April 15, 2011 at 9:09 am
Doctor Who 2 (4/15/2011)
You brought up an interesting point, Jack, and that's the number of recruiters contacting you, trying to fill jobs. A few years ago (I don't remember if it was in 2008 or 2009) I had a recruiter contact me at least monthly. During the last 2 years and up to today, I've not heard from any recruiters. It's kind of creepy, really.
Starting back in 2010, at least once a month, recruiters, who I've never even contracted before, will call directly to my desk phone at work. My guess is that they locate my name and company on web somewhere and then call the receptionist asking for me by name. Even though I'm not really interested, I don't care if they send me an email with a job description, but tracking me down at work is creepy. Then again, these guys are for the most part in the direct marketing business, so I guess I should expect no less.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
April 15, 2011 at 9:14 am
Kenneth Wymore (4/15/2011)
I know exactly what you mean. Money isn't everything (although it does account for a lot)! I actually make a little less than I did before but everything else is better.To everyone considering an employer change, keep in mind that you don't always have to chase the money. The non-financial benefits often outweigh the extra money that you may have made somewhere else doing a job that you hated. If you hate your job then your overall quality of life will suffer and a few extra $ won't fix that.
Happy Friday!
I agree, 100%. Much better to be happy where you work than get a 5-10% increase in pay but be more, or equally, miserable with the job.
----------------------------------------------------The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood... Theodore RooseveltThe Scary DBAAuthor of: SQL Server 2017 Query Performance Tuning, 5th Edition and SQL Server Execution Plans, 3rd EditionProduct Evangelist for Red Gate Software
April 15, 2011 at 9:16 am
Kenneth Wymore (4/15/2011)
Doctor Who 2 (4/15/2011)
You brought up an interesting point, Jack, and that's the number of recruiters contacting you, trying to fill jobs. A few years ago (I don't remember if it was in 2008 or 2009) I had a recruiter contact me at least monthly. During the last 2 years and up to today, I've not heard from any recruiters. It's kind of creepy, really.I saw the same thing and then late last year I started getting recruiter calls and emails again. Seems I am getting a lot more through LinkedIn now though. I would say overall it is still less than it was in 2008 but a heck of a lot better than 2009-2010.
I'm getting lots of recruiter calls. What I'd rather get is a few consulting calls. Of course I only hung my shingle out a couple of months ago.
----------------------------------------------------The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood... Theodore RooseveltThe Scary DBAAuthor of: SQL Server 2017 Query Performance Tuning, 5th Edition and SQL Server Execution Plans, 3rd EditionProduct Evangelist for Red Gate Software
April 15, 2011 at 9:19 am
My dad, God rest his soul, was fond of saying, "A job is what you do to maintain a certain standard of living and save for retirement. If you happen to like it, that's a perk."
I don't have the luxury of taking lower pay in order to be happy. Many people don't.
April 15, 2011 at 9:20 am
Am I better off than a year ago? Interesting question for me. I make less money, but I am happier.
In 2008/2009 had perm job doing SQL dev and old VB6 dev work. Pay was actually good for me, but work environment was poor (not the people) and my skill set was going nowhere. Still "low level" sql dev work on SQL2000 and VB6.0. Then got laid off in 2009 and spent about 14 months doing contract work; actually made more money but the work was not fulfilling and I wasn't getting jobs that improved my marketability. Actually wasn't worried because it seemed there were still plenty of contract jobs available, companies just didn't want to hire full time. But they were always got "low level" sql dev work at companies stuck in SQL2000. Actually had 2 different 4 month assignments that were pretty bad, the last one was actually horrible. That's when I decided to get another perm job that would improve my skill set and provide some consistency, even if that meant a pay cut. Decided to look more at the company environment than the $$.
Here I am making considerable less money, but I'm much happier day to day. Company seems very stable so I feel pretty secure (as secure as anyone could be).
My position is as the DBA, which I had not done before, hence the more entry level DBA position with lower pay. I would say higher than a true entry DBA because I bring dev experience. Improving my DBA skills and have opportunity to do ETL and DW work.
I do feel the market is better. If the need did come up for me to be in the market I feel comfortable. Jobs seem to be up and I've increased my skill set in the last 9months.
April 15, 2011 at 9:21 am
I'm pretty sure I'm doing better but I'm in week two of a new job so I may be wrong. I did get a significant increase coming here as well as better benefits. At my last place I was focused just on development. Here right now I'm primarily responsible for maintenance (which does include writing scripts to take care of some things) so I'm broadening my knowledge base. I'm working with a former co-worker who left my last company to come back where we are now and talked to a woman at church who said they went through some tough times recently but are coming through that.
I'm still feeling rather optimistic about things. Especially because, despite storage issues causing databases to go corrupt last week, one of the managers said it was a good thing the other DBA was taking some time to relax once the majority of the explosions were dealt with. Complete change from my last place where I had two people ask me five different times to call a client before they were even open.
April 15, 2011 at 9:34 am
Even keel, Steve. Doing the same as last year and expecting the same in the coming year.
Interesting to see the difference between the public and private sectors.
