2473: Closing Date

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It is the closing date for applications for a job I’d actually quite like tomorrow. Supposedly the closing date marks the time when said job will actually start shortlisting applicants, so no-one will have heard anything back from it yet.

This particular job application sticks in my mind because the process was much more than the usual CV and coverletter crapshoot that 95% of positions seem to require. Rather, the application process was more of a “virtual interview”, with a number of questions specifically designed to let the applicant talk about the ways their skills and experience make them eminently suitable for the job.

This strikes me as a good way of finding someone that you would actually like to work for you, because it allows the applicant much more opportunity to talk specifics about how they think they will suit the position, and it allows the employer much more opportunity to judge the applicant through specific examples rather than the usual generic rubbish people put in cover letters about being “passionate” and “enthusiastic” about things no-one in their right mind is passionate and enthusiastic about.

I understand why the majority of positions advertise on the big sites and simply require a CV and cover letter, mind you — with the sheer number of positions each company has to fill, it would probably be impractical to 1) design a unique questionnaire for each position and 2) have someone actually go through the answers in detail rather than simply judging on the basis of a CV and cover letter — perhaps only superficially in some cases.

That said, the organisation that is recruiting for the position I mentioned — I’m not giving specifics just yet because I don’t want to jinx anything — is not exactly a small operation, and doubtless employs hundreds of people for its various roles at the very least. And if they can find the time to produce a tailor-made questionnaire specifically for the position that I’ve applied for, it would be nice to see other companies following suit.

Surely it would be for the best in the long run? It’s pretty easy to lie on CVs and in cover letters, whereas if you’re given specific, directed questions it’s a lot harder to bullshit your way through them if you don’t actually have the answers. For once, I actually felt like I had the answers to the questions and could speak from a position of confidence rather than the subservient position of self-justification that I normally feel like I’m in. That made me feel pretty good about the application — though naturally it will also make me feel pretty bad if I don’t get the position, because it feels like the first good opportunity that has come my way in quite a long time.

I would like a normal life with a normal job. Instead, I’m currently working 7 days a week for peanuts doing something mind-numbingly boring and physically tiring. But I guess I should be semi-grateful, at least: peanuts is, after all, greater than zero, and I hope — I wish more than anything — that this is only temporary, and that good things will come to me soon.

I have to hope that, because the other possibility is becoming increasingly unbearable to contemplate.

#oneaday, Day 165: I’ll Job You In A Minute

The astute amongst you will have noticed from the frequency of my tweeting, Facebook updating and the fact I had time to draw several cack-handed Paintbrush portraits of a few friends today that I still am not in possession of gainful employment. The supply teaching seems to have dried up, too—and yes, I am chasing them up before anyone even thinks about nagging me about it—so there’s not a lot to do each day except do the rounds on the Internet desperately trying to see if there are any jobs worth doing.

Job hunting, as I’ve said before, is a distressing, depressing experience. Jump onto a jobseekers’ website and you’re confronted with the possibility of “OMG THOUSANDZ OF JOBZ 2 CHOOSE FROM!!” and only then do you realise you have absolutely no idea what sector you’re qualified to work in. A huge list of job types appear in front of you, and not one of them seems to quite fit with what you want to do. Am I interested in “Printing and Publishing”? Or “Media”? Or “New Media”? Or “Web Content”? Or “Information Technology”? God knows.

So you tick all the boxes. Then you get told you’re only allowed to tick three at a time. So you pick the three that you think are most relevant and tell it to search. It soon becomes apparent why you’re only allowed to tick three boxes. That’s because ticking just three boxes gives you roughly thirty-two thousand listings to look through, the vast majority of which are miscategorised. That’s not a word, according to the spellchecker, but I’m officially coining it here and now.

I digress. The fact is that there’s a ton of jobs listed that have nothing to do with the categories they’re listed in. How is an “IT Sales Executive” anything to do with the “Travel and Tourism” sector? Answer: it’s not. Bored or underhanded recruiters simply inserted the job listing into EVERY category to ensure it gets seen, thereby making the whole category selection process in the search procedure utterly meaningless.

“Use the keyword search!” you may say. But the truth is, I have no idea what keywords to search for. I look for “writer” and all manner of unrelated nonsense comes up. I look for “journalist” and all the PR jobs which say “this post is not suitable for a journalist” come up. I look for “KILL ME NOW” and a job in Asda comes up. I may have made that last one up.

It occurred to me today that a lot of the work I’ve done recently—paid and otherwise—has come about via social networking. My current regular gig writing news for Kombo came about through a friend who worked on the side – the fine and hairy Mr Jeff Grubb – and my past work on promotional materials for Good Old Games also came about via responses to tweets.

Are we getting to the stage where the traditional job advertisement is becoming meaningless? It’s entirely possible. They’re already filled with nonsensical jargon that is presumably designed to sort out the people who can do the job from the people who can’t. But in these days of easy connections between people online, that personal connection is much more important, it seems.

So with that in mind, you have over 165 days of material with which you can get to know me pretty well. Who wants to hire me?

No? All right. Here’s a video of a cat.

One A Day, Day 2: More Bollocks

Here we are again. Good evening. What to talk about today?

I was all set to do an immensely amusing post where I wrote down all those stupid random thoughts that come into your head and you really want to say out loud but then don’t because they’d make you look like an imbecile. But I forgot to write anything down, apart from the one I had in the shower last night which, for the record, was “Don’t you hate it when you’re in the shower and close your eyes to stop the soap going in, but nearly fall asleep?” – because I’d closed my eyes to stop the soap going in and had nearly fallen asleep. That’s what I get for showering at midnight after taking an actually-not-that-ill-advised run at a late hour in the evening while our podcast uploaded.

So I have to think of something else to write about. Having been at work all day and not listened to the news I can’t even comment on that… or can I?

*checks BBC News*

Oh, right. Cadbury got taken over by Kraft or something. I did know that, probably thanks to Twitter. Job cuts bad. Cheesy chocolate bad. Boo hiss, and so on.

Okay, that’s the news covered, what did I get up to today? Well, I applied for another job. Most of you know how much I bitch and moan about how much I hate my job, so I applied for another one that I thought I’d like. I enjoy the writing, as should hopefully be apparent from this site (and also this one – the new home of my games-related ramblings), so a writing-based position sounds right up my alley. At this point, I’m not even too bothered if it means a pay cut, as the employer in question (whom I won’t reveal for the moment so as not to jinx things) is pretty high-profile and has a lot of potential for building a future career.

Ugh. Hate phrases like that. So management-speaky. Sometimes you have to use it, and it sucks. One thing I want to make sure I never do is become one of those tossers who sits in their office in a patronising manner, talking to employees about “going forward” and saying that “as a manager…” blah blah blah whilst simultaneously crippling said employees’ self-esteem and sense of independence. Yes, I do have some specific examples in mind but it would be unprofessional and unkind of me to mention them by name.

It’s Charlie Brooker’s Newswipe tonight, a fact which the BBC have inexplicably left off their own site. Charlie Brooker’s work is always a laugh and a half, so I’m looking forward to this new series. Plus I might actually have something to say about the news after watching it. You never know.

Well, that’s today’s brain-dump done and dusted. Two-day combo! I might make it to the end of the year yet.