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Recent Grads and Experience Beyond the Desktop?
over_exposed asks: "I'm a recent college grad (B.S. in C.S.) and have been on the job hunt for about 6 months. I've been playing around with tech toys as long as I can remember, but it all focuses around the desktop environment. Desktop-grade routers, switches and wireless as well as any/all desktop PC (and some Mac) hardware is what I could get my hands on with my limited budget. After looking through hundreds if not thousands of job postings, everyone is looking for 3+ years of network admin experience or 5+ years of C++ experience even for an entry level position. How is one expected to gain that kind of experience when no one will hire you without the experience? What kind of (part-time) work can you get as a college student to gain experience (Cisco, Exchange, SQL, etc) that will be marketable in the real world? Any suggestions from the Slashdot community will be of great benefit to myself and thousands of others who will enter the 'real world' in the next few years."
The best way to do it is an internship. The best way to get a job is NETWORK, NETWORK, and NETWORK. All the jobs I've gotten has always been through someone I knew, who knew someone. So work your friends, friend of friends, and socialize more. Best advice.
Best Community for Gaming and Gadgets!
The two best ways are to apply everywhere imaginable for a job, and to ask every single person you personaly know who might work someplace where there might be a job available. Don't be afraid of temporary contract work, becuase it is never truly temporary. There will always be more work to do after you finish with the first contract.
It is more about who you know in this industry than what you know.
Seriously. Many of those requirements are written by people who have no idea what they're talking about. Now, in many companies, your resume will just get thrown out because you don't match some HR monkey's checklist -- but with luck, at a few places, your resume will get to someone with some technical knowledge who is willing to at least give you a chance in an interview.
I mean, apply everywhere. Any job you think you might possibly be able to do. If you get one nibble for every hundred resumes -- well, these days, in the post-.bomb world, that's not bad.
Also, I don't know if you're still eligible for this since you've graduated, but most schools' CS departments do have lists of available interniships. The money usually isn't great, but it's real experience, and can lead to a full-time position. (Mine did, though I didn't get it through the school.) They may have some formal job placement services for grads, too.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
While this used to work many moons ago for most positions now, no way. To combat this exact behavior a company I recently interviewed with had two different system engineers grill me followed by the a director. They were very prepared and all asked different questions. Unless you KNOW you can fake it, don't.
My answer was, I took a job with a smaller company where they understood my position but gave me responsibility and room to grow. Of course.. less salary, but it is a good starting position. I once met the "first CIO" in the United States, Duwayne Peterson - his advice was simply to "get your foot in the door" somewhere!
Good luck to you! -6d
You should either be a GOD in CS with a PhD or too many impressive qualifications to find a 'good job' in CS these days.
If you have only minimum quals, you might end up as a sysadmin somewhere for a small network.
If you're not a GOD, and want a good job, then try not to be a pure CS guy. Take up a minor that you like while you're still in school and try to think about how your CS skills can be used in that minor. Eg Civil engineering needs lot of programmers who know some civil engineering. There is a surfiet of programmers in the market who know nothing other than programming lanugages.
If you lost your job today, don't despair. You may die tomorrow anyway.
Lie. Corporate America is all about lying; how it's done, when it's done, and whom to lie to.
Or just twist the facts a little. Doctor your resume. Cook your C.V. Overstate your importance.
Or work on Free Software projects and list them all in your resume.
-Jem
- Hobbyist experience. Have you done projects on your own for fun? That you can show me? I want to hire people who are resourceful and who love their work.
- Attention to detail. You wouldn't believe how many people have poor formatting or spelling errors in their cv's. If you don't take the trouble to proofread your own cv, it doesn't make me feel warm inside that you're going to carefully check all those boundary conditions and return codes in the code you write for me.
- Good attitude. New grads have actually said to me that they don't see themselves programming for long, and that they see themselves as more management material. Ejector seat. Not all of work is fun, and everyone has to pitch in on the tedious jobs like testing, backups, maintenance. No prima donnas please.
- Good communication skills. It truly disappoints me how many people look great on paper, but after an interview you realize that they simply aren't going to be able to work in a team setting.