April 15, 2011 at 11:11 am
This year, as in each year over the last 5, both my career and our financial situation continued to degrade. Local housing costs (purchase or rent) are up about 50% across the board. Food and fuel prices have risen by a comparable amount overall even though they've held steady for about the last year. Utilities seem to also be steady over the last year or so. I've been getting what everybody tells me are good raises, and this year is no exception, but we've still lost disposable income. Worse, over the last 5 years we've had to gradually reduce the amount we're saving for retirement. First, it was just slowing the rate at which we were increasing our investments, then not increasing the rate at all, and it looks like we actually have to go backwards this year.
Trading jobs isn't a good answer because those other jobs aren't providing anything more in the way of working conditions, skills development, or total compensation. In my opinion, that's because the local market has not yet adjusted to the extreme change in cost of living. Our cost of living is closing in on most of the rest of Canada, but wages are nowhere near what's available elsewhere. Moving out of province to some place where the employment market has already adjusted to higher costs of living is something we're looking at, but at age 55, both of us finding jobs to move to will be challenging at best.
I'll end on a positive note. The company I'm working for, apart from the salary thing, is still a fantastic place to work and we can still afford to get out to the lake pretty much every week-end. I can't afford to build another boat, but when we compare our situation to that of many others, we still count ourselves pretty lucky.
April 15, 2011 at 1:20 pm
JP Dakota (4/15/2011)
My dad, God rest his soul, was fond of saying, "A job is what you do to maintain a certain standard of living and save for retirement. If you happen to like it, that's a perk."
JP - your dad sounded like a very wise man.
I've been fortunate to build a career doing something I like doing. Are things better this year than last? I (still) have a job that pays the bills, so no complaints here.
April 15, 2011 at 3:11 pm
What I have is better than the alternative. I'm alive, have good health, have a decent paying job, and have time for some leisure pursuits.
All-in-all, it's pretty darned good!:-)
April 15, 2011 at 3:21 pm
I wouldn't say the crisis hit me, but my career is going better now than 1 yr ago.
Jason...AKA CirqueDeSQLeil
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April 16, 2011 at 12:12 am
Do I do better now than last year? Well, let me put it this way. I still have a job and I am thankful for that.
:-PManie Verster
Developer
Johannesburg
South Africa
I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. - Holy Bible
I am a man of fixed and unbending principles, the first of which is to be flexible at all times. - Everett Mckinley Dirkson (Well, I am trying. - Manie Verster)
April 16, 2011 at 4:23 am
I am in the UK and private sector. IT here seems really buoyant at least where I am in the south east. I am nearly15% better off pay wise and getting good bonuses (sorry) which I was not before - to a certain extent this may be due to my taking a chance to shine - but my colleagues are doing well too.
I know many friends in government are having a hard time - lucky to still be in jobs, more reponsibility for the same pay (typically). The main cloud on my career horizon is simply the effect of the recession on other industry dragging things down long run.
I extend every sympathy to those having difficulties especially when it is no way your choice or fault. I'm very lucky.
April 16, 2011 at 11:46 am
In the UK it's generally impossible to do a Tax return this early - there is all sorts of stuff for which you need figures, some of which you don't see until you get official paperwork (often a month or more after the tax year ends on 5 April). So I expect to be doing my tax return about the end of May (we have until about Christmas - I can't remember the exact date - to do it) and expect the IR to put a tax refund in my bank account a few weeks later (like many Britons, I nearly always pay too much tax and get refunds - the IR are pretty good at overcharging on the pay as you go game, also pretty good about handing it back).
Am I better off or worse off than before? Well, I'm now semi-retired with no intention of working more than a few weeks a year. My income is about half of what it was two years ago (that's assuming I don't work at all; any year I do some contracts it will be more). On the other hand, my outgoings are much less - I don't have to live in London for most of the time, nor do I pay a stupid amount of train fare and tube fare, I don't pay into a pension fund any more (money now comes in the opposite direction), the Income Tax I pay is less than 30% of what I used to pay, I don't pay any National Insurance (UK Social Security Tax) at all now, I save quite a bit on air fares between UK and Spain (because I no longer have to get back to the UK regularly throughout the year). Some other costs are down too - for example a bottle of wine that costs 8 Pounds in the UK will be about 2 Euros here. I can't say I'm actually financially better off - I'm not investing as much as I used to - but life is much easier, in many ways much pleasanter, and I'm not short of money. But I do miss the pressure of handling problems and doing crazy things to keep the company going.
As for the economy - it's a mess, and the people who caused the problem are patting themselves on the back and awarding themselves big pay rises and bloated bonuses while the regulatory authorities are sitting back and doing nothing. While this insane culture of rewarding the establishment for incompetent warding assessment of risk and running the economy into the ground and rewarding the regulators for failing to regulate while the people who do anything useful or constructive suffer the consequences of the establishment's greed and uselessness I don't see much chance of things getting better quickly or staying better for long when/if they have done so. Maybe I'm just a pessimist, maybe things will change.
Tom
April 17, 2011 at 11:06 pm
To me, I have improved a lot in last 1 year both financially and technically.
Technical front : I have started writting article in SSC, started giving training to my Organization on SQL Server (and got Star faculty recognition).
Financially, I baught a car(which is my 5 year dream)
2010 and 2011 are great years to me.
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