Fan To Pro - The Blog of Professional Geekery

Frustration Friday: The Fear of THIS

Whenever my friends, family, coaching subjects, co-workers, ex-co-workers, etc. talk about their job searches I almost always hear some version of the following phrase:

"But I don't have THIS!"

THIS is usually a bullet point out of a large amount of bullet points on a job posting. It may be a skill, or a class, or a certification that, but THIS is something the person in question does not have, and they fear they won't get the job because of it.  Their whole world collapses into the fact "I don't have THIS."

I'm really tired of THIS.

Looking for Jobs in All the Odd Places

I told Steve this story a few weeks back, because I thought he'd be interested, and he suggested it would make for a good Fan to Pro post.

I'm a 2L--a second-year law student--at a, he said modestly, very prestigious law school in New York City. I'm also a huge geek. A geek of just about everything, to boot--science fiction and fantasy literature, renaissance faires, anime, video games, comics, computers...you get the idea.

I actually came at law from a computer geek perspective. When I was in college, I wanted to be a programmer. I have a Bachelor's of Science in Engineering in Computer Science and all.

But while I was in college, I started taking courses in things like History of Technology, History of the Information Age, and Cyberculture, and the next thing I knew, I was learning about John Perry Barlow and the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Larry Lessig and the issues with copyrights and the Internet. I even worked as a tech intern, writing scripts and webapps, for the Creative Commons during college. I was bitten by the IP bug.

By the time I graduated college, I knew that I wanted to go to law school and become an intellectual property lawyer. I didn't want to do it immediately, though, so I spent two years as a programmer. Reality training, I guess you could call it.

Once that was done, I applied and went off to law school. My first summer, I landed my dream job: interning at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Best. Job. Ever.

Moving to a Geeky Job: The Business Shift

Related to my previous post on geeky jobs, another issue I encounter with people wanting to use their skills on their jobs is the feeling that what they do know, what they enjoy, just isn't going to have a plance in the areas they want to work.  They're good at something that doesn't seem overly fannish, and they just can't see how it relates to the cool things they want to do or the place they want to work.

I relate of course, as a Project Manager.  I seriously enjoy gant charts, forms, coordinating, and organizing.  I've had moments where I am probably having more fun than anyone else on a project.

Indeed, there were times I wondered where I would go with this, many years ago I began looking at ways to go "the whole fan" and do what I liked where I liked.  I was in IT, which satisfied my geek, but I wanted to do more.

Book Review: The Unwritten Rules of the Highly Effective Job Search

The Unwritten Rules of the Highly Effective Job Search: The Proven Program Used by the Worlds Leading Career Services Company
by Orville Pierson

ISBN-10: 0071464042
ISBN-13: 978-0071464048

PROS: A sober, thoughtful, organized book that presents a definite plan for a job search, organizing many common elements of a good job search into one process.

CONS: Extremely dry writing style may put some off.  Despite organization, some of the book's organiation is odd.

SUMMARY: A must-buy book for the job search, presenting an organized plan you can use "out of the box" as long as you're willing to do some research.

Your Elevator Pitch

Could you describe yourself and your career in an elevator?  In two minutes?  Assuming your captive audience wouldn't hate you?

The "Elevator Pitch" is a classic element in a job search - learning to pitch yourself and quickly describe yourself career-wise.  The idea is that if you can do this you can sell yourself well because you can describe yourself and what you do.

I've used "elevator pitches" for years, and have to agree with the wisdom of them.  When I interview, I try to find a way to encapsulate my pitch to present myself concicely, effectively, and enthusiastically.  Of course it changes as you evolve and grow in your job, but it's a great exercise and tool.

I find that the ability to boil complex things into simple descriptions - or even a sentance or a word, is really about your ability to get to the heart of things.  If you're not good at an elevator pitch, keep trying one - it's a learning experience.

If you've never tried an elevator pitch - start doing it.  Work on presenting and selling yourself.  Try it out on yourself.  On other people.  On your fellow fans.

When I do job searches, I pitch myself as an IT professional and pro geek.  So, what's yours?

- Steven Savage

Interview: Ayu from Voice Actor Kick Start

Recently I had the pleasure of meeting Ayu one of the founders of Voice Actor Kick Start, a web page for potential voice actors, mostly focused on Anime.  Intrigued I asked for an interview, so here you potential voice actors go - a discussion of Voice Actor Kick Start!

Networking, the job search, and cost . . .

As all of us has been informed ad nauseum since we ever