The job market is tough. The good news is, it's not that hard to stand out.If you create something you can show a prospective employer, not only are you gaining experience but it goes a long way towards showing you're a self-starter and eager to learn.
I'm in "in the trenches" programmer, not a manager who does hiring. But I've been doing it for about 8 years, and I've been sometimes involved in the hiring process at the companies I've worked for.
Anyway, I agree with the above post. To me, a person who loves this stuff enough to code something up on their own has the right mentality to be a talented programmer. In fact, I've seen somebody with no professional experience whatsoever get hired that way... the person doing the hiring was so impressed at the kid's demo software that he hired him right away. He turned out to be a brilliant programmer.
OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
I'll be the technology coordinator for a school district this coming fall. Now, I know there's a bunch of people out there who are gonna say "Those who don't know, teach." And they can just piss off. I'll tell you, the last tech coordinator I knew personally taught at my high school for four years and is now pursuing a doctorate while being the head of the technology development team at Indiana State University.
First, let me tell you: you need to be professional. That means cordial, exchanging pleasantries whenever possible, writing letters, as well as actually calling the human resources department personel and introducing yourself, if not in person. Believe it or not, professionalism will get you a lot further into acquiring a job then just sending out apps and waiting for something to happen.
Second, you gotta start somewhere. Example: banks always need IT support staff, but more often than not they hire internally. Start off as a bank teller. Sure, for a Comp. Sci. college grad it doesn't sound like a lot of money, but the perks are nice and it leaves plenty of room for growth. From experience, companies that have high demands for entry-level programming positions do so because it is easy to filter the qualified from the "they say that they're qualified, but...". It's simply because a company is not going to waste precious hiring-time to see if you can do the kind of work they demand if you've never done that kind of work before.
Or, try for tech support. Again, the pay ain't great, but every TS company has an IT support staff, and at the few I've applied to in the past couple years, all only hire for that internally, because they want someone who knows their systems and demands rather than some joe with an A+ cert. off the street.
Finally, even accept something lower. I did merchandinsing for CocaCola for a couple years, and they hired a lot of staff internally, including their IT support staff (well, if they did not find internally, they looked elsewhere, but the company knew that a lot of their workers are soon-to-be college grads who are looking for more qualified work, and it saves the company a lot of money not to have to advertise the position).
I suppose to sum everything up: climb the ladder. It's not fun, and you have to lower your expectations to start out with, but if you're as qualified as you say you are (and professional, I can't stress that enough), you'll get what you're looking for eventually.
The father of my freshman year roommate was a professor at the University I went to. He was a mathmatician and he had written a C program to do mathmatical modeling. My roommate told me he was looking for someome to make some modifications to the program. I worked on modifying the program to run under both UNIX and windows. I got some good experience from it, and I was able to help the professor. I also got paid some for the work, so it worked out pretty well for everyone.
If I hadn't ended up traveling the China to study abroad, the professor was also planning to give me a system admin job for the department he managed.
The main thing is to keep your eyes open and talk to people. Talk to some professors you know and like, ask them if they could hire you to do some work (paid work looks better than volunteer on a resume I think, because it shows that the work you were doing was really valuable to someone.) Or if they don't have the money or need, ask them if any of their coworkers do. Don't just ask the comp. sci. department either, talk to all of your professors.
If no one you know needs help, go talk to your schools job search assistance center. They can help you look for something on campus that will help you fill out your resume before you graduate.
And of course, look for something that you will like, that is really important. If you are interested in the work, you will do better work, and then when your first post-graduation employer calls for a reference you will be remembered as a happy active employee.
--David
Actually Fedex does hire outside from their ranks. Always has. They have a large shop in my neck of the woods. But they do give preference to in-house.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Get a crappy help desk job and work your way up.
While not unrealistic in the current IT market, "crappy help desk job" has nothing to do with becoming a software or network engineer.
For an analogy, a helpdesk job at an IT firm compares well to a secretary at a law firm. The secretary does not "climb the ladder" to full fledged lawyer, and the helpdesk guy does not eventually become a real engineer (not to say it never happens, but it when it does, it will involve some circumstances beyond "working up the corporate ladder"). Totally different jobs, one geared toward MCSEs and assorted other college dropouts, the other to people with a 4-year degree and good coding skills (which do not automatically come with any degree... You have to get those skills on your own through years of practice, which fortunately can start long before college).
