job search

Fannish Skills On The Job Search – Art

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I write a lot about using your fannish and hobby skills on the job.  It's sort of a big thing, what with this whole "Fan To Pro" title putting pressure on me.  But there's more to using the skills from your recreation in your profession – you can use them in other "professional areas", which I'm going to talk about in the weeks to come.

Namely, I'll be writing about how your fannish, geeky, and otaku skills can also be used in your job search.  It's even possible you have some skills you don't want to or can't use in your chosen career that are great to use on your job search.  You probably have a lot of unappreciated talents anyway (or at least ones that you may not be great at but you can leverage)

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Go Farther: We Need a Fandom Job Site

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 came up in a recent podcast, but it's something deserving of it's own post.  It's a  a business idea if you will that I welcome some of you out there to try, be it as a hobby or something commercial.  Just let me know – hint, hint.

We need a fandom job site.  By we I mean "us assorted fans, geeks, otaku, nerds" and the like.  Well, and the world, but that's only because the world needs us nerds and fans and technophiles.

I'm not talking a website for jobs applied to fans (though that might be cool, if difficult).  I'm not talking about anything for profit.  I'm talking about a site where people post their needs for people to help with fannish events and projects and endeavors so they can find the right folks.

Consider a few examples of who could be recruited through such a site:

  • People could recruit for convention staff.
  • People could recruit for speaking and doing events at conventions.
  • Fannish websites and similar endeavors could find new staff.
  • People doing nonprofit projects that may look good in a portfolio, could find contributors.

Of course this is a tool to do what I love to emphasize – fansourcing, leveraging your fandom connections to get things done.  In this case, it's a way to help people make new connections, stretch themselves, improve themselves, and maybe get something to put on a resume.

I don't see it being hard to implement:

  • The technology is probably already out there in one form or another anyway.  You could start something in Drupal or even Joomla, or slam together some code modules.
  • The talent base is probably easy to find as well – your basic "LAMP" knowledge would let people run it.
  • There are plenty of fandom people with design skills as well who could make the look just right.
  • A lot of people would probable be on board to do it.  Though,ironically, sourcing a site like this would probably be easier if a site like this existed.
  • The basic job-search metaphor is very familiar to people.

Oddly the main challenges I see would be that promoting it properly would be hard (so people didn't get the wrong idea), and policing it properly would take work to make sure posts are legit, control spam, etc.  You'd need a dedicated core of people to do it . . .

So, got some spare time?  Spare programmers? Spare ambition?  Want to help your fellow otaku, fans, and geeks?  Here's a suggestion right here . . .

. . . plus imagine how this'd look on a resume and what kind of contacts you'd make.  Why if you did this it could lead to full, paying jobs someday . . .

– Steven Savage

Just What Is Sabotaging Your Job Search?

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As is painfully obvious, I know a lot of people looking for work.  Too often I hear people wonder just why they can't find jobs.  If they do have jobs they seem to wonder why their friends and family can't find jobs.  No matter the perspective it's always the question of "person has X trait, that is good for job Y.  I'm sure there are openings in job Y.  Why don't they have job Y?"

I ask myself this question a lot because, as is obvious, I talk to a lot of people looking for work, thinking of looking for work, or who should be looking for work.  Over time I've come to several conclusions about why people qualified for jobs don't have them – despite everything they do right.

YOU HAVE THE EDUCATION – BUT LACK EXPERIENCE: Degrees and training are great, but people want some hard experience in many cases.  Not having that experience can mean that, no matter your degree, you don't get hired – since people want to know you can do the job.

YOU HAVE THE EXPERIENCE – BUT LACK THE EDUCATION: This is where you've obviously shown you can do the job, but you don't get hired due to lacking the formal education.  This could be because of legitimate reasons – that employers want someone with recent academic knowledge or some specific training, or even proof you truly care about the career in question.  This can also be because hiring figures that it's better to hire someone with a degree because if you screw up they can't be blamed.

RIGHT EDUCATION, WRONG COLLEGE: Some people are biased towards certain educational institutions, regardless of quality. It happens.

THE DOUBLE BLADE OF AGE: Know the worry that some people have that they're too old for their jobs?  It's even more confusing as age can be an advantage or disadvantage depending on job, location, and even company.  The age issue is real – but it varies a lot.

TIMEOUT: Sometime the time is just wrong.  You may be looking for work at the wrong time in a company or locations history.  You can give up right before it gets good – or start looking right after a hiring binge ends.

THE EXTRA EDGE: Sometimes a job needs some specific abilities or experience.  If you don't have that, you may be out of luck.  Finding what that is?  There's your problem.

LOCATION, LOCATION: All of the above can change depending on location – things may be different in another state or other country, or even employer to employer.  On top of all the other reasons people don't have jobs it may be simply they're trying with the wrong company or in the wrong place.

Knowing how to get your job is important.  Knowing what might keep you from getting the job equally so.  Diagnosing if these issues are part of what's sabotaging your job search is important.

– Steven Savage