Thread: Which job to go for?

Originally Posted by Kees

BTW when I was 18 I worked for a month in a holiday home in the Isle of Bute as a kitchen help. I loved the place! The natural beauty, palm trees along the shore, submarines coming by.

Only place i've seen in Scotland with palm trees.....

Sidney -
There is one health element that I am sure that you have thought about but I will mention it anyway.
Seizures like the one you experienced in July can be brought on by stress. Travel adds many different kinds of stress whether a person admits it to themself or not. Separation from a loved one adds stress.
Bottom line: While I know you want to follow a career path instead of just a job, consider the potential health implications also.
Best of luck with your interviews and your career!

A quick update.

I got back from a couple of days away to discover a letter from the medical centre. In it I was told I had been unsuccessful and that another candidate was more suitable.

Looks like the problem has solved itself. Now I have a deadline of the end of this month before I am out of a job and have no job to go into. Great.

Originally Posted by sidneykidney

A quick update.

I got back from a couple of days away to discover a letter from the medical centre. In it I was told I had been unsuccessful and that another candidate was more suitable.

Looks like the problem has solved itself. Now I have a deadline of the end of this month before I am out of a job and have no job to go into. Great.

I assume that this is the local job, the safe, secure job that you were sure you would get, right? I usually don't say "I told you so" but in this case, I was the first and only one to say, "Job certainty is an illusion". Keep a positive attitude and don't worry. You didn't want that job anyway (in your heart). A better one will come along.

Originally Posted by sidneykidney

A quick update.

I got back from a couple of days away to discover a letter from the medical centre. In it I was told I had been unsuccessful and that another candidate was more suitable.

Looks like the problem has solved itself. Now I have a deadline of the end of this month before I am out of a job and have no job to go into. Great.

Is the other gig in the bag? I hope so and I hope you are happy with your new job. Good luck.

Brad

As Chimensch pointed out no job is certain. No I dont have even the interview for the further away one yet. Pants.

A little late to post in all this, but here's my 2cents (pence? for you) when it comes to evaluating two jobs:

compare salary
compare benefits package (insurance, vacation, 401k, etc)
compare location (how much do I drive each day? is it accessible by public transit?)
compare career utility (will it get me up the chain faster? is it a dead end job? is it on the bleeding edge?)
compare job responsibilities (what will I be doing?)

once I know all these things, I'll usually try to talk to some of my future coworkers from each place and get a feel for the corporate culture there. that's a nontangible thing, but is a huge factor in workplace misery.

in the end it's all about perceived benefits vs. perceived costs. will the job give you net happiness? or net misery?

can't offer much advice on your particular case of "job in my field" vs. "job not in my field" because getting a job not in your field is pretty much career suicide in my line of work, so I've never tried for it.

As long as you can meet your basic needs, I would say hold out for the job you will get some enjoyment/satisfaction from. In my experience, nothing is worse than a job you care nothing about. It'll grind you down eventually. Don't sell yourself short. Just my opinion, obviously.

Jordan

Sometimes you can get one job to hurry up and let you know if they are going to make you an offer by telling them you have another offer and need to make a decision. And if the second job doesn't respond to that, sometimes that tells you something.

If that isn't an option in your siutation, sometimes you have to do what you have to do to take care of your family. If you need to take the lesser job while you wait for the better job, and then take the better job if you get it, then you need to do what you need to do.

It's better to act courteously on these things, but you have to prioritize taking care of your business above not huring the first job's feelings.

I've had a lot of jobs in my life ... I spent 25 years as a salesman and I think that, as a class, salesmen change jobs more than the average. In any case, I have two job search tips that have got me the best jobs of my career:

1. Choose the company/organization that you would like to work for and call and ask them if they have any openings, even if they haven't published an ad. Sometimes, you get in right under the radar and it impresses the hell out of them that you want to work for them enough to call. Also, don't call HR. Call the switchboard and ask who is in charge of the area where you want to work and ask to talk to them.

2. If you have interviewed with a company in the past, say a year ago, and you didn't get the job, call the person who interviewed you and tell them that you're still interested and would like to know if there's an opening. It makes a tremendous impression.