State of the market

[Keen2Work]

Response to 'State of the Market'

You said you had some interviews but failed them? The fact you are getting interviews means the market is ok, but the fact you are failing them means you are doing something wrong. Usually contractor interviews are just a formality to check you are ok and that your CV checks out.

Maybe you need to ask feedback about why you never got the roles after interviewing? Be honest with yourself, did you fluff them? Were you prepared? Did you show knowledge in the areas specified?

I am in .NET and haven't been on the bench unintentionally since I started.

Of course I'm doing something wrong - I'm not the preferred candidate.
No disrespect kandr, but I'm afraid I disagree with the statement that "the market is ok" just because I've been getting interviews, and that interviews are "just a formality". That's not been my experience of the last 25 years - win or loose. I'm certainly not getting interviews now.

I'm also fairly honest with myself, often know why I fail and try to learn from the experience. Do two or three failed interviews mean I've permanently blown it?

Just because someone has desireable skills and is in work, doesn't mean the market is strong in general - history shows that as a consequence of success, individuals presume the same opportunities must be open to everyone. I also generally find the you make your own luck point of view a bit patronising though to be clear, my comment isn't aimed at anyone in particular.

FWIW, my personal view is that the balance of supply and demand in our industry has shifted in recent years, meaning you have to be better at your job just to stay in work?
I also feel clients will not hire a contractor without recent on-the-job experience in a mixture of skills, and that skills mixes have changed significantly as clients have become more fussy?
The result is that (quoting from a famous novel) "in this land you have to run really fast just to stand still", and many of us may end up on the bench, permanently.
What can an individual in this position do?

One of my original objectives in this thread was to take the temperature of the market in general by the balance of responses. At the moment I would say the responses are generally more pessimistic - which has certainly been my personal experience.

[kandr]

Of course I'm doing something wrong - I'm not the preferred candidate.
No disrespect kandr, but I'm afraid I disagree with the statement that "the market is ok" just because I've been getting interviews, and that interviews are "just a formality". That's not been my experience of the last 25 years - win or loose. I'm certainly not getting interviews now.

I'm also fairly honest with myself, often know why I fail and try to learn from the experience. Do two or three failed interviews mean I've permanently blown it?

Just because someone has desireable skills and is in work, doesn't mean the market is strong in general - history shows that as a consequence of success, individuals presume the same opportunities must be open to everyone. I also generally find the you make your own luck point of view a bit patronising though to be clear, my comment isn't aimed at anyone in particular.

FWIW, my personal view is that the balance of supply and demand in our industry has shifted in recent years, meaning you have to be better at your job just to stay in work?
I also feel clients will not hire a contractor without recent on-the-job experience in a mixture of skills, and that skills mixes have changed significantly as clients have become more fussy?
The result is that (quoting from a famous novel) "in this land you have to run really fast just to stand still", and many of us may end up on the bench, permanently.
What can an individual in this position do?

One of my original objectives in this thread was to take the temperature of the market in general by the balance of responses. At the moment I would say the responses are generally more pessimistic - which has certainly been my personal experience.

Its very difficult to gauge the market, but I certainly think the last few months have picked up, compared to the previous year. I was getting no calls/emails for weeks on end at one point. Now I get calls every week, whether they are bonafide roles or just agents fishing is another question.

[swamp]

Normally getting interviews is the biggest hurdle. At the actual interview a good candidate should find it easy. This is what most contractors experience, and indeed contracting should really be about quick and easy hiring.

However, interviews can vary widely. On a big programme of work which kicks off and needs 30 developers ASAP, you will experience an easy interview Are you normal? Do you have only one head? That sort of thing.

Interviewing for a contract on an established team with one vacancy can be a very different matter. Lots of egos around on the project eager to prove how tough they are. The interview will be hell. In the current climate there are probably more of the second type of roles than the first. There are certainly not many big work programmes starting up right now.

[Aman]

I am considering a role in shipbuilding, Agent said he thinks he will be able to get me a Monday start. It'll pay the bills, including the accountant's bill which is due soon.

When I'm seeking refuge from the recession in shipbuilding, it means the economy is in bad shape (or just that there are jobs in shipbuilding).

My CVs could use a fresh perspective, I'm sick of the sight of them, particularly after recentky updaing agencies with 'fresh' revisions.

I've just seen a whole bunch of healthcare / biomed / medeng ads dated Thursday on one of the job sites I use, probably following the not-so-harsh spending review. I'm working though which ones I'll apply for, so maybe back to plan A for me. Plan B (Telecomms/IT) is too saturated with candidates and geographically and technologically all over the place.