No, a recent college grad shouldn't expect a six-figure salary. But they shouldn't take a $7.50/hr helpdesk job thinking it gives them any sort of "skills" beyond "new ways to insult users without them noticing".
Now, I did mention that the current market may require such work... Not because it has any relevance to the desired "real" job, but rather, because of what so many others have pointed out - You don't get a job by sending out resumes, you get a job because you know Bill, and Bill knows Fred, and Fred's sister works in HR at BlobCo, where they need a new entry-level code-monkey. From that position (which, if you tried to get it from a job posting, would still mention 5+ years of a dozen languages, as well as intimate familiarity with every type of networking hardware ever created, even though they just want someone to do VB scripting to access their customer mailing list running on Oracle 7 on an ancient Sparc with a fully redundant backup - Which you can later call "3.5 years of experience with Oracle in a mission-critical clustered environment" for the HR drones), you can work your way up to a real engineer. But the work at a helpdesk in the interim just kept you fed until you met the people needed to actually get a real job.
Now, the above may sound a tad elitist, but I don't mean it as such - I really do appreciate those who can work a helpdesk. But don't delude yourselves into considering that as any sort of entry-level position for a software engineering job.
I hate to say this (since you are already graduated), but ALL students need to be investigating internships(paid or unpaid) in their fields while they goto school. With the job market the way it is, work experience is required to pad that post graduation resume. For CS majors, there is no reason you can't find a decent work-study job doing cs work on campus. Every dept/college in the university has it staff now, and they are always looking to save money by hiring students to do much of the tier1 stuff(our dept. has 4).
Since you are already out of school and can't do this, review the techniques you are using to find work. You need to treat it like a 8hr/day job, and use every resource in the world to find work. If you are looking for jobs requiring 3yrs exp...well duh, you are shooting TOO HIGH. As most others have said, you'll need to start at an entry level and move up. A CS degree no longer guarantees you that sweet do-nothing project manager job so prevalent in the late 90's. Your degree will, however, allow you to either rise w/in the company faster, or more easily move to other companies.
1) Identify what types of employers you want to work for, make a list and start making cold calls from the phone book. Dont be afraid to call it managers to ask them questions. It will be very informative, and you might make some really good contacts.
2) Prioritize 5 "realistic" types of entry-level IT work that you want to do, and tailor your resume to fit each of them. Do NOT fill your resume with every last tidbit of knowledge you think you have. Instead, make it realistic about your skills and focussed on those areas you do best, or are most applicable to the job.
3) Network, Network, Network-use/abuse friends, family, acquaintenances, etc to land that first job.
4) Dress for success-meaning, get your interviewing skills honed so that you can answer any tough question thrown at you, and appear calm and thoughtful. Remember, once you hit the interview stage, they've already decided that you can do the work. Make sure you identify what type of people they are early, and tailor your interview personality to it. ASK QUESTIONS(and not just about pay,benefits,etc). They want to know that you are really interested in them as a company,dept,etc. Lastly, you are the RIGHT candidate for the job, infact it is your job, just waiting for you to start it.
5) Look into non-profits, universities, etc. While they may pay a little less, often the work experience, and benefits will far outweigh the negatives. Also, that experience looks good on a resume.
As an employment counselor for 5 years, these techniques did wonders for my clients in their job searchs. Remember, every job you don't secure gets you closer to the one you land. Use every rejection and interview to hone your job search skills, until you find that employer that can't do without you.
Good luck
Be sure to show the applicant the resume you have, and see if they agree with it. I went on an onterview, 10 minutes into the guy is asking me questions about things I didn't know. I asked to see the copy of my resume the agency sent him, it had all kinds of things I had never put in my resume.
I politely informed him that the agency had doctored my resume, and then gave hime a copy of my actual resume. He called the headhunter. They exchange some pleasentris such as: "I can't believe your wasting my time" and, my favorite "I'll never use your agency, and I'm calling all the people you sent me and tell the about this!"
my point is, be sure it was the the person and not the agency. If the agency lied, then it's hardly the applicants fault.
