Banging my head against a dead horse?

Hello there loyal reader! 

As you may have gathered from the heading, you find me at a phase of the job search where things are, perhaps, going other than entirely to plan!  Please, however,  don't get the impression that this means I have succumbed to the depths of despair - it's more in the nature of a 'road to Damascus' moment! 

I have, in essence, come to a point where the spotlight of much-needed self-examination and re-evaluation has thrown the shortcomings of my efforts into sharp relief.

"Explain yourself man!" I hear you cry (or at least the part of me that imagines you as a crusty old colonel in an Agatha Christie story does!)

To elucidate then....
     (i) It's reached a point where one week's list of applications for C++ positions is increasingly becoming indistinguishable from the previous one.
    (ii) Even the most hopeful initial responses to these applications soon tail off to nothing.  This particularly hit home with the previously mentioned response from Hewlett Packard (there I've said it!)
   (iii) I have been put in touch, by Robin at A4e, with a splendid organisation called FiftyON who provide 'Older Persons Employability Skills and Self Employment Training'.  In the course of my email exchanges with them regarding my CV it has become increasingly apparent to me (as I'm sure it has long been to those around me) that it's simply not realistic for me to keep knocking on the software development door.

The problem with this is that, while I've always been prepared to consider other employment avenues, I've never had the faintest idea what other jobs I might be suited to. (It boils down, basically to never really having had a clue what I want to do when I grow up!)

HOWEVER!!!!!

(Yes, this is the road to Damascus bit!) - while reflecting on this, it seeped through to my consciousness that a number of (apparently sane and sensible) people have recently asked me, quite independently, whether I've considered working as an employment advisor (for A4e or similar), as they think I'd be well suited to the task! 

My first reaction to this was along the lines of "I'm sorry, you appear to have mistaken me for somebody with a degree of self-confidence!"  Where the Pauline flash of light comes into things was the moment when I suddenly thought: "Hang on Matey" (I'm still in character in the whodunnit, since you ask!) "- all the assorted stuff I've been through lately has turned me into just that person!"

Quite how my lack of success (to date) in finding a job for myself, makes me a good candidate to assist others in their search, I'm not entirely sure - at least (I suppose) I'm hugely familiar with the process!  I'm not going to let that put me off though - if people who know me think I'm right for it, who am I to argue?

So, with the promise of help from Emily (still my A4e advisor, but not mentioned for a while) with the necessary and appropriate re-drafting of the CV, a new chapter begins......

Has it really been that long????

Greetings world!  I imagine some of you (assuming I still have a plurality of readers) thought/hoped I'd permanently disappeared from the radar.  This is (as I suppose is now self-evident) not the case.

A combination of circumstances (family bereavement, Royal Jubilee, closed libraries, lost wallet, cancelled A4E sessions, apathy, lethargy, inertia etc etc) conspired to keep me from you, but fear not (or possibly 'be very afraid!'), I'm back and raring to go!

I'm currently feeling somewhat boosted by a conversation I had earlier this week with a chap at a well-known two letter multinational computer company. (Think brown sauce, paying on the never-never etc!)  The boost came from the facts that (a) he was actually an employee of the company, not an agency, and (b) he assured me that he would put my CV in front of the appropriate managers straight away.

Unfortunately I made the basic rookie mistake of missing his name on the phone, and was too excited by the conversation to ask him to repeat it, so I'm a bit scuppered as far as follow-up calls are concerned.  I do, therefore, find myself wondering how long to maintain my level of buoyancy before allowing the life-jacket of optimism to be deflated by the slow-puncture of disappointment at not having received any feedback!

But enough negativity!  The North West Hampshire J.C. continues to inspire, in large part because the turnover of members seems increasingly to be driven by various individuals' successes in their search for the next step!  Hearty congrats (and hardly a hint of jealousy) to those who've managed to move on! 

We've also made considerable progress on setting up our skills-bank (via the use of a unique search-argument in LinkedIn, of which more later) and raising our public profile through the printing and distribution of some splendid glossy postcards.



The Wolversdene Club - Our New Home

 Our most recent meeting (at our new venue, Andover's Wolversdene Club) featured an intriguing presentation from Tony Field of Icon Business Solutions.  His observations revolved around treating the job search as a selling exercise, with yourself as the product. It was, for me, one of those special occasions when, although most of the factual content wasn't new, the abilities of the speaker and the angle from which he approached the information gave it a new resonance and really got the grey matter working.