Life on the bench: in my dressing gown

[NickFitz]

It's the sleepless nights that are the worst bit.

Lying there in the dark not knowing when circumstances will change.

Beating yourself up for making 'career' decisions that seemed valid at the time but, with hindsight, are no longer valid.

Feeling bad about not being able to answer questions from family and friends that want to help: "So when do you think you'll get a job?".

Trying not to get angry about questions from people that don't understand: "Have you considered looking on the InterNet to look for a job? How can you be in IT and out of work? Have you considered one of those government training programmes?"

And when a close friend finally confesses her life is going wrong and could do with a little help, not being able to help - that hurts.

Oh well. I'll go back to watching online techie training videos. At least then I'll feel like I'm doing something about the situation. Or I'll finally fall asleep!

[sweetandsour]

It's the sleepless nights that are the worst bit.

Lying there in the dark not knowing when circumstances will change.

Beating yourself up for making 'career' decisions that seemed valid at the time but, with hindsight, are no longer valid.

Feeling bad about not being able to answer questions from family and friends that want to help: "So when do you think you'll get a job?".

Trying not to get angry about questions from people that don't understand: "Have you considered looking on the InterNet to look for a job? How can you be in IT and out of work? Have you considered one of those government training programmes?"

And when a close friend finally confesses her life is going wrong and could do with a little help, not being able to help - that hurts.

Oh well. I'll go back to watching online techie training videos. At least then I'll feel like I'm doing something about the situation. Or I'll finally fall asleep!

Mate, you're not the only one.

When the contracting is going well it is a good life, when it goes bad

As to the unwanted questions from friends and family - when things were going well I would never let on to my non-contracting friends and family how much I was earning. Now, if they make me feel awkward I do tell them that a period resting is part and parcel of earning £75 an hour when demand is higher. I find that shuts them up.


I only ever earned £75 an hour on one contract but they are not to know that.

[Sysman]

Beating yourself up for making 'career' decisions that seemed valid at the time but, with hindsight, are no longer valid.

Did that last night. Coming across an article about an ex-colleague who has done extremely well didn't help.

Feeling bad about not being able to answer questions from family and friends that want to help: "So when do you think you'll get a job?".

Trying not to get angry about questions from people that don't understand: "Have you considered looking on the InterNet to look for a job? How can you be in IT and out of work? Have you considered one of those government training programmes?"

That one definitely hurts. Also when presenting yourself for a permie job you get "Why on earth do you want to pack in being self employed? You must be raking it in working for yourself."

Trying to persuade a young relative not to go into IT is a thankless task as well.

And when a close friend finally confesses her life is going wrong and could do with a little help, not being able to help - that hurts.

That must hurt a lot. You have my sympathy.

[RichardCranium]

Last week I had to add another 10 loose-leaf pockets to my applications folder; I had gone over 90 concurrent active applications. That's what comes of applying for everything where I stand any kind of chance. In this market, that's a waste of time and energy; I probably spent 80% of my waking hours to searching, finding and applying for work last week and got no 'phone calls or emails in response. None.

I've done my Monday morning weeding of my records and discarded the 16 applications I made in the week of a month ago for which I have heard nothing back.

So I have decided: new week, new approach.

I spent some time setting up alerts on the web job boards last week. I will now get a message pop up in Firefox if a suitable gig appears. So, other than the occasional specific search, I'm not going to bother looking. I'm am going to spend this week doing study into technical stuff instead. (And following CUK, of course.)

This has been prompted by some threads lately. I came into IT because I wanted to be a programmer. I ended up a full-time project manager, which I find dull. So I am going back to my roots.

RC in Kunta Kinte mode.

[TiroFijo]

[QUOTE=This has been prompted by some threads lately. I came into IT because I wanted to be a programmer. I ended up a full-time project manager, which I find dull. So I am going back to my roots.

RC in Kunta Kinte mode.[/QUOTE]

Good move, I've been an analyst\programmer since I graduated and I'm now 43 and quite happy still doing it. I do JEE and everything that goes with it and I had quite a lot of interest in my CV last year I was looking.

I did the Prince2 course (was paid for by the client!) on one of my last contracts. Apart from doing the course I've never done any project management and long may it continue!

[zeitghost]

ZeitGhost in "Chicken George" mode.

Whatever that was/is/maybe.

As long as you don't go into the mode where someone chops yer foot off, you'll be ok.

Though I suppose if someone does chop yer foot off, then at least you could claim disability.

[George Parr]

Mate, you're not the only one.