Finally, are you hiring?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Use alumni contacts to get internships and be willing to intern through college. If you are on mom and dad's health insurance and they put a roof over you, you don't need much money. Use this time wisely.
My company has four interns right now. They get paid peanuts but they do real work. They get to be lead developer on their own small projects with me looking over their shoulder.
To ensure I wasn't exploiting them, I asked each to come up with a list of what they want to learn this summer, and in exchange, they make me money. We do monthly formal reviews of their experience make sure everyone benefits. I feel that screwing knowledge workers is a bad proposition in the long run.
That said, I take mentoring seriously. Not everyone does.
I'm curious as to why you politely dismiss the applicant then trashing his chances at future employment at your company, and then unleash the beasts of the apocalypse upon the headhunter as well. I've known a few headhunters in my time, and even the ones that specialize in placing techies are pretty easy to deceive regarding qualifications. Then there are recruiters who are desperate for a commission and willingly shove any warm body in front of an interviewer.
I guess what I'm asking is, given that you don't know whether the blame should be on the applicant for lying to the recruiter about her qualifications, or the recruiter for lying to the applicant about her chances for getting the job, is it really fair to just bring the hammer down on both of them?
Regarding your practice of spreading the word throughout the company, you make it sound more effective than it probably is. First, many applicants are looking for a job in a certain area, not with a certain company. So it doesn't matter if your company has fifty people or fifty thousand, if your company only employs fifty people in that location. Second, your mentioning of the applicant to other managers is likely a far cry from a true company-wide ban. It all depends on how many other managers actually keep track of your list.
So from an applicant's perspective, you're not doing much to shut him out of a location because you're just one of many potential employers. Nor are you shutting him out of the company if getting employed there is his goal, because he can apply for positions in other locations. It might be an effective weapon against headhunters, though.
I don't begrudge you your attitude towards those who don't respect the value of your time, or who would apply for a job they know they're unqualified for. But if I were willing to lie my way into an interview, I don't think your warning would do much to dissuade me from the strategy.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
The average middle manager wouldn't know a Linux User's Group if it jumped out of their ass and did the tap number from 42nd street.
While certainly deserving of being modded "Funny," it's equally deserving of "Overated," possibly "Untruthful." The North Texas Linux Users' Group job opportunity list routinely sends out requests for assistance, sometimes full-time, sometimes part-time, sometimes contract. Over the years I have participated in a few contact jobs as a result of posts to the LUG mailing list. Contrary to the parent poster's message, there are people out there who recognize the value of networking and the value of targeting a select group of individuals who, on average, will generally have a more appropriate skill set than, say, the population exposed to a newspaper classified.
Find the LUGs in your area, as well as other UGs and subscribe to their job lists. It's probably one of the more underated activities and least time-consuming you can add to your job search techniques.
That's right - instead of the productivity gains of accelerating automation being spread out more equally, it is increasingly being concentrated by the extremely wealthy; us "useless eaters" are left to scramble for shittier and lower-paying make-work jobs (and hopefully die of disease-of-the-month to free up some realestate for more golf courses)
The pyramid needs to be flattened...
--
Power to the Peaceful
I've graduated a year ago, and I hope my experience can help you and other recent graduates, even a little bit, in this tough market.
I got my Bachelor's in CS in May 2003. I didn't graduate a Top 10 Ivy League school, or have a particularly good GPA, so I knew it was going to be very hard. I looked around for jobs for a while, went on a few interviews, but I had no clue on how to pass interviews, or how to write a resume. So, money was very scarce and I needed some kind of job.
So I got a job - I don't even want to say what it was, it wasn't programming for sure. I worked there for 8 hours a day, and then I went to my friend's office to help him set up his business - both software and hardware, and then I came home, practiced programming and sent out resumes. I read programming books on the train everywhere, as well.
After a while, I got really lucky - a family friend agreed to help me with my resume, and I realized how much it sucked. There's way too little space here and I don't have the time to say everything I want to say about the resume, but here's a few basic pointers.
Make it absolutely clear what kind of job you are looking for. Don't put there things that would indicate that basically, you would agree to any job in an IT field.
