I will be an Epic employee in one month

Faithful readers, I found a new job! I'm going to be a software developer at Epic in Madison, WI. There are so many great things about this prospect that I could write a lot of words. Instead, I'll do a bulleted list.

-I get to be a software developer, something I've always wanted to do but was afraid that I lacked the training for. But I got to prove that I had the skill during the programming test that I took. Yay me!
-The company culture, if I didn't make it clear in my last post, is super chill and unstifling.
-I'll be making ~2.77 times what I did at my last job with a starting salary of $72,000.
-I'm going to have real-people insurance that covers many things including getting a physical, which is something I've been wanting to do for about a year and a half that my old insurance didn't cover.
-I'll be living in Madison which I think is more my style than Chicago: somewhat dense, but not so much crime and much more bike friendly.
-I may get to live in a co-op.

So there you go. My unemployment ends April 6th. I'll spend the time between now and then feverishly packing up my apartment, finishing up my part-time jobs, and saying bye to people. My wife will still be in Chicago and I'll be visiting every weekend, so it's not out of the question that I'll see my Chicago people again after I move.

That's the catch, though: my wife will still be in Chicago. That's a pretty big downside. At least Madison is close to Chicago and it will be temporary. We've spent time apart before (when she started grad school in Chicago while I was finishing my Bachelor's degree) so we know what it's like and that we are capable of it. We've talked it over and we are ready. So now I'm trying to focus on all the positive.

I'm afraid to believe that this is happening. To have found such a sweet job after so much uncertainty seems very unlikely, even though it did happen. At least, I think it happened. I won't believe it until I get my first paycheck.

So I can't know how much more I'll be posting here. Probably not much. Since I'll be leaving so many awesome people behind, I may start some sort of blog so people can keep track of my life. But I don't know about that. Check back in April; if I do start that sort of blog, I'll post here about it.

My big interview

I think it went really well.

The company I interviewed with is kind of like a cult. They have a *huge* amount of land in a suburb of Wisconsin where they have a campus of interconnected, geothermally-heated buildings. There are currently six work buildings, and they are all decorated very uniquely (the buildings have different architectural and decorational themes). The conference rooms are amazing. Maybe you think it's weird to get excited about a conference room. I think you just have to see them to know what I mean. They are huge and comfortable and pretty.

Anyway, the company has a really lax atmosphere. No dress code, no one gets hired in as a manager, and so on. Every employee gets his own office. They have a cafeteria with really cheap ($3) lunches. Oh, and they've experienced ~30% annual growth over the past 10 years with no sign of slowing down, especially with the passing of the stimulus package (which affects them a lot). I definitely like the company's foundations.

I also like the work I'd be doing. The position I originally applied for was in Implementation Services, where I'd know a lot about the software and I'd travel to installation sites to customize the software for the client and make sure everything goes smoothly. They always have their prospective employees take a test to make sure they will be able to understand the necessary coding. I did so well on the test that they moved me from implementation services to software development! That's exciting because I wasn't crazy about all the traveling, I've always wanted to try software development, and software developers make more money (minimum of $65k!) and have the lowest turnover rate at the company.

So, I like the company, I think I'll like the work, they like me enough to put me in a $600 hotel room for the night, and they are financially poised to hire me. The only drawback is that they are in Madison while my wife has to stay in Chicago to finish her Ph. D. The two cities are only about 3 hours apart, and my wife only has a little longer than a year before she's done, so it's workable and temporary.

Big week

Hi readers! This week is sort of a big deal in my household. My wife has a committee meeting Thursday, the same day that I have my final interview with a company in Madison, WI. After that big day, we are going to start packing and looking for a new apartment, since our lease ends 4/30/09 and we've been planning for a long time to move closer to my wife's work.

Moving will be tricky, since I'll have to move to Madison if I get the job in Madison (of course), so we'll have to pack our stuff separately and decide who gets what. It's like a divorce except we are staying married. We definitely aren't looking forward to the time apart, but Madison is only 2.5 hours from Chicago, so it could be much worse.

I'm not really doing justice to the immensity of the changes that may be coming up for me, but honestly they are on my mind so much that I don't really feel like rehashing them here. Later probably, but not now.

I'll let you know how the interview goes.

Incidentally, the guy who sent the email I discussed last time is reconsidering me after I wrote him back and we exchanged a few emails.

Changing Careers Is Difficult

I heard back from a user-oriented design and engineering firm that I applied to a few weeks ago. Here's the email I got from the contact person in its entirety:

"Your resume does not seem to be a good fit. Just wondering why you want to change careers and do a 180?"

This is the exact sentiment that I fear many HR people experience while looking at my application materials. Because of that fear, I address the sentiment in my cover letter. Which I sent to this guy.

Whatever. Cover letter aside, my fear is that people see I don't have a degree in Industrial Design and don't give my application a chance. Or that people get stuck in the most conservative possible view of careers: that we must do what we picked to do at the age of 18 or 20 or whatever and we are allowed to change our path only if we can do it without any dead spots on our resumes.

I had feared these things without any evidence that I should fear them. But now I have this email, so I know I'm not completely crazy.

And I know changing careers is hard. It's not that I didn't expect this. I think my problem is more with the seemingly-simplistic nature of his thoughts: "Y U wan 2 change careers?!?!"

Also, his firm does engineering. I am an engineer. It's not a 180. It's maybe a 50.

I could also just be a little sensitive about everything.

The Experience of Clocking Out

Not too much has been changing for me, so there isn't much to update on. I'm still waiting for interested companies to get back to me about interviews. Realistically, I think only two companies will actually be getting back to me.

And I don't know if that's a sign of the times or what, but it's been a little draining living in uncertainty for so long. So, this week I've been focusing on/embracing the part-time jobs I've begun: tutoring and programming.

I experienced something at my programming job that I haven't felt in a long time: the day was over and I clocked out. I could stop being the focused programmer and go home and relax. This is the result of structure. And boy did I miss structure; I didn't know that was even possible.

Some good news I can take to the bank

On Monday (2/9), I interviewed for a part-time programming job with a lab at Northwestern. Tuesday evening, I found out that I got it! It's ideal in many ways: it's somewhere I already know, it's flexible, it's permanent, and it could actually go on my resume. I start next week. It's only 10 hours per week, but it's better than nothing.

I'll also be doing some tutoring. I'm meeting with my first client today.

All in all, even with the potential money made from programming and tutoring, my wife and I are still in the red on a monthly basis. But the extra money will definitely help to keep us afloat until I find a full-time job. And it's more comforting than I could have guessed to finally be making some money.

Oh, and I found the flyer for the programming job on February 3rd. I think I mentioned how February 3rds always offer me something unique and useful.

Temporary work

I'm still in a state of waiting on a number of opportunities. As a quick summary, I'm waiting on

-One final interview
-One post-testing-but-maybe-not-"final" interview
-One response from an interview
-Two first interviews
-Four responses to directed-strike style job applications that I sent in last week or the week before (I have no reason to believe that these four companies will ever get back to me beyond by own belief that I'm a very good fit and I wrote really good cover letters).

To alleviate the financial stress I'm feeling due to unemployment, I've started looking at temporary technical work, which I'd never really given much thought to. I've posted ads on a few sites as a tutor/freelance programmer. It felt really good to do that, and I realized that if I were getting money in any fashion right now it would really change the mood of the times.

So far, nothing has come of these ads, but I have found possible temporary work as a scientific paper editor for a Japanese company and a part-time programmer for a lab at Northwestern. I interviewed for the programming position today and did pretty well. The Japanese paper-editing people are supposed to send me a sample to edit soon.