Just Lost Job - Coping/Job Hunting Advice Needed

Everything else
1981

Looks like my turn…

I’m a web application and eLearning developer. I’ve been contracting for 18 years, but the vast majority of those years were spent subcontracting with a small company. Up until September or so of last year, that company kept me busy enough that I never needed to look elsewhere for work. Then the government contracts I was working on were either cancelled, or dried up.

Around the same time I was awarded a small eLearning contract with one of the groups I had subcontracted to, so I didn’t start looking for replacement work. Unfortunately the work has been repeatedly pushed back while waiting for them to get materials together I need to do the work.

Around February/March the reality of the situation started to sink in, and I started actively looking for contract work. I initially went to places like Upwork and the like, but found them inundated with a) offshore workers willing to do work for next to nothing or b) clients who wanted the world for next to nothing. So gave up on those, fixed up my CV, and put it up on some of the more common job sites (Indeed, Monster, Dice) and started reviewing the listings. I quickly found myself faced with a number of challenges.

  1. The work I have done most of my career has been for agencies on significantly outdated technology. I have roughly 15 years experience in server-side development, but it’s all Classic ASP/SQL 2000. I’ve got the same amount of experience on client-side (HTML/CSS/Javascript), but no practical experience with anything newer than jQuery because I was required to support IE6 (updated to IE8 in the last two years) for most of it.

  2. I am not looking for a full-time/employee job. I do still expect this contract to come in, which is going to require me to be at least part-time on it for several months

  3. For several lengthy-to-explain reasons, I can’t relocate right now, so I’m primarily looking for remote work.

Suffice it to say, there are very few listings for Classic ASP developers to begin with, and fewer still that allow remote work. I have applied for the few positions I’ve found, and some that even didn’t say whether they allowed remote or contract work. I’ve had a few interviews that looked really promising, but they’ve ultimately went with someone else.

I have spent a good bit of time this year trying to improve my skills, and at least bring them into the current century. The challenge I’ve found is that there are so many different directions you can go in web development now that it’s very hard to determine what I should be aiming for. I am generally pretty good at picking up on new technologies, languages, etc. One of the reasons I’ve been successful over the years prior to this is that I was always capable of picking up stuff as projects demanded. But without an actual project, I’m having a much harder time doing so now, and determining what direction to take. I’ve been learning ASP.Net MVC, but finding it difficult to progress past the basics. It didn’t help that I had an interview for a MongoDB/Angular 2 job so I switched gears to that for a bit just to have it not come through. Then an opportunity for PHP/MySQL popped up, so I spent a few weeks working on that, only to have it fall through again.

Even if I were to successfully learn something newer, everything out there seems to want at least several years of professional experience in developing in that environment. I’ve considered going after junior developer positions, but I’m not really at a point in my life (family with kids, primary earner, mortgage, etc.) where I can afford to do so. And there aren’t really any junior positions out there which allow for remote work on a contract basis anyway.

I’ve also looked into eLearning jobs, but the field seems to be going more towards a single person who can both design, develop, and implement content (typically using a tool like Articulate or Captivate) where the jobs were split when I started in the field. I’ve programmed dozens of custom eLearning courses for the government in HTML/CSS/Javascript through the years, but it seems that very few people want that anymore, and those that do want it done in house.

So I’m at a bit of a loss, and hoping there might be someone else with a similar background that might have some advice.

Marketing has never been a particular strong suit of mine. I managed to do well when I went out on my own initially because of word-of-mouth and a few good relationships I developed out of college. But after I started getting fed so well from one source, I stopped looking elsewhere beyond a very few rare side projects, and now all of those other sources have dried up.

1982

If you know one language, learning another isn’t that big of a deal. FWIW, my team is migrating from the typical .net environment to javascript. They played around with Angularjs, which is very popular right now but they are not happy with where angular2 is going, so they are in the process of testing out auriela.