Put concrete things on your resume, that show that you know what the hell you're talking about. So instead of 'Programmed a Java', write 'Used Java to design and develop an inventory management application, utilizing Swing for front-end and JDBC to interact with Sybase database.' People that search through resumes on Monster.com or Dice.com don't look for 'Java', they look for Swing, JSP, JDBC - etc.
Don't lie. At least, don't flat out lie - everyone expects your resume to paint a little better picture than you actually are, but don't put blatant lies like 4 years of Unix experience while your Unix experience has been limited to checking your college mail at campus network (guilty).
Keep track of where you send your resume, what position, and what version of your resume. Nothing fancy, simple Notepad file will do. But it saves you a lot of valuale time while searching for a job.
Interviews - again, there are tomes written on this subject, but basic pointers again: SHOW YOUR ENTHUSIASM. Ask questions that show that you understend and are genuinely interested in the subject. The word "no" should NOT come out of your mouth. Of course, again, you shouldn't flat out lie - but if someone ask's you if you know skill X, instead of 'No', you should say "I've heard about it, but didn't have the opportunity to work with it professionally.. however, I'm a very fast learner and will pick up very fast"
The money question. The correct response to 'How much money do you want?' is "Money is really not that important to me, if the job is interesting and challenging, I would be happy with any reasonable offer." If they ask you to name a number, name a range. DON'T UNDERVALUE YOURSELF. If the job pays $40K and you say you'll be willing to do it for $25K, the alarm bell immediately rings in your interviewer's head - if this guy is so desperate to do this job for $25K, he must be a loser. Next!
So, in conclusion, looking for a job is a VERY HARD job in itself. You have to pay attention to every small detail and work very hard to succeed. In my case, after 10 months it finally paid off - I was offered a full time position and now happily working for a major financial company, with a salary almost twice as large as an average entry-level CS graduate.
The instruction to "put all certs on CV" isn't going to help you in the states. In the US, you want to target your resume to the job. Don't lie, but also don't give them ANY INFORMATION WHATSOEVER that isn't pertient to the job. Don't include an "objective"...it is meaningless, and could easily demonstrate that you don't know what you're talking about. For example, an objective that says something like "a job in a challenging environment where I learn new things all the time" might actually get your application discarded, because (surprise!) there are lots of IT jobs out there that pay well but simply aren't that exciting, aren't in a challenging environment, and don't let you learn new things every day. But, they are jobs, they pay well, and if you can stick it out there for a year or more (preferably 2 or more) you can look for something else external or internal. Remember that your application is being seen by someone who KNOWS NOTHING about IT. If it is even a real person...often it is an automated scanning program. The first person to see most apps is a HR person who doesn't know anything but how to match terms in a job description with terms on a resume. If your resume has more terms than the job description, you come off as "over qualified". If you don't have the same terms as the job description, you aren't qualified. The advice above is good advice. In the states, especially in the north and in CA, you want to lose EVERYTHING that is even remotely personal except for name, address, city, state, zip, phone, and email. No pictures, no entries about hobbies, no titles like "Mr" or "Mrs". You want your application and resume to cause every person to see it to think "this person is perfect for the job!". If they think anything else when they see your resume (such as "guns! I hate guns!" or "My sister's horse kicked her and broke 3 ribs") then you've missed your opportunity. My rule of thumb: Take your name off your resume, and everything personal but address, city, state, zip, email, and phone. What's left should cause the person seeing your application to say "this resume (not this person) is exactly what we need for job XYZ!". Then put your name back on it. Then send it in. Anything extra on your resume is asking for disappointment.
You'd be surprised how much that doesn't work.
I recently filled 3 of 4 open positions in my section and will be interviewing people for the fourth one next week. When I go through a stack of resumes, I triage them like this:
- Yes, contact these people. They get a first interview.
- Maybe. If the best people in the Yes group have already taken jobs or othewise don't work out, this is the stand-by group. So far, we have never had to call anyone in the Maybe group.
- No. People in this group are one or more of: way over-qualified, way under-qualified, totally unqualified, way too expensive, are in some other way unqualified (sometimes we relocate people, other times we want to make a local hire, for example), or they were caught in some lie on their resumes.
