<p>I ask all candidates (new grads on up through SVP’s) what other companies they are looking at or interviewing with. Any candidate can choose not to answer the question-- but I disagree that it’s “none of my business”. That’s one way companies weed out the “I’m shopping around for more money/less work but don’t really know what I want to do” vs. the serious candidates.</p>
<p>I would encourage new grads to rehearse an answer that shows that they’ve done some self-analysis on what they’re interested in. If you’re interviewing with Bank A you don’t need to cite Banks B and C to show that you’re interested in banking- especially if you’re not all that interested in banking per se. But if you’re interviewing for an entry level job in PR at a bank, a good answer might be “I’m a strong writer and am hoping to start my career in corporate communications with a company that has a high profile in the press. So I’m interviewing with your bank today-- and have a few other meetings scheduled with large companies which take media relations seriously.” That’s pretty non-committal, doesn’t present you as someone who is dying to work at a bank but who is also not interviewing randomly for jobs which don’t fit your skill set.</p>
<p>I regularly ding candidates who offer up the following:</p>
<p>“I’m interviewing with companies within a 10 mile radius of my boyfriends apartment so we can save on rent”; “I’m interviewing with company X since I know they pay for grad school”; “I’m interviewing with company Y because I love their casual Friday/flex time policies”.</p>
<p>People say dumb things in an interview. Don’t be one of them.</p>
<p>^^^This reminds me of The Office episode where the candidate wanted to make sure he had two weeks off to attend a family vacation in the Finger Lakes. So funny! And DON’T SPOIL WHO IT WAS!</p>
<p>Blossom, I think you’d have been satisfied with the answer I gave even before I had rehearsed an answer. So that makes me feel better about it.</p>
<p>Today’s interview went well, I think. It was pretty straightforward. At the end of it they took me on a tour of the office and introduced me-- individually-- to every single person who was in the office that day. It seems like interrupting every person in the office one by one wouldn’t be something they would do with someone they already know they aren’t hiring, even if they were only looking to see how I would handle myself in that situation. They said I should know in a week and a half. I really like this opportunity so I have my fingers crossed, it sounds like a really good place for me and I think I would be able to contribute a lot to their work.</p>
<p>I just got a call today from the company I interviewed with a month ago letting me know that I made the first cut, and I am interviewing with upper management on Friday. I already know there will be one more round of interviewing after that if I make it through round 2. I should be hearing definitively by the end of this week from the company from last week. Choosing between the two of these companies had been what I was hoping to avoid, and I thought I was out of the woods since it’d been so long since I heard from the first company… guess not. These were both the two opportunities that had me really excited, so it should be an interesting week.</p>
<p>I thought that I’d post an update for this week.</p>
<p>The Friday employment report was miserable showing the fewest added jobs in a month in a very long time. Basically job growth is deccelerating quickly which is not surprising giving the weakness in other economic indicators. Austan Goolsbee, Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers (for the White House), said that the economy is growing and that we should see improvements in the second half of the year.</p>
<p>Ben Bernanke, Chairman of the Federal Reserve echoed these sentiments yesterday in his speech. The markets were unconvinced and sold off yesterday and today. It appears that we will see no monetary of fiscal stimulus this summer, and, perhaps, a slide in the financial and jobs markets. I expect strong profits to continue for the second half but I have lost a lot of my optimism in the jobs market based on the May reports.</p>
<p>I will be watching for the June report and would be quite happy to be wrong.</p>
<p>One of the companies that he interviewed with updated him on his status. He was approved by the hiring manager and HR but now it goes up the management chain for their approvals. The person that has to approve it is traveling so he’s in limbo. My guess is that new hires have to get approved all the way up to senior management or close (that’s the way that we do it), so this could take a while.</p>
<p>The number of entry-level jobs showing up in the online jobs boards has declined. The number of jobs for experienced tech workers is still strong. My company is hiring but it appears that our minimum is now a Masters.</p>