Javascript and html5 is where the world is going. You really can’t go wrong with any of these I would think. Don’t box yourself in.

1983

Thanks Tman. I’ve always felt the same, that jumping around languages isn’t that bad. But unfortunately while my long-term client had no issues bringing me in on projects requiring new languages, so far none of the prospective clients I’ve talked with have been comfortable doing so.

Angular seems to be in a real weird spot at the moment. When I was considering going after the lead I mentioned above for the Mongo/Angular job, I actually spent a day or two going through a number of tutorials on Angular(1). Then I did the interview and found out it was Angular 2, so I spent several days while waiting for the callback going through a few courses on it. It seems a little more logical and flexible in some ways to me, but at the same time I can definitely understand why long-time Angular developers would be upset with the changes. I’d like to dig deeper into Angular, but if the Angular team is transitioning to v2 and pushing it, I wonder if it’s worth getting into either until things settle down.

I’ll admit that I’ve also been a bit shy about jumping into the various Javascript frameworks because they all seem to entail a completely different development environment consisting of NodeJs, NPM, some sort of task runner like Grunt/Gulp, CSS pre-compilers, occasionally some sort of NoSQL db, and a bunch of other components…and it all seems to change so frequently with everyone chasing whatever is new and shiny.

Anyway, my short-term goal at the moment is to attempt some conversions of my Classic ASP projects to ASP.Net while continuing to look for new clients. If I can do that successfully, I might be able to pull in some of the conversion projects I’ve seen out there. In the meantime, if anyone’s got any good advice on finding clients, or anything otherwise appliable, I’d be grateful for it.

1984

Gedd,

I won’t promise this is good advice, because I’m legendarily bad at job hunts, but I’ve read in various places that fudging this stuff a little isn’t necessarily out of line, if you can prepare yourself properly prior to interview. As you and others have noted, your years of experience in this field in a general sense have not only taught you a lot about the specific techs you’ve worked most heavily with, but also the skillset necessary to learn new technologies/frameworks relatively quickly (compared to a total layman coming at web dev for the first time ever, particularly).

But, as you’ve also noted, it’s tough to get calls back just saying “I can learn quick!” I blame part of that on the front-end of the hiring process being run through HR knobs (sorry Qt3 HR people) who often know very little about what the technical requirements for the jobs in question are or mean. There’s a bit of “throw alphabet soup into the req’s and you’ll definitely get qualified developers!” mentality going on, sometimes. The actual engineers/managers you’d be working with day-to-day are more likely to appreciate both the necessity and the value of having a rapid personal learning-curve for new tech.

So, consider embellishing a little when a job listing throws out 30 different skillsets to get past the HR hurdle, prepare well for the interview, and explain your full background and learning/dynamic capabilities a little in the actual interview.

Of course, avoiding outright lies (and particularly not promising anything you wouldn’t be able to reliably fudge during the interview–e.g., know how to manage the web-dev equivalent of knocking out Fizz-Buzz in whatever framework they’re looking for) is always good, but a little stretching never hurt nobody. Probably.

1985

Oddly enough, for this last position it was the other way around. Interviewer was fine with the lack of practical experience, but on-staff developers apparently weren’t.

But yes, one of the lessons I’ve learned through this experience is not to be so quick to undersell my capabilities, even when dealing with new tech. I tend to be very quick to be truthful about my experience with any particular language, but not as quick to mention my previous history of picking up new stuff fast. So thanks for the reinforcement on that point. :)

1986

Gedd:

I’ve been doing a lot of web development in the past few years, but I understand where you’re coming from - I worked at a company for years and years, and when the work dried up and I saw the writing on the wall, and I started looking to get out, I found out there wasn’t much demand for what I’d been doing. Fortunately, I’ve been able to keep reinventing myself and have kept up with current trends fairly well (it also helps when you get hired by a small company, where you are forced to do and learn everything if you want to get the project done!)