Among the members of the No group for this round of hiring is a person who was pretty well qualified (possibly over-qualified, but I would have put him in the Yes group) but was caught with BS on his resume. He is in the No group not just because that one part was a lie, but because at that point I instantly lost all confidence in all of his claims of experience. Anyone who has been looking at resumes for a while can recognize the BS pretty easily. If I see BS on your resume, you go into the No group. Do us both a favor and be honest. If you're honest, the worst thing that can happen is you won't get that position, but if your resume seems OK but just wasn't right for that position, I'll hang onto it. You never know what might come up in six months. If I catch you lying, your resume goes into a file of people who will never be contacted for a job with us.
Also, we do background checks before extending job offers. If you succeeded in BS on the resume and again at the interview, but get caught in the background check, not only will you not get the offer, you will never interview with us again. If you get by all that and get an offer and get hired and it becomes obvious the you just lied really well and got hired anyway, you will be fired. So far, no one has gotten past us.
I look at all the resumes I receive. It's true, triage takes out most of them. That's just a hard fact of life that comes from the fact that there are far more applicants than there are positions. I usually wind up with two (and sometimes three) resumes in the Yes pile for each open position. We interviewed six people for the three positions filled so far, and on of the other three was referred to another section where we knew they had an opening and her skillset matched what they needed a lot better than it matched what we needed. We still interviewed her, but we invited that section's manager to the interview and that manager asked most of the questions. The applicant is now a finalist for that position. If she had given us BS on her resume or in the interview, that would never have happened.
Bottom line: honesty on your resume and throughout the interview process is really the best policy, even if it sometimes looks like BS could be a good shortcut. The best people to work with and for, at the best places to work (and I think we are pretty good in both of those respects) will hire you as much for honesty and personality fit with the team as for technical ability. So much of effective management and team-building comes from recognizing people who don't *need* to be managed and who fit in well with each other and easily form a cohesive team, that if you don't meet those criteria then we don't care about your technical skills. I want people on my team who are honest, self-motivated, get along well together, and have no "issues" that I need to deal with. If you don't meet those criteria, I have no use for you. So don't lie on your resume or in the interview.
Be honest. It won't always get you the job, sometimes it might cost you the job, but if you sling BS either on your resume or in person, I guarantee it will cost you the best jobs out there.
Don't just look at networking toward those people who are involved in tech companies... There are plenty of non-tech companies out there who need programs written, and networks maintained. Computers have become such a major part of life that just about every company needs computer people, regardless of what they do! Not only will you gain good experience, but you'll learn a lot of new, interesting things that are completely unrelated to computer science. The beauty of computer science is that it can be applied to anything!
I started out as a word processing-lab assistant, for minimum wage, quickly graduated to the faculty lab, then on as a full sysadm running all the computer systems. Along the way, I picked up a TON of experience including Novell (hey! it was neat back in the day,) UNIX, Linux, and Cisco networking.
Medium-sized schools or bigger tend to be pretty well equipped, even if it's not readily visible (does you school have labs spread across multiple buildings, dorm-networking, wireless???)
I leveraged that into a good IT engineering position, and beyond.
Get in with your UCS/ACS/OIT/Whatever it's called, department, and you can learn a heck of a lot.
-buf
Your resume is basically one or two sheets of paper you've sent in as part of an application. What happens is this gets torn apart, possibly duplicated and passed around. Objectives are useful, if written appropriately. An objective isn't a one-liner to show how big of a goody goody two shoes you are, it lets the reader know what job you are applying for. In practice your resume gets a scant few seconds of recognition before it gets placed into a "keep" pile or the popular "on file for 3 months" pile. Once it gets to the keep pile it will whorl around several people's desk and they may or may not keep track of it very well or what it pertains to. Hence a specific objective, like "a career as a Software Engineer at Obscene Quantities of Money Investments." But how can you write a general resume and have a specific objective? Answer: you don't.
You should definately have a general resume for uses like your webpage and for unexpected solicitations. There shouldn't be an objective on it like "a job in a challenging environment where I learn new things all the time", or any objective at all. But when you send a resume to someone, it should be TARGETED to them. An objective for starters. And certifications that count help as well. If you're applying for a military software job, maybe a gun cert would be helpful, though usually service counts far more, and
But remember that a resume is supposed to be curt. Extras like your hobbies and maritial status are extraneous and come off as padding and awkward.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
It was an obvious lie involving an impossible number of years of experience for the technology in question. Even if he had invented it , he couldn't have had that many years.