<p>Son is about halfway through the book in his self-study and has finished two projects and is working on the third (there were three projects in the Stony Brook syllabus that he’s using). I expect him to finish the book and two other projects in two to three weeks.</p>
<p>The trader thing is progressing. Now I know what it’s like to have a full-service broker. I had an account at Salomon Smith Barney many years ago where commisions on a trade could cost $1,000 (before online trading was widespread). Son has made seven figures in trades for me over the past week. He wakes up and starts the streamer and keeps an eye on the market while he’s doing his studying. I give him instructions to make trades based on what is happening in the markets. Today, he called me while I was at the dentist and gave me some information and I subsequently instructed him to liquidate several positions which he did. I normally place my own orders which works when I’m near a computer and can watch the markets but today wasn’t one of those days.</p>
<p>So he’s studying and we’re waiting. I expect things to be pretty slow this summer and we’ll start discussing fall courses if we don’t see anything concrete in June.</p>
<p>I thought that I’d post an update for this week.</p>
<p>The Friday employment report was miserable showing the fewest added jobs in a month in a very long time. Basically job growth is deccelerating quickly which is not surprising giving the weakness in other economic indicators. Austan Goolsbee, Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers (for the White House), said that the economy is growing and that we should see improvements in the second half of the year.</p>
<p>Ben Bernanke, Chairman of the Federal Reserve echoed these sentiments yesterday in his speech. The markets were unconvinced and sold off yesterday and today. It appears that we will see no monetary of fiscal stimulus this summer, and, perhaps, a slide in the financial and jobs markets. I expect strong profits to continue for the second half but I have lost a lot of my optimism in the jobs market based on the May reports.</p>
<p>I will be watching for the June report and would be quite happy to be wrong.</p>
<p>One of the companies that he interviewed with updated him on his status. He was approved by the hiring manager and HR but now it goes up the management chain for their approvals. The person that has to approve it is traveling so he’s in limbo. My guess is that new hires have to get approved all the way up to senior management or close (that’s the way that we do it), so this could take a while.</p>
<p>The number of entry-level jobs showing up in the online jobs boards has declined. The number of jobs for experienced tech workers is still strong. My company is hiring but it appears that our minimum is now a Masters.</p>
<p>Son is about halfway through the book in his self-study and has finished two projects and is working on the third (there were three projects in the Stony Brook syllabus that he’s using). I expect him to finish the book and two other projects in two to three weeks.</p>
<p>The trader thing is progressing. Now I know what it’s like to have a full-service broker. I had an account at Salomon Smith Barney many years ago where commisions on a trade could cost $1,000 (before online trading was widespread). Son has made seven figures in trades for me over the past week. He wakes up and starts the streamer and keeps an eye on the market while he’s doing his studying. I give him instructions to make trades based on what is happening in the markets. Today, he called me while I was at the dentist and gave me some information and I subsequently instructed him to liquidate several positions which he did. I normally place my own orders which works when I’m near a computer and can watch the markets but today wasn’t one of those days.</p>
<p>So he’s studying and we’re waiting. I expect things to be pretty slow this summer and we’ll start discussing fall courses if we don’t see anything concrete in June.</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>My feeling is that the hiring process is really slow at companies given
current economic events. If son doesn’t have a job by the fall and the
economy and job markets do recover, then I’m going to tell him to apply
like mad in the fall.</p>
<p>The Beige Book report came out yesterday and the report was positive (more like not negative). From the FRB:</p>
<p>Commonly known as the Beige Book, this report is published eight times per year. Each Federal Reserve Bank gathers anecdotal information on current economic conditions in its District through reports from Bank and Branch directors and interviews with key business contacts, economists, market experts, and other sources. The Beige Book summarizes this information by District and sector. An overall summary of the twelve district reports is prepared by a designated Federal Reserve Bank on a rotating basis. </p>
