Moving Day
Today is moving day. What better day of the year to move than New
Years Eve with a temperature of -26 Celcius. I have gathered some
helpers who are willing to brave the cold to put this event in
motion. My big question is if the one helper, from tropical (by
Canadian standards anyway) Vancouver Island, will survive the day with
all her fingers and toes.
Got a Job
It appears that the interview in Edmonton has gone well. They have
offered me a job for the start of January. The timing is rather
unfortunate as they haven't offered this to me with the time such that
I can give sufficient notice for leaving my apartment. They also
haven't endeared themselves to me by stating that there is absolutely
no provision to pay for my moving expenses and they are also offering a
significantly lower pay package than the market in the Edmonton area
currently dictates.
So I figure I can suffer with the low pay and the poor moving circumstances if only to be closer to the city where I can continue my job search while collecting a pay cheque. I figure that I will keep my eyes open and if anything wonderful presents itself in the first few months I'll have to jump on it.
So I figure I can suffer with the low pay and the poor moving circumstances if only to be closer to the city where I can continue my job search while collecting a pay cheque. I figure that I will keep my eyes open and if anything wonderful presents itself in the first few months I'll have to jump on it.
Choices
Tomorrow I am going to the Edmonton area for an interview with a small
software company in the agri-business industry. This is very much
the dream combination (IT+Agriculture) that I have been seeking since
getting out of school. These guys are small (13 employees in all)
and are currently staffed with 3 developer/support people + the
position that I'm interviewing for. They're currently rebuilding
their existing application into a VB.Net/SQL Server 2000 combination
and very much like the combination of agriculture and VB/SQL skills
that I have. Good things for me are that I would get a whack of
experience in .Net and they mention that the position would be
responsible for the majority of the reporting development (SQL 2k
Reporting Services?).
My last job started with a similarly small company that also was re-technologizing the software (VB6 & SQL 2k) from the ground up. I did this experience and reaped all the rewards that in the end were offered by burnout. Although I did benefit greatly from the technical and professional experience, there were many things that the job did not offer. One of those things, which turned out to be a major point of contention between different employees, was the lack of structure. At the time, I felt that the horizontal structure provided the company with the opportunity to quickly react to new situations. The thing that I didn't see was that it also opened the opportunity for people to reject accountability (no one to report to) and compartmentalize thier reponsibilites, and work environment, with only themselves in mind.
I know that it would be very premature and prejudicial of me to believe that, this company that I am interviewing with, would either currently or in the future will be in this situation. I do suppose that the purpose of the interview tomorrow is not only for them to get a read on me, but also for me to aquire the 'correct' information on their current situation.
Part of the reason that it is so difficult for me to go running, with spread arms, to this company is that I have had some significant interest from another. The drawback with them is that thier internal buraucracy has slowed the process of interviews/offers damn near to a halt. I first interviewed with them, via phone (their HR is in Winnipeg and the department is in Saskatoon), on or about the 22nd of October. Just this past Fiday (26th of November), they called me back and the HR lady seemed very enthusiastic about having me fly to Saskatoon for what she described as a meet and greet with the IT Manager and to see if the city fit my needs. I agreed that the position was of great interest to me and that this would be a step I would openly welcome. Her response was that she would contact me in a day or two with flight information for a day this week. I finally had to call them today to ensure that I wouldn't double book the days that they chose for a flight, and my conversation with her led to the fact that they were reviewing budgeting and that it was holding up the decision, but most likely I would hear something next week.
Now I have one company very interested (Edmonton) and looking to make stuff happen at a reasonable pace, and another that appears interested, but works at the speed of molasses in January. All things about these two jobs (salary, technology, ect) are very similar, the one big difference is that the job in Saskatoon is more intellectually interesting to me, and that company has the structure and procedure in place that I would like to experience sooner in my career rather than later.
I'm guessing that I will have to make the decision on the Edmonton position middle to end of next week. Hopefully the people in Saskatoon get something together before then.
My last job started with a similarly small company that also was re-technologizing the software (VB6 & SQL 2k) from the ground up. I did this experience and reaped all the rewards that in the end were offered by burnout. Although I did benefit greatly from the technical and professional experience, there were many things that the job did not offer. One of those things, which turned out to be a major point of contention between different employees, was the lack of structure. At the time, I felt that the horizontal structure provided the company with the opportunity to quickly react to new situations. The thing that I didn't see was that it also opened the opportunity for people to reject accountability (no one to report to) and compartmentalize thier reponsibilites, and work environment, with only themselves in mind.
I know that it would be very premature and prejudicial of me to believe that, this company that I am interviewing with, would either currently or in the future will be in this situation. I do suppose that the purpose of the interview tomorrow is not only for them to get a read on me, but also for me to aquire the 'correct' information on their current situation.
Part of the reason that it is so difficult for me to go running, with spread arms, to this company is that I have had some significant interest from another. The drawback with them is that thier internal buraucracy has slowed the process of interviews/offers damn near to a halt. I first interviewed with them, via phone (their HR is in Winnipeg and the department is in Saskatoon), on or about the 22nd of October. Just this past Fiday (26th of November), they called me back and the HR lady seemed very enthusiastic about having me fly to Saskatoon for what she described as a meet and greet with the IT Manager and to see if the city fit my needs. I agreed that the position was of great interest to me and that this would be a step I would openly welcome. Her response was that she would contact me in a day or two with flight information for a day this week. I finally had to call them today to ensure that I wouldn't double book the days that they chose for a flight, and my conversation with her led to the fact that they were reviewing budgeting and that it was holding up the decision, but most likely I would hear something next week.
Now I have one company very interested (Edmonton) and looking to make stuff happen at a reasonable pace, and another that appears interested, but works at the speed of molasses in January. All things about these two jobs (salary, technology, ect) are very similar, the one big difference is that the job in Saskatoon is more intellectually interesting to me, and that company has the structure and procedure in place that I would like to experience sooner in my career rather than later.
I'm guessing that I will have to make the decision on the Edmonton position middle to end of next week. Hopefully the people in Saskatoon get something together before then.