You think you can't be caught? Fine, just go on thinking that. I'll never have to compete with you for a job.
Keep thinking that about background checks, too. There are agencies that specialize in getting exactly that kind of information, and it's a lot easier than you think.
Screwing over entry-level workers? Who? When? Where? You obviously have no idea what being screwed over even is.
When, exactly, did all these nameless companies tell people that if they got CS degrees they would get jobs? No one ever told me that. If you said a lot of people assumed that if they got a CS degree they would practically have lifetime employment, you'd be right. But that is very far from companies telling them that. No company every tells anyone anything like that. Sure, the jobs dried up. That isn't the fault of any of the companies who are hiring (or not) CS graduates today. Indeed, the companies that are hiring (or not) today are the ones that survived. If you want to find someone to blame for the jobs that dried up, you have to look first to the people that ran all the companies that *didn't* make it. The ones who burned through huge piles of VC cash on luxurious parties, foosball tables, video games, any sort of corporate extravagance you could name, astonishing salaries even for people with no experience and less skill, the whole dot-bomb nine yards.
I remained gainfully employed through the burst of the dot-com bubble. The only period I was unemployed was from June to September of last years, and that could be termed voluntary, since I relocated and resigned from my old job to do so. Now, of course, I'm working again. Those three positions I wrote about were newly created. The one I still have to fill is an existing one to replace someone who got an offer he couldn't refuse. I hated to see him leave, but it's a great opportunity and I'm glad it went to a deserving person. If he ever wants to come back here, the door is wide open.
Do you know why I remained gainfully employed through the jobs massacre that was the aftermath of the dot-com era despite the fact that I don't even have a CS degree? Contributing reasons are that I'm careful about choosing who I work for, and also probably a bit of plain old luck.
Another is that while I did not do my degree in CS, I do have a brain and skill, and I use both. But the capstone of all that is that I never misrepresented myself in any way to any employer, so what they saw was what they got, and I could fully deliver on everything I claimed.
If you talk the talk, but don't walk the walk, you'll be the first to go if there is belt-tightening.
Also, please keep this in mind: pretty much every employer has a clause in their personnel policy which says that if they ever discover that you lied about anything on your resume or application, references, anything at all, you can be fired. Now, read this very carefully and be sure it sinks in: there is no one in my section who is so good that, if I found that they had lied to me on their resume and been hired on that basis, he or she could expect to have me not want them fired. No one.
Now, I'm not looking for skeletons in their closets, because they all have been checked out, they all are honest people, and they are walking the walk. But just imagine a situation where someone takes a dislike to you and *does* want to find a skeleton in your closet. There had better not be one on your resume, because that resume is still on file and they could go through it with a fine-toothed comb looking for problems. If they find out you never worked at company XYZ, or you never really took course ABC, that's all they need to fire you with cause.
You seem very young, possibly even an unemployed CS graduate yourself, with very little experience in the working world, and not much in th
You're right, they don't need cause to fire you. Not here in California, either.
But as you mentioned, they need cause to have you denied unemployment. That's why they'd rather fire you with cause.
Also, if they have cause, it's a lot easier to defend against any action you might try to bring against them. If someone sues you for wrongful termination, the fact that you are an "at will" employer isn't much of a defense in court. You want to walk in there and cite exactly what that person did to deserve being fired.
Too many people, sometimes even people like yourself with "35 years in the computer field," don't know very basic things, things that can make them less effective than properly-trained CS graduates.
There are a relatively small number of interview questions for candidates that help us to drill down on this:
There are many more of these questions, of course, but one doesn't have to ask them all in order to make a quick and accurate assessment.
I have found over 17 years as a hiring manager that non-CS graduates often have troubling gaps in their knowledge base. Not everyone has the intellectual curiosity to cover, completely on their own, all the topics introduced in a rigorous 4-year degree program. And, on-the-job experience appears to be a poor substitute.