<p>The report on New England indicated that economic activity is fairly strong with increased demands for certain products and services. Employers, though, are spending more on merit compensation instead of hiring additional workers. There are concerns over rising commodity prices. The report didn’t indicate concerns of a business slowdown. So it may be that the economic recovery continues but that it won’t feel like one to those without jobs.</p>
<p>Son is talking to a recruiter on the phone right now I think. Other than that, no new contacts other than the relatively good news early in the week.</p>
<p>Son saw the results of his trades earlier this week as the market is going through a slow motion correction which may morph into a crash. I think that he was somewhat amazed at how a few moves could have such a huge effect.</p>
<p>Had another interview today. I was there for two hours and had six different interviews, and they all seemed to go really well. One was a little bit harder than the others. I got a lot of coaching for interviewing with the woman that is doing round 3 if I make this cut, so it was interesting. I’ve never had an interview that long before, how exhausting! I guess we’ll see what happens now.</p>
<p>I don’t know how your son is doing it, BCEagle. I am already so burnt out on interviewing that I couldn’t even work up the energy to get nervous for the one today.</p>
<p>My S has his first interview on Monday. The guy told him to be prepared for an hour interview. I have mixed feelings, the job is in our town and I am not sure I am ready for my S to come home. The job doesn’t pay much but might teach him a skill he is weak in. It also will start as part time with potential for full time work if they like him and his skills.
I know the job isn’t what my S is looking for but on the other hand in this economy I wonder if he should take any job he can get.</p>
<p>My husband and I got of engineering grad school in May, 1986, the same month that we got married and that oil prices tumbled from $27 to $13 a barrel. We had excellent GPAs and experience. The job offer I had lined up was rescinded because of the devastated Texas economy, and my new husband had no luck at all in-state. </p>
<p>So we sent out 273 resumes all over the country, from Maine to Hawaii. Only a handful of people contacted us, most of whom regretted they had no jobs to offer. After about six months, we ended up each getting offers in Albuquerque and Portland, Maine. You can tell from my screen name where we ended up! We are truly thankful for the difficult start, because we love our adopted state. Now we have our own business that we run out of our house. Things couldn’t have turned out better!</p>
<p>Great story of perserverance, Maine. Seems that sometimes when tough times come about, those that stick to it end up turning a bad deal into a great situation.</p>
<p>I’m a working engineer pretty happy with my job, but like most of us I get solicitations from recruiters over the phone or in my email box. I recently got one from a company called Epic. I know nothing about this company except it sounds interesting. It’s a medical IT products place, but, and it looks like they are huiring from a wide variety of majors.</p>
<p>I know nothing about this company really, only that they look interesting. I get these types of things all the time and this was the first one in a long while that looked interesting enough to click onto the website. Maybe everybody already knows about this place, it may even have a horrible reputation. But if not, I’m just passing it along.</p>
<p>During one job search (a long time ago) I was promised a job that they basically guaranteed. THey stalled me through six weeks saying “an offer was coming” before telling me it fell through. After that I spent 6 months and probably 100 interviews before getting hired. So I have some idea of what these young people are going through.</p>
<p>I was at an event last night and spoke with a couple of hiring
managers at a large Boston-area tech company. They basically told me
how hard it is to hire people right now - they both see a pretty sharp
labor shortage and this confirms what I’m seeing in the job bulletin
boards. Employers do, for the most part, want specific skills. It
seems that a Masters or Phd will substitute for specific skills.</p>
<p>Son got offered a research internship for the summer out of the blue -
it involves some specific skills that he has. I’m going to suggest
that he accept it (he hasn’t seen it yet) and continue the job search.</p>
<p>Yesterday I was perusing the Dept. of Energy website, and the R and R Website, both of which list the many projects and companies to which the government has given money. There is
also an employment page for the DOE with listings in all disciplines. It looked like a good resource for job searchers. There was also a section with grants given, broken down by state.</p>
These were both the two opportunities that had me really excited, so it should be an interesting week.</p>