Given your background it seems to me that you could easily transition to something like ASP.NET or .NET development - I will admit that’s one area I know nothing about but I do know .NET development seems pretty healthy (for the short term at least) because I keep running into people who do that type of development, and I see a fair number of requirements for that (in the DC area, anyway). I don’t know about the viability of doing that type of development in a remote or contract environment, though.

As for front-end web development, a lot of my work has been focused on GEOINT related stuff, so I’m often mucking around with Leaflet or Cesium and the like, but I’ve spent a fair bit of time working in a JavaScript/jQuery/ExtJs type of environment and then transitioning to the MEAN stack (with Angular 1) and that’s worked out pretty well. While I do think that Angular 1 may be a bad choice for new projects seeing as to how Angular 2 is coming right down the line, if you’re getting onto an existing project, they might be using Angular 1. So I wouldn’t rule that out as something to know about. As for other frameworks, I’d never heard of Aurelia, but I’m going to look into it shortly, so I at least know what they claim they can do. But one other framework I’d look at is React. I’m pretty leery of the “next big thing” with respect to JavaScript frameworks - it’s easy to get jazzed up over something that flares out in a few months (I’m looking at you, Meteor!). But I think Angular2 & React are good bets to be the “big ones” for the short term. And there’s React Native, which is a decent (from what I’ve heard) multiplatform mobile development solution. In addition to those there’s lightweight frameworks like Handlebars or Backbone (heck, or even Ember I guess) which might be useful to at least know about.

Keeping up with this stuff keeps me frazzled!

If you are at least nominally conversant with how these frameworks differ then I think that would go a ways towards making potential employers feel better about contracting you to work with technologies that are similar but not identical.

The hiring rules for contract work are probably different from the hiring rules for companies, though. Smart companies know that if they hire a guy who has a good foundation in something like .ASP or a MV* framework that it’s easy enough to ramp up on another type of framework, since that type of knowledge is transferable. However, I suspect that if a company wants to hire someone for contract work, they probably want that candidate to come in already knowing the technologies, so they can be productive right away (“we ain’t paying you to learn this stuff!”). That’s a tough environment to be in.

Maybe it would be worth your while to do some small sample type of apps using a couple of frameworks? In your spare time, lol. At least then you’d have something you could point to as some work with the technology.

Good luck.

1987

I don’t think this is just related to web development, programming, etc.

I’ve thought about this a great deal, in part because I work in a field where there are not a lot of “hard” skills (e.g. it is all soft stuff, like analysis, negotiating, etc.).

The issue is, everyone says they learn quickly. They even believe they learn quickly. The number of people I have met who tell me they learn quickly, but after working with them for a while clearly don’t learn quickly, is huge.

It is difficult (in my opinion) to sell those soft intellectual skills for exactly that reason. How do I tell people that I read, write, and analyze better than most others? Who doesn’t believe that about themselves, even if it is not true? What exactly does that mean? How is it measurable?

There are some things that are harder to fudge than others. You either won a sales award or you did not. You either got a certain account or did not. (I am aware there is room for creative interpretation around even some of these situations, but not nearly as much as saying, “I’m a quick learner.”) But with being a quick learner - nearly everyone believes that about themselves. It’s basically Dunning-Kruger.

I even feel bad saying the quick learner thing about myself in interview type situations. Because I’m fairly self-effacing in reality, and kind of think I’m an idiot (even though objective measures would say otherwise). I feel like my memory is shit, I don’t grasp things as quickly as I should, etc. So when I think about saying things like, “I’m a quick learner,” there’s a little voice in my brain that says, “Are you really? Compared to who? Are you as quick as when you were 25? Remember that article you read last week in the newspaper - do you even remember any of it?”

Ok, that turned into a digression at the end. :)

1988

That goes back to everyone being a great multi-tasker or being a great self-starter.

1989

Thanks Charl, that was some good advice as well.