HEAVEN KNOWS I'M MISERABLE NOW

I was happy in the days of an invoiced hour
But heaven knows I'm miserable now
I am looking for a job but I can't find a job
And heaven knows I'm miserable now

In my life
Why do I spend valuable time
Calling agents who don't care if I
Live or die

Today Jobserve worked fine, I applied for nine
But heaven knows I'm miserable now
I am waiting for a call but I don't get a call
And heaven knows I'm miserable now

In my life
Oh why do I spend valuable time
Calling agents who don't care if I
Live or die

What they asked of me on the interview day
Was really a piece of cake
"But you've been on the bench too long" they said
And I naturally fled

In my life
Oh why do I smile
At agents who I'd much rather
Kick in the eye

I was happy in the days of a conjugal hour
But heaven knows I'm miserable now
"No, you've been on the dole too long" she said
I had a noodle instead

In my life
Why do I spend valuable time
On CUK just to get my
post count high

[NeverBeenNorthOfTheM25]

It's the sleepless nights that are the worst bit.

Lying there in the dark not knowing when circumstances will change.

Beating yourself up for making 'career' decisions that seemed valid at the time but, with hindsight, are no longer valid.

Feeling bad about not being able to answer questions from family and friends that want to help: "So when do you think you'll get a job?".

Trying not to get angry about questions from people that don't understand: "Have you considered looking on the InterNet to look for a job? How can you be in IT and out of work? Have you considered one of those government training programmes?"

And when a close friend finally confesses her life is going wrong and could do with a little help, not being able to help - that hurts.

Oh well. I'll go back to watching online techie training videos. At least then I'll feel like I'm doing something about the situation. Or I'll finally fall asleep!

Dude I feel guilty now having just got a new contract

Anyway get back into programming. Any and every numpty can be a project manager (not saying you were a bad one, but trust me, Ive worked with plenty that couldnt organise a p 1$$ up in a brewery.)

[cojak]

You'd be so disappointed!

I have worked with poets, cartoonists, comics, multi-linguists, beauties, those that bring in food, flirts, story-tellers, charmers, spontaneous wits and all manner of other talented people. Sadly, I have no social skills to offer beyond honesty and openness, so to compensate I just try to do the best job I can.

I'm a focussed, stuffed-shirt, shiny-suited, smart-arse in the guise of a professional project manager who assimilates the organisation's culture and rapidly infiltrates the supposed process chains, then uses the organisation's weaknesses against itself to enforce better practices. After a few weeks, when the cogs are moving uncommonly smoothly and happily yet the squeaky wheels are wondering why they no longer have anything to do, you will have forgotten I am there. Until I have worked out what the organisation needs to change to become a centre for excellence. Shortly after that the key decision suggesters will be coming to you singing a common tune (that they have individually thought up, of course) that you don't want to hear but know to be true.

All you will have seen of me is me stomping around in a foul mood unless my eye is caught, in which case I am insanely cheerful, miserable, optimistic and cynical - simultaneously.

Then you will discover the projects you wanted me to do are finished and your staff are elated with what they have achieved and you barely knew the projects were running.

Around the same time, you will get semi-formal complaints about me from one or two middle-managers: the squeaky wheels, people that have never done a day's work in their lives. Don't worry too much; such people leave of their own accord before I do, and they will not be missed.

And then I won't be there either; I shall be on another client site, slipping between the teams like mercury, filling the gaps between the resources like a pontoon bridge, taking the raw edges off the processes like diamond paste and stroking egos with a velvet-wrapped house-brick. Whilst undermining the prejudices, preconceptions and assumptions.

And you won't even notice how many prejudices, preconceptions and assumptions no longer exist in your organisation.

And I chuck all that in for free, because I do it keep myself amused and have no idea how to sell it as a skill.

Manipulating a corporate culture to one's own ends is such an exquisite delight, don't you think?

And you say you have no skills beyond honesty.

I have never seen a more lyrical and poetic description of a good PM anywhere...

[RichardCranium]

Though I suppose if someone does chop yer foot off, then at least you could claim disability.

I doubt that would be sufficient these days. But if they do, I wanna prosthetic like the bloke I saw just before Xmas.

It was cold and wet out but he was wearing shorts. On his feet were trainers but only a sock on his right foot. His left leg from the knee down was a Terminator-style leg. (Actually, he probably had an artificial left foot too, now I come to think of it.) It was a highly polished rod with a couple of narrower rods either side, and a black and shiny socket affair his knee went into. It losoked futuristic and hydraulic. I expected it to either give off steam at the joint as he walked, or to go "Pssshhhh, hissssss" instead. But it didn't. Sadly.

So, none of your rubbishy flesh-coloured artificial stuff and walking with a dodgy limp for me, matey boy. I want proper bionics.

Too sporty and cheap. I want bionic.
Too plastic. I want bionic.
Rubbish pink foot. I want bionic.
It's mechanical. I want bionic.
Android isn't good enough. I want bionic.
Metallic red is good. I want bionic.
Not sci-fi horrific. I want bionic.
Like this. Bionic. And I'd wear shorts too.

And if I can't have bionic, I'm having one of these. No, sod it, that's a permie's leg.

This is a contractor's artificial leg.