Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Grimmace whatever you do the job, your profession is NOT who you are. Dont let this consume you. I know it's stressful; I know someone who committed suicide after 6 month of unemployment after the collapse of Lehman Brothers.
Please try to stay focused on yourself and your family; on your goals in life. Your profesion or your job is just a mean to to gain money to live, but you could support yourself in many ways if jobs in your field are not plenty. Consider a career change or opening up a business. In any case I can't stress enough that you shouldnt let depression get the best of you. At the end of one,s life nobody regrets they didnt work more. Your life and who you are is not your job. There are poor people out there who are perfectly content with their lives and with the little they have.
You make great points in this. For me it's definitely been hard to take the focus off work, to realize my profession is not who I am. I'm a career oriented person, and I grew up always dreaming and wondering about what I wanted to be when I got older. I went through school wishing I was done because I wanted to be working at my job instead! Most of my decisions in my teen and early twenty years were essentially all preparing me for when school was over and it was time to FINALLY start my job I've wanted for so long. When things didn't go as planned, my world crashed in around me. The feeling of inferiority, the self doubt, the depression, the where did I go wrong, it hurts and stings deep.
But like you said, you're profession is not who you are, and I also know of the many older folks whose number #1 regret in their old age is that they spent too much time working. I'm trying to take my focus off the work, but it's an uphill battle. Like others have said, there is also that psychological "Men have to be the breadwinners" mentality that is hard to beat as well.
Thanks for reminding me of these things, I'm definitely trying to relax a bit with the job and appreciate the many other good things about life.
I'm a Sound Designer for games and films, but am also qualified to work pretty much any professional audio job. Live sound, studio recording, corporate AV, audio production, etc etc. I graduated from a tech school for audio engineering and landed my first internship in school yet at an AAA game developer doing game audio. As much as I love audio work and have my "dreams" to do it, I think all the signs are pointing away from it. The sheer instability of the field, the intense competition for the few jobs, and all the other stressers are just getting too much to handle. I'm a down to earth guy who wants to get his home in the suburbs, start a family, and have a career I'm not constantly battling godly forces to hold on to with my last breaths! Considering the circumstances, I feel extremely lucky to just have gotten the contract work I have had over the last 4 years!
Anyway, transferable skills and the such. I worked as a lead for 2 of my 4 years in the audio world, and my last position I was basically working as the audio director though my title was the tier lower. Basically one of those situations where you're always doing the job above you. Anyway, I feel that progression is definitely worth something, and I have a bunch of great recommendations along the road as well. As far as other skills go, my conventional skills are some of my greatest strengths. Communicating, scheduling, planning, seeing things through, reports, managing, etc. Some people shy away from lead positions because it's less of the fun design stuff and more of the managing and business end stuff. I love that stuff, and feel I do quite well at it as well.
Ironically, I tried to make lateral moves in the companies I worked at into Associate Producer or Project Manager positions (which are more stable roles that align with my strengths), but was almost always told they loved me where I was as a Sound Designer, that they didn't want to lose my expertise in that area. I've applied to these types of positions externally, but feel these positions are generally filled by internal hires, so I was out of luck. In short though, production and project management would be right up my alley if someone gave me the chance. I'm scrum certified as well and am quite familiar with Agile and waterfall methodologies.
In the present time, I actually enrolled back in school to finish my B.S. degree in Business and hope to have that done in under 2 years, or possibly much less. I'm pretty much open to anything right now and for the future, but my biggest focus would be the project management, scrum master, or producer roles I talked about earlier. Definitely interested in a lot of other positions as well though such as Business or Financial Analyst, Human Resources, Accounting, and more. Of course I'll also keep professional audio jobs in mind because who knows if some neat audio opportunity will present itself down the road, but it's nice to be going down a different path now that will open up some new doors hopefully for careers.
P.S. I also feel it's worth saying that the professional audio industry is quite similar to many other industries before people write it off as a poor career area. Niche and competitive? Yes. Harder to get into than other industries? Yes. But fundamentally different than other industries? Not really. There's still the normal interviewing and hiring practices, company politics, in-house vs contract work, corporate positions (last company I worked at had 2000+ employees in one location), etc etc. Definitely could be a good career, but for the sheer instability of it, or at least my underwhelming experiences so far after 4 years in the industry have me expanding my career options now.
Id go to California if I were trying to get a FT position in anything related to producing sound for entertainment. Im an auditor for a very large global bank. Its relatively stable and there are openings for internal audit at almost any medium to large size company. Once you get your business degree check out auditing its a 'shoe in the door' type position to learn a company and can also be a career which is where I am 7 years now since graduating in '05 with a BS in finance, but if you happened to have a bachelors in business and looked at a company relevant to your past experience it might be a good move for you.
Can't stress the gym part. You need to look healthy and vibrant, out-of-shape and sickly is not going to win you any sympathy from employers. Also quit investing such a disproportionate amount of effort and time applying for jobs. Remember 4 hours a day only. Get it done and get on with your life. If its in the cards, you will get a job offer. Be a well rounded candidate (strong skillset, strong network, strong interviewing skills), not a machine gun resume spitting machine.
I really think you will be fine man.....and if it just becomes to unbearable to continue, don't be afraid to graciously admit defeat and retool for a different career path. My dad always told me that failures are only opportunities with thorns. As cliche as it sounds it has applied in my case. I lost my first job out of college and was able to find something better even though I was laid off for 3 months....so don't lose hope.
I'm rooting for you man....good luck.
A lot of really good advice here, and go-getta's recommendation to not spend more than 4 hours per day applying to jobs is excellent.
