Forgot how bad job searching was :(

[NickK]

Which is what I did. It's also the advice given by the coach I saw and from the national careers service website.

I'm now desperately trying to find my GCSE and A Level exam certificates. It's over twenty years ago and if I can't find them, I may well be screwed! ��

20 years ago.. so basically they have no bearing on your current abilities then... most people aren't interested in beyond 7 years ago.. other than showing a background and your history.

So I get on vacation, come back and one agent is nolonger working for that agency with no info.. the other is 'active' and the third I should find out today if I'm shortlisted after a telephone interview on Wednesday.

Still looking..

 

[Quinnaay]

So I've recently passed an assessment for an well paid Apprenticeship Electrical maintenance engineer (fitter type role) Im at the next stage which is group discussion, factory tour and a individual competency interview. Now I'm curious on your takes for what sort of questions they may ask me just to prep.

 

[rodo]

Finally found a new project job a couple of weeks ago and finished at my current employer today. Moving from one large american IT monster to another but it's a nice pay rise and hopefully more varied work. It's taken a year of looking and applying to find the right role but I'm glad eventually I've moved a rung up the career ladder. I've just got to manage long weeks with a new employer alongside studying for my PMP. Nice feeling of persistence paying off.

 

[NickK]

Job interview tomorrow - local place too.. really I think this would be my ideal job (commute is about 15 minutes!).

Shirts, tie, suit - check, polished shoes - check, just reading up on the company and products for a second time.. before a final recap tomorrow.

 

[Psypher5]

Hi dude, completely missed this. Can you elaborate at all? 'Games' is something I've been interested in but unless you have some mega portfolio it seems ridiculous to get in to? That and there probably isn't anything near me

QA Testing is usually an good job to get "in" to the game industry and work up from there.

Not seen previous posts, but if you have ever done software testing, it's a very fresh, and satisfying job move.

 

[NickK]

Job interview tomorrow - local place too.. really I think this would be my ideal job (commute is about 15 minutes!).

Shirts, tie, suit - check, polished shoes - check, just reading up on the company and products for a second time.. before a final recap tomorrow.

Well I got the feedback yesterday after a 2 hour discussion interview - the CEO likes me, so I'm into round two of the interviews with possibly four other candidates however according to the agent I'm a favourite (naturally as the agent smells money!). So a week gap - still need to continue looking for jobs in the mean time.

 

[Delvis]

QA Testing is usually an good job to get "in" to the game industry and work up from there.

Not seen previous posts, but if you have ever done software testing, it's a very fresh, and satisfying job move.

Many, many moons ago. Where can you search for such jobs like this?

I've been looking at job sites on and off for ages now, I'm sick of it, I have a job...I just want a career I can work up in. All I seem to look towards on job sites are Helpdesk based ones, which I don't want to be doing any more!

 

[Rids]

Found myself approaching a couple of recruitment consultants today - time to look for a new place of employment.

Had a great 18 months at work, progressed massively, passed 6 exams with results of a further two expected in a couple of weeks. Took on a great deal more responsibility, work that would usually be done by fully qualified accountants, did it faster and better than it has ever been done before. Had a great end of year review 4.7 out of 5.

Two weeks ago was told that my rating (along with everybody else in London Finance) was being scaled back by a full point, the results achieved by our team were just too high above the company average. No matter that we absolutely crushed all the objectives set and worked god knows how many hours doing it, blanket reduction, I'm now at a 3.7 rating. Spoke to the Finance Director who agreed whole-heartedly with me, however the MD has made the decision and it is what it is.

Just had my pay review through, 2.5% uplift on Salary and a £500 bonus. The company had the best year it has ever had since I've been here, yet my bonus is down massively and my pay review is a joke. I am also taking on a huge amount of responsibility, Finance Lead on a huge project that is expected to take 4 years to complete.

The final straw came when I was asked to recruit to backfill my role, to cover me when I'm off on this project. The salary range on offer for the role I do now is £5k more than I'm being paid currently.

It really feels like they don't want to keep me. I've spoken to colleagues and other managers within the organisation and they tell me they can see no reason for it, but god knows.

So yeah, any decent accountancy roles for a finalist, preferably working in the city, hit me up!

 

[NickK]

Continuing to plough through online vacancies can make it really depressing. Really searching hard core now as I'm half way through the money and we need some savings for IVF.. which is really like having an open wound, sticking the knife in and adding more salt for good measure - no one is to blame, just redundancy and life.. so focusing on getting moving with more opportunities.

Linkedin is 99% silent rejection rate - the 1% actually responding to reject. I've switched attention to jobs boards - these seem to have a better response rate and with agents requesting

The local opportunity is still in the fire - so that's all to play for but currently waiting for the next stage.

Got a few pieces of interest - just waiting to hear back on a possible phone interview sometime this week too.

It's just so damn annoying that you spend all your time applying, with a cover letter and etc just get no response. HR via scanning software really is down to buzzwords.

 

[Windle]

Continuing to plough through online vacancies can make it really depressing. Really searching hard core now as I'm half way through the money and we need some savings for IVF.. which is really like having an open wound, sticking the knife in and adding more salt for good measure - no one is to blame, just redundancy and life.. so focusing on getting moving with more opportunities.

Linkedin is 99% silent rejection rate - the 1% actually responding to reject. I've switched attention to jobs boards - these seem to have a better response rate and with agents requesting

The local opportunity is still in the fire - so that's all to play for but currently waiting for the next stage.

Got a few pieces of interest - just waiting to hear back on a possible phone interview sometime this week too.