That’s a great point. I definitely think I would have had a better shot at the Angular 2 job if I was going in as an employee.

Maybe it would be worth your while to do some small sample type of apps using a couple of frameworks?

I usually go about learning stuff by getting a basic foundation somewhere, and then trying to put something together, so that’s a good idea as well. Typically I find it easiest if I take an existing project and convert it to the new thing. That way I’ve already got all the design and logic figured out, it’s just a matter of the implementation.

So a quick update, one of the groups I talked with a few months that went with someone else called me back last week and decided to bring me on after all. It’s Classic ASP work, but I think there’s some room here to do some parts in .Net and possibly even explore some of the Javascript frameworks we’ve been talking about. Either way, I’m going to make sure I carve out some time after I get settled in with these folks to explore the newer development tools out there. Thanks again for the encouragement.

1990

Cool! Good luck and congrats.

1991

For those seeking a new line of work and who thrive on being called a jackass-loser-douche for a 1-3 years,

http://www.faa.gov/jobs/

The new OTS bid is out for controllers. We really need them. Median wage is about 122K or so.

If you’re confident, decisive, and accurate, we need you. ZLC can’t get any worse. :p

1992

Hal, no one can say you don’t believe in honesty in job recruitment!

1993

Heh. The first time I ever keyed up live, my trainer, a tiny gal, slapped me so hard that my headset flew off. The words she had to describe me…months and months of that! And I wasn’t even bad.

:D

But once you make it, it’s a different ballgame! RESPECT!

Anyway, probably a lot of the folks on here would be good at TRACON and ARTCC. Maybe not tower. Great pay and benefits! Let your friends know. We’re hurting.

1994

Ageist bullshit. :p

1995

I know, but the cognitive declines and loss on investment really do hurt after that age. I still think that it’s BS for exceptional people. Zero-tolerance policies could mean that Superman wouldn’t be qualified. Silly.

But if you’re under 31…I beg you…apply. It’s killing us. Me. Meeeee.

And I have no other valuable skills anymore so I’m stuck. Let’s be friends!

1996

So I’m not interested in the job, but curious generally as to this: do you really see such severe cognitive declines as to materially affect job performance?

Like, a 40 year old simply cannot track and follow flights (or however you would describe the position), and it is a noticeable and material degradation from what a 30 year old can do?

That’s kind of creepy (and, as a 42 year old, personally depressing).

1997

Man I am turning 31 in October.

1998

Well I should clarify. I have not seen older people pick up the skills needed (or at least master them) as well as younger people—perhaps like learning a language? Although this is more stressed-based and dealing with one’s ability to rapidly, correctly, consistently interpret lots of data and also issue control instructions.

For example, I often listen to another controller, coordinatewith him, and at the same time I listen to various pilots (different speaker) and quickly swap transmitters to issue instructions to them…and also do my own written work during this time if I don’t have an assist. Since we can’t really multitask, it’s related to the ability to quickly switch tasks while maintain accuracy.

But in short, past 31 (and especially 34 per the studies), people just can’t pick it up.

Past 56…well, I can’t imagine anyone wanting to inflict that on themselves anyway. But there is supposedly a decline in performance. Personally, the best of the controllers that I work with are older. I’m not sure how valid that is.

**TLDR: If you’re eligible and want stability and income, apply! Now! Trade in the soup kitches for self-loathing. **

1999

You forgot the part where you have to drive into the city every damn day.

2000

That is true. I don’t know, though. There are so many worse careers.

The lack of manning isstarting to wear on me, though. I am so fatigued by 6-and-1s. While I know that I’m cognitively capable, I also understand the Swiss Cheese Model. One of my coworkers (older, excellent controller in a different facility) had a near mid-air a bit ago. Reportedly less than 50-feet vertica sep, unknown lateral target sep.

More manning=greater safety for everyone.

Anyway, two days left for those who have maybe just lost a job or are seeking a new one. Good luck. May the odds be ever in your favor.