for it.

[Marty Ferguson]

Basically, many of us are labor meat in a mall-shopping culture.

To elucidate:
We "IT" workers are shopped like meat on the hoof at an auction when 
seeking employment. 
The employers are only interested in a specific skill set which  is 100% 
directly and immediately
applicable to their problem domain.  This, combined with
(A) continued rising unemployment in the tech sector , and
(B) HR databases which are designed to correlate human skill sets with 
organizational needs, and
(C) the Wal Mart  mentality of always shopping for the lowest price
=> results in a "race to the bottom"

Very few IT folks have been successful at "branding" themselves.  So 
unless that
is done, we all appear as generic brand "X" commodities, providing a 
collectionof features.
    Lead developer on 8 Open source Java projects .  Whiter Whites, No 
Phosphates!!!
    Sendmail admin and spam filtering expertise ....  Ultra Low Carbs, 
Too!!!
    Excellent communications skills (this always appears) .... New 
Disposable Carton!!!

For any kind of scientist, this industry has gone to hell in a 
handbasket. The structure set in place disallows
a hiring manager to give a damn if you "really" understand subjects like 
bottleneck issues, task-swapping problems,
or even the simplest heat disipation-in-a-server-closest problems; let 
alone actually having any
"communications skills" and the grace to *not* piss off the technophobes.

That's just the way I see it.
M

========================
Bob Evans wrote:

>>>My brother, the CPA (geekness runs in the family),
>>>      
>>>
>>recently moved
>>>from the plastic credit business to the healthcare
>>business.  I was
>>    
>>
>>>floored that he was able to port his basic skills
>>>      
>>>
>>from one industry
>>    
>>
>>>to another.  In the IT and engineering world such
>>>      
>>>
>>portability is
>>    
>>
>>>rare.  The stratefication is stifling.
>>><snip>
>>> 
>>>      
>>>
>
>I've been programming professionally since '79, on
>everything from IBM mainframes, to all flavors of
>UNIX, to PC. The kiss of death for me is: my entire
>career has been in banking.
>
>When bofa riffed me in 2002, I tried to break out. Got
>an interview with Schneider Trucking and a couple
>insurance companies in Greensboro, but actually got a
>job at a bank. I can't break out.
>
>
>
>=====
>Bob Evans        bobevans19 at yahoo.com   (read weekly...)              
>alternate        reevans at bbandt.com     (read daily M-F) 
>704 562-7166 mobile     
>704 954-3415 office            
>704-882-6214 home...last resort, please
>
>There are 10 kinds of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't.
>
>
>		
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