Since my last post, I have turned down yet another offer. I was pretty disappointed, because other than the lowball salary, it looked like a very interesting and challenging job that I would enjoy. It was a difficult decision, especially since I had just been turned down for another position that looked like it would have been a great fit all around. I did not have any good way of knowing whether it was the right decision, so I went with my gut. (I will refer to that company below as company ‘P’).
Then I got turned down by another company for a position that I thought would be a great fit. Apparently, the company did not agree with that assessment. They have not filled that position yet. I was not able to find out why they did not choose me, which leads me to suspect that the reason was my 60th birthday coming up.
Later that week, another company turned me down. The recruiter told me that although they liked me and thought I did well in the interview process, they had selected another candidate. (For later reference, I will refer to that company as ‘N’)
A few days later, the recruiter from company N called to inform me that the person that did get the offer had rejected it, and they asked if I was still available. So I re-submitted.
Then a few more days later, the recruiter called to tell me that company N decided not to fill the position at all, and hire a junior-level developer for a very low salary. So, I wrote them off and continued my search.
Activity in the job market here in Dallas was showing signs of picking up, and I got three phone interviews and two in-person interviews that week. None of the companies or positions were as interesting as either ‘P’ or ‘N’, but one was a reasonable match for my skills and could possibly keep me intellectually engaged for several years, and I was willing to accept an offer from that one provided the salary wasn’t another insult.
About two weeks later, I got yet another phone call from the recruiter from company N. Seems that the offer to the junior developer was also rejected, over a relocation issue problem, and they wanted to know whether I would accept an offer. The salary was a little lower than I had been making before, but was well in the range I deemed acceptable, and a lot higher than the one I was offered at company P. So, I accepted. Then the wait for the “background check” began. I had been warned that this company was constrained by fairly rigid bureaucracy in their HR department, so it could take 3 weeks or longer to complete the hiring process. One person I contacted said that the on-boarding process had taken so long that by the time they got back to him with a start date, he had already started at a job with another company. It was not a done deal. So, I did not suspend my job search, despite a signed and accepted offer.
During the wait, I got an early-morning call from another recruiter who spoke of a much better salary from a company doing some interesting embedded systems work, and when I explained my situation, he said they could arrange an interview right away, and that I could possibly get an offer the same or the next day. Okay, I said, submit me, we’ll see how that turns out… I did not hear from him again that day. I guess the ‘urgency’ of that position (which did call for some fairly rare skills that I happen to have) was mostly on the part of the recruiter (who probably was looking at a looming rent payment), and not on the part of the company.
The next morning, I got another call from the recruiter from company N, with a firm start date. So I halted my job search, and emailed all of the recruiters and companies that I had dealt with, letting them know that I was (really, this time) no longer available.
I got 3 more calls that day from recruiters who saw my resume on Monster. I went and deleted my Monster.com account. And my Dice.com account. Turns out that deleting your account from Monster is difficult, and requires an email exchange with their support department. The only place I have seen where it is tougher to delete an account is Facebook.
Any rate, I am scheduled to begin my new job a week from Monday. The delay is due to a couple of things, 1) I will be going to Bonham on Thursday to get my new hearing aids fitted, and 2) they have just completed a major move to a location that is much closer to my residence, and are still recovering from the distraction. That also gives me a week to get some other personal items wrapped up so they won’t be a distraction at my new job.
On the Sunday before I start my new “day job” I will be teaching an NRA Basic Pistol Class. As I expected due to my taking a couple of months off, this class will be fairly small. Although I won’t be making much money on this one, I don’t really mind. Small classes are easier to manage, and the student experience is enhanced, and each student gets more hands-on time in the range. I cap that class at 10 (and I have a co-instructor if there are more than 4 students) anyway, so that there is adequate time to spend with students who have little or no handgun experience.
The Saturday following the NRA class, I am resuming my Texas Concealed Handgun License classes. The enrollment for that class is also lower than average. Most of the student are renewals, which will make the range portion easier. I may end up with only one or two initial applicants, but I will teach the course anyway. After all, the first two years that I was a CHL instructor, I rarely had more than 3 or 4 students.
I suspect that one reason for the small enrollments in the next few classes was a glitch in the new enrollment script that I installed. That’s my fault — I should have tested the script much more thoroughly. Fortunately, I had a couple of students try to sign up, and then call me when the script did not let them, which alerted me to the problems. I was able to work around those problems. I think it is now working well enough, even though there still are some minor problems that I plan to fix (I’m now waiting for a response from the author of the script). There is no way to know how much business I lost in the meantime. I’m still ranking pretty well in the search engines for the keywords I’m targeting, so there is hope of building that business back up to former levels fairly quickly.
It looks like the emotional roller-coaster ride of the last 6 months may be smoothing out for a while.