It's just so damn annoying that you spend all your time applying, with a cover letter and etc just get no response. HR via scanning software really is down to buzzwords.

If you're struggling to get interviews, or are getting a lot of rejections I'd go back to source and reassess my CV and the opportunities you are applying for.

 

[NickK]

If you're struggling to get interviews, or are getting a lot of rejections I'd go back to source and reassess my CV and the opportunities you are applying for.

I think the CV is sound, it's also had considerable review/reworking with help from a Penna coach.

I think the main issue is that the CV is perhaps to much "I do everything" simply because I have had to - product management, programme management, project management, technical management.. which the man in the middle (agent) finds difficult to match and the main response from agents is "perhaps too senior for position" or "have applicants that are better suited" (due experience in the domain outside of mobile).. perhaps I should just target CTO level instead

Part of the issue is that mobile as a domain is fast vanishing - being replaced by the need for X domain with mobile domain experience. Product Management is partly about the domain - hence a bit of a circular scenario. It's that which is causing the problem. Then multiply that by the linkedin effect.

 

[InvaderGIR]

Taylor your CV to show what industry / area you actually want a career in, don't just list everything.

I've had reason to start applying again and redid my CV for a company to show what I'm after and capable of despite having done a large amount of general rubbish. I sent my CV in and got an instant response that they wanted to interview. Got through that without issue and had a second stage which I don't think went as well due to being grilled with generic HR questions and not really being prepared for that (was told it'd just be a chat with the person to see if I fit there). I'll find out about that role sometime this week.

I'm also thinking about changing industries / sectors and if I decide to do that or find a role that I'd like outside of software then again, I'll be rewriting my CV to suit each role I apply for.

Having gone through the process with this company direct, I think I'm just going to have to find companies I can apply directly to, the response rate seems to be much more favourable than with pushy recruiters, plus I don't have to deal with the people I dislike.

 

[NickK]

Taylor your CV to show what industry / area you actually want a career in, don't just list everything.

I've had reason to start applying again and redid my CV for a company to show what I'm after and capable of despite having done a large amount of general rubbish. I sent my CV in and got an instant response that they wanted to interview. Got through that without issue and had a second stage which I don't think went as well due to being grilled with generic HR questions and not really being prepared for that (was told it'd just be a chat with the person to see if I fit there). I'll find out about that role sometime this week.

I'm also thinking about changing industries / sectors and if I decide to do that or find a role that I'd like outside of software then again, I'll be rewriting my CV to suit each role I apply for.

Having gone through the process with this company direct, I think I'm just going to have to find companies I can apply directly to, the response rate seems to be much more favourable than with pushy recruiters, plus I don't have to deal with the people I dislike.

I agree - and with the Penna coach we've pretty much gone through customising the CV and job market behaviour such as linked in non-response rate (this is 73% according to Penna) vs the far high direct or even via your network.

The annoying thing is that many job boards do not allow you to maintain multiple customised CVs but do allow cover letters to be customised (which I do when possible).

However, getting off my hobby horse, I think you're right - there's a rework in my future and far more customisation. I think possibly the language used may be confusing for domain people rather than mobile+domain....

 

[InvaderGIR]

Update...just had a call with an offer for the position I applied direct. Amazing.

 

[Delvis]

Update...just had a call with an offer for the position I applied direct. Amazing.

Awesome news

I'm really down in the dumps today, wanting to change jobs but literally no idea where to go now, keep going round and round in circles.

 

[Repta]

Interestingly I have had more success just using a generic cv and cover letter for every job than tailoring them for each job. 4 months of nothing with tailored to in 3 weeks, 1 interview, 4 phone interviews and 2 assessments days to come with the same generic cv and cover letter.

 

[NickK]

Interestingly I have had more success just using a generic cv and cover letter for every job than tailoring them for each job. 4 months of nothing with tailored to in 3 weeks, 1 interview, 4 phone interviews and 2 assessments days to come with the same generic cv and cover letter.

There in lies the problem - it's a trade off, on an opportunity by opportunity basis, of time spend vs getting past any form of filtering mechanism to actually have a human read scan over it.

Still, I have a phone interview later this week and an offsite interview day some point next week with two companies. Both are interesting jobs - more tech related.

 

[dr_volki]

just had a call and been invited for an interview next Tuesday
funnily I didn't even do anything, someone found my linkedin and got in touch.

 

[Quinnaay]

Got a practical assessment and short interview for an Craft engineering apprenticeship with Northern Powergrid. Awesome career if successful, however the job I applied for was a plant maintenance fitter role, they also do overhead cables linesman roles etc and I've a feeling these practical tests will be abit of everything as it says it's outdoors and to wear outdoor gear. Problem 1 what do I wear without looking scruffy, problem two I hate heights.. Most definitely going to have to suck it up and deal with it as the career is what I'd really want once filtered down the path I desire if I was to be successful.

 

[FortuitousFluke]

Seems to be a wealth of information in here so I'm hoping I can enlist some assistance.

My partner has been a store manager in a retail environment (small/medium sized Jewellery Store) for about 4-5 years, the job is stable but she doesn't enjoy it and the amount of responsibility she has is incredible.

She's not got a clear vision of what she wants to do but she know she wants out of the sector. The issue is that I'm having trouble working out where she could move on to. I've tried agencies, more to get an idea of what to pitch at, but they turn up nothing.

She has some IT, admin experience and has good experience of managing and motivating a staff team, budgetary control, meeting targets etc. Current pay is £20k but I'm starting to think we may need to take a hit for a few years whilst she starts at the bottom in a new industry. Has anybody made a transition from retail management to another sector? I'd really appreciate any tips.