After moving to a new city in 2011 for my SO's job, I spent all day, every day for almost an entire year sitting at the computer looking for positions, filling out online applications, forever tweaking my resume, and spending inordinate amounts of time writing "perfect" cover letters. It got me nowhere. I finally figured out that I was wasting my time, and that most of the applications I sent went straight into the cold, dark hole of Virtual HR ABYSS, never to be seen or heard from again.
So, volunteering is another possibility. You say you're working a full-time job currently, but if at all possible, volunteering at least a few hours a week in your field would allow you to make connections, network, and perhaps give you an opportunity to learn valuable, new skills. Volunteering in relevant areas may even morph into a job that, though not ideal, can serve as a springboard into a more desirable position in no time.
I realize that the idea of working for free kind of sucks, but the reality is that employers and hiring managers have become ridiculously skittish and linear in their thinking. They are reluctant to take any "chances" in their hiring practices. So, by volunteering, you can actively demonstrate, rather than simply asserting in an application or interview, what a reliable, effective, valuable employee you would be. Establishing credibility can give you a feeling of progress.
Most important of all, as others have mentioned, getting out of the house, keeping active, and talking to people by exercising daily and/or volunteering is ESSENTIAL to your mental and physical health.
You're not alone: I'm currently working a temp position in my field of work (which I managed to get by volunteering) and actively applying to relevant permanent positions within the organization. All the best to you!
A lot of really good advice here, and go-getta's recommendation to not spend more than 4 hours per day applying to jobs is excellent.
After moving to a new city in 2011 for my SO's job, I spent all day, every day for almost an entire year sitting at the computer looking for positions, filling out online applications, forever tweaking my resume, and spending inordinate amounts of time writing "perfect" cover letters. It got me nowhere. I finally figured out that I was wasting my time, and that most of the applications I sent went straight into the cold, dark hole of Virtual HR ABYSS, never to be seen or heard from again.
So, volunteering is another possibility. You say you're working a full-time job currently, but if at all possible, volunteering at least a few hours a week in your field would allow you to make connections, network, and perhaps give you an opportunity to learn valuable, new skills. Volunteering in relevant areas may even morph into a job that, though not ideal, can serve as a springboard into a more desirable position in no time.
I realize that the idea of working for free kind of sucks, but the reality is that employers and hiring managers have become ridiculously skittish and linear in their thinking. They are reluctant to take any "chances" in their hiring practices. So, by volunteering, you can actively demonstrate, rather than simply asserting in an application or interview, what a reliable, effective, valuable employee you would be. Establishing credibility can give you a feeling of progress.
Most important of all, as others have mentioned, getting out of the house, keeping active, and talking to people by exercising daily and/or volunteering is ESSENTIAL to your mental and physical health.
You're not alone: I'm currently working a temp position in my field of work (which I managed to get by volunteering) and actively applying to relevant permanent positions within the organization. All the best to you!
If you live near a city with more than 100k people and follow my advice, you could get a job. It may seem like a waste of time to listen to a stranger, but you have some free time.
When you guys change your resume, are you using wordle to identify the frequently words in the job description and your resume are aligned.
I've been making custom resumes and cover letters from the start. It unfortunately takes much more time, but I think it's the right thing to do. I would love to just take some generic basic resume and use it for every position (and I will do this sometimes if I'm emailing companies who don't have positions open), but when there is a listed position I always make my resume reflect the job postings requirements and same with my cover letter. Sadly I don't know if it's ever really helped too much, but like I said, I don't want to half ass things so I'll continue to do it because I like doing things right.
Quote:
Originally Posted by 04blackmaxx
Id go to California if I were trying to get a FT position in anything related to producing sound for entertainment. Im an auditor for a very large global bank. Its relatively stable and there are openings for internal audit at almost any medium to large size company. Once you get your business degree check out auditing its a 'shoe in the door' type position to learn a company and can also be a career which is where I am 7 years now since graduating in '05 with a BS in finance, but if you happened to have a bachelors in business and looked at a company relevant to your past experience it might be a good move for you.
Kind of been there done that. I've applied to jobs in California for a long time, and only recently stopped just in the last 6 months because my wife and I totally realized we don't want to live there. (Ironically when I was first out of school I really wanted to go to CA but got a great internship in the midwest)
Anyway, the company I was contracting with previously was actually in San Francisco, and I had done business trips to SF and LA quite a few times. The cost of living plus urban sprawl is not what we want. We also just recently moved to Texas for the SOLE sake of me being around more local opportunity. If that's not determination I don't know what is! So far we've been here 6 months and unfortunately nothing is panning out yet. I've been networking like crazy, and there's many more industry events and networking events to attend which I have been going to, but nothing too fruitful yet. A lot of people saying they want to get me a job, but it usually is just all talk. I'm also currently interviewing with 3 companies now as well, but I've learned to not get optimistic till an offer is on the table. I've done countless interviews over the years and only was able to snag those few contracts I've done. I really can't say how they will turn out now, you just never know.
I'm definitely hoping once I finish my business degree it will open new doors to go down that route. I'm fearful of falling into the big "college graduate that can't find a job" but pray to god that because of my past professional experience and also my determination to find work in even one of the toughest fields will allow me to have an easier time finding work in business related fields. I think it will ultimately give me a lot more options as well, since I'm interested in everything from Project Management, Business Analysts, Financial, Human Resources, Accounting, and more. I can only hope for the best.
Thanks again to all for the encouraging words and great advice! It really helps!
Working a string of temporary and contract jobs beats the hell out of constantly searching for work and getting nothing. Some unemployed spend about every waking hour searching, networking and so forth. Very depressing.
Working a string of temporary and contract jobs beats the hell out of constantly searching for work and getting nothing. Some unemployed spend about every waking hour searching, networking and so forth. Very depressing.
Also just because you take a job that is "below" your expectations does not mean you stop looking for the ideal job.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
It may seem like a waste of time to listen to a stranger, but you have some free time.