[craig1]

I thought I'd finally register here rather than lurk.

For the first time in 10 years, I'm benched. Normally I start looking a month before the end of a contract and have a new one ready to start when I walk out the door but I'm now sat at home and have been for the best part of a month.

I spoke with one agent I trust last week about a role, he said he'd had over 650 applicants for it and the client was being very specific about candidates having very narrow industry sector experience despite there being no-one available on the market with that experience for quite a while. The client was apparently "desperate" and had upped the rate but still refused to consider anyone from outside of the narrow sector. I got a note this morning saying the client had cancelled the project due to not being able to find "skilled" contractors. The project was listed as an "datacentre PM" role in a fairly bland environment with nothing that indicated problems for non-sector PMs.

Another trusted agent said that the client was insisting the candidate "must have financial sector experience gained within the last six months" for a simple, vanilla server platform upgrade that any competent project manager could do in their sleep. The agent said the client threatened to delist them as a preferred supplier if he sent forward a CV without the financial sector experience.

I had another agency call me on Friday offering me an interview for a role at a client I'd worked for previously. In 2007 I was being paid £475 per day at that company, the agent said this new role was £200-£250 per day with a minimum six month tie-in contract. I contacted the guy I worked for at the client and he told me they were offering the sole agency £350 per day. Now that's one hell of an agency cut! Past experience means I know they won't contract directly with me and my contact said they would not pay higher than £350 a day to an agency so I ruled myself out.

I stuck my CV on the usual suspect job sites a few weeks ago, in that same day I received about 10 agency calls fishing for contacts at my blue-chip prior roles. Two insisted I provide two references before they'd send me the job spec, another asked me to do a "psychometric test" at my own cost, another would only put me forward if I were employed through their "preferred" umbrella company. All sent me LinkedIn requests and some of them got very huffy when I sent them my standard "you get me a good contract and I'll accept you on LinkedIn" reply, they couldn't understand that I was protecting my genuine contacts' privacy.

Another agent for a genuine role refused to put me forward for because they only contracted with "limited companies" and LLPs are "not a limited company"; this was a very, very large agency and she took advice from her "legal team". I could have easily set myself up a subsidiary ltd company but the contract was just not worth the hassle based on location, rate and duration.

If that's the state of the market then I'll probably take the rest of 2010 off, go do some training and get some beach time in and hope 2011 is better.

[BlasterBates]

I thought I'd finally register here rather than lurk.

For the first time in 10 years, I'm benched. Normally I start looking a month before the end of a contract and have a new one ready to start when I walk out the door but I'm now sat at home and have been for the best part of a month.....
.

Craig1, are you in banking/finance?

Beach sounds like a good idea.

[craig1]

Are you in banking/finance?

No, generic IT project management specialising in infrastructure work. Until now, I've not had problems with cross-sector work, in the last 20 years I've done everything from public sector work to telecoms and law firms to retail giants. In all those 20 years I've not seen such a narrow focus on specific industry skills over genuinely transferable experience.

[kandr]

There is a lot of contractors who didn't have any business contracting, they were under skilled and lacked excellence that contracting requires. Now the boom times have gone a lot are scratching their heads, wondering why they are benched, whereas the real contractors continue to invoice.

(Im not suggesting that applies to anyone here btw).

[gingerjedi]

You said you had some interviews but failed them? The fact you are getting interviews means the market is ok, but the fact you are failing them means you are doing something wrong. Usually contractor interviews are just a formality to check you are ok and that your CV checks out.

I would have agreed 18/24 months ago but back then they'd have already made their mind up on the strength of your CV, nowadays you'll often find they're interviewing 10 candidates from 100 CV's, yes you're doing well to be in the top 10% and get an interview but so have the other 9 guys.

Many people on here (including myself) had a 100% interview success rate up until a couple of years back, in recent months I've had dozens of interviews and despite positive feedback I keep getting beat by someone better/cheaper/closer... any number of reasons?

[kandr]

I would have agreed 18/24 months ago but back then they'd have already made their mind up on the strength of your CV, nowadays you'll often find they're interviewing 10 candidates from 100 CV's, yes you're doing well to be in the top 10% and get an interview but so have the other 9 guys.

Many people on here (including myself) had a 100% interview success rate up until a couple of years back, in recent months I've had dozens of interviews and despite positive feedback I keep getting beat by someone better/cheaper/closer... any number of reasons?

Where are you based?