This thread is inspired by some of the changes I have encountered since the last time I was actively looking for work.

No longer does the Sunday paper come packed with endless columns of fine print. No longer is every day spent endlessly dialing the phone, or trudging from office to office. Now it's all in the 'inter-sphere.'

With a multitude of job sites, and other places to post your resume, the great computer rapidly attempts to steer you to an appropriate lead.

Sometimes these matches are something only the internet can connect; I mean, how does a search for an 'electrician' result in the US Army inviting you to join a mortar platoon?

Today, however, took the cake. Advised of a new posting, I eagerly opened the e-mail. The job? Kangaroo Keeper. I kid you not.

Maybe I'll take a job with the circus as a human cannonball. After all, the pays allright, the benefits are great, I get to shoot the bull with the world's smartest aps (Thank you, Webb Wilder!)

I know reno. What about all the places where you fill out a complete application on line. Only to get told to come to the office to fill out the same complete thing on their computer.
Than they send you a post card saying sorry we don't have any postions available.

I am still registered on the state bid web site for electrical inspector positions in a process that made it look very specific. I get requests to bid on all sorts of things. The other day I got a posting for database analysis that sounding interesting to me but it certainly is not in my profile with the state.

Some of these job sites use keywords to offer options to what you are intersted in. I get all kinds of oddball notices because one of the words was facility.

I work for my federal govt. Despite of all the BS I have to put up with, its a job and a full paycheck, every payday. If anyone out there is cosidering working for Uncle Sammy, I would glady answer any of your questions. Each agency works in their own weird way so I will try my best. The following link is off of fedjobs.gov, the offical website for federal jobs.

http://jobsearch.usajobs.gov/search...jbf565=&caller=default.aspx&pg=1

Well... times are sort of tough right now... and let's face it... those kangaroo's aren't going to clean up after themselves.

Fed Jobs: That's the only Industry growing right now.

I will with hold further comment.

Are you not experienced in kangaroo maintenance?

Spot ya digger!

From what I hear from Rolf Harris you just tie them down.

Not for electricians. The numbers are down across the board. There is half the jobs that use to be on the board. A paycheck is better then going hungry.

.... and I want my wallaby back, Jack!

I've actually received a few -very few- rejection slips. I suppose it is nice that they responded at all ... though the expressed reason rarely makes any sense. Sometime you don't even get that much.

A few places immediately removed me from consideration - and, in the internet age, there's no one to speak with, or any means of inquiring as to the 'why.' Quite often, there's a blunt refusal to talk to you.

Ironically, the bureaucracy bound, budget stressed city hall has been the most responsive, and reasonable, of the bunch. That's still no substitute for a paycheck - but everyone else ought to be ashamed!

And, frankly, that kangaroo job is looking better. While the job's not quite local, it's only a short hop ...

Sure, here he is:

Around here it is more like "see you later alligator"

If someone offered me a job wrangling kangaroos, I'd take it. Seriously.

RH1,
Have you ever seen a 'roo up close?
Think a taller Mike Tyson, without the lisp and tatts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_D-LmRNdQiQ
With visual aids for those too young to remember this wobbleboard hit.

And the artist's website...
http://www.rolfharris.com/

Joe
PS: I find that Roos go well with Fish Heads...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTpUVAcvWfU

We've been through this before. I don't have a solution, but the future is clear. When work is hard to find many electricians start out on their own. The abundance of electricians working out of their homes drives prices down and the companies with overhead like offices, secretaries and estimators can't find work and lay off even more electricians. The handy-men who do unlicensed electrical work because the market is good will be joined by handy-men who can't find enough fences to build. Wages will go down.

When this happened in the mid 1980's, I was a good union member and refused to take a pay cut that wasn't approved by the union. Then, I was an unemployed electrician who had a past employer who hated me and told prospective employers that I was a union trouble-maker. Finally, I was so broke that I couldn't afford the union dues. My employer paid the court-ordered settlement to the union lawyer and the money disappeared. I never saw a penny and the union office was closed to me.

The lesson I learned is to take the pay cut because it's every dog for himself. It'll be a few years before it gets better, but it gets better for those actually working as electricians, first. Finding a job after being out of the trade for a decade is next to impossible.

I hope I'm wrong. I really hated installing cable tv for flat rate. I'm with RH1 and I don't care what a kangaroo looks like. It can't be any uglier than a cable company. Sorry about the rant, but it still bothers me and I still refuse to watch cable tv.

With the economy in the shape it is in a smaller pay check is better the no paycheck. It's so bad out there that most employers will not hold it against you taking odd jobs. They know that you need to eat and your willingness to work. When I got started and got laid off, I took a job sorting and packing parts because i had two girls at home to feed. Gaps in resumes are a little more accepted but if you can fill them in today's economy, that will work in your favor.

Employers are also in the driver seat when it comes to who works for them. There's is a big line outside the door of people who want you job for less then they are paying you.

If you go into a interview be ready to ask the big question when the interviewer asks you, "Why should I hire you over the hundrend other applicants?" If you can not answer or give a canned generic answer, chances are, you are toast. Do your homework, practice what you are going to say and be confident. We play with electricity for a living. One of the tricks I use is look at the walls of perspective employer and look at the certificates, pictures, and awards. See if you have some sort of connection to any of them then bring it up in the interview.

I went through a layoff a year ago. Got a bunch of resume books and most of them said to avoid the internet. The funny part is, every prospective job, as well as the job I finally took, were offers I got through on-line postings.

There were probably twenty internet postings for every word-of-mouth or newspaper listing. It's just the direction things are going.

The down side is that I've found people seem to treat internet communication with far less professionalism. I'd get responses from multi-national companies that said stuff like:
"so when cab you come in for an interview. thx. julie"

Make sure you keep your professional face on even if they don't.

-John

I think you have to be careful of the publication date of books in the internet age. Things that may have been true 5 years ago are dated now. Who would have thought Craigs list would have wiped out the whole newspaper advertising business 5 years ago? I am amazed an the response I get to ads there.

Greg ... funny you should mention that ...

I got the best job offer I've seen -literally-since 1978, within a time frame of a few days, by responding to an ad on Craigs' List.

Real company, real benefits, etc. I was hired within a week of my responding to the ad.