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Project Job Search - November 2009

After the second round...

November 25th 2009 04:39
.... all is still not clear.

I went for my second round of the recruitment process today. It wasn't an interview, rather a standard professional assessment test every candidate for every position must take to join this company.

I was sat in a room with many others, all have applied for different positions, in front of a computer to take the 4 part test.

The first part is about 28 questions with a series of pictures and you have to determine what comes next. - This part I was good at, and I wasn't worried at all.

Second part is comprehension type of questions. You are given a set of short articles and questions on the articles. Sounds easy? They only give you about 30 seconds to answer each question, including reading time. I was only up to question 21 of the 30 set of questions before the screen timed out. By this time, I wasn't feeling so good about myself.


The next part was worse. Maths. I haven't had to do statistical maths since... I don't know... last year of uni? In my previous jobs I haven't had to figure out an exact amount from different sets of percentages and graphs. If it had been just a simple "There are 20,000 people in the city and 20% of them are unemployed, how many people are employed" type questions, but "if there are 20,000 people in the city and 20% of them are unemployed in 2009, an increase by 1.5% since the year before, then how many people have found jobs if the population grew by 10% in 2009?"

If you had the time and properly sit down and work it out, then all is well. But once again, we had 30 seconds per question, including reading time and working it all out time - I completely lost it. I think I must have just ended up guessing half of the answers (it was multiple choice) which was probably not the smartest thing to do....


Finally, a part which doesn't have real answers, but a set of questions to assess your personality.

When I walked out of that room, I no longer had confidence if I'd get in. But as a friend reminded me - most people were probably in the same boat. Why should I worry?

Anyways, it might take them another week to put a list together for the final part of the recruitment process before I find out whether I have been successful in my application.

So... let's wait.
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It's not yet all bad news

November 21st 2009 21:34
Remember that job interview?

Well, the interview went well. I thought so at least. The hiring manager was positive that I was going to be among the last selection of candidate to go through to the next round to meet the Managing Director. She said she would call the next day.

So next day comes and the phone rings - the Managing Director has gone ahead and hired someone internal instead. She was very sorry.

Again! This is the third interview where I thought it had gone all so well and positive and they ended up hiring someone internal.

Understandably it's cheaper for them to do so, but how frustrating.

However - not all bad news. About half an hour after that phone call, I get another phone call. This time was from another firm wanting an interview.

This particular firm had rejected me before. Large financial company - tough to get in. Despite that - I went in with a positive attitude.

Once again, I thought the interview went well. I had a panel of two interviewers. We got along, spoke about my various experiences and interests, took 40 mins and I was told that someone will call in the next week or so.

After this apparently there will be two more rounds before I will find out if I get the job, but it's a start.

So it's not all bad news just yet. To make it even better - Will actually got a job at Woolies! Prior to this he's been doing mail box walking dropping advertising - I had to help him because the amount of stuff they have been giving him is so much that there was no way he could have delivered everything by himself, especially with the wild weather. That's been back breaking work but he did earn someone to contribute to our living expenses. With this Woolies job, even though it'll be night shift, but it'll at least pay a bit better and I don't have to help after work
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Finally, an interview

November 15th 2009 06:09
It has been a long journey - I have been applying for jobs for at least 2 months now, on an average of 3 applications a day. There has been nothing. Mostly rejection emails saying that "there has been a significant number of suitable applicants, and although we are impressed with your experience we have found someone more suitable" type things, and sometimes not even a reply.

While going through my resume with a friend of mine, we realised that in times like today where jobs are scarce and more and more people are out there looking, employers simply take one look at my resume, see my current employement 'Flight Centre - Travel Consultant' - laugh to themselves and cast aside, without even looking further down the line to see my real IT experiences.

And finally, on Friday I get a call from a small boutique IT consultancy for a chat, and an interview has been scheduled for Monday at 8am.

Although this does not mean I have a new job yet, but it's that little bit of hope I have been looking for. At least I know, there ARE something out there, and there are people out there who are willing to read beyond the first lines.

Wish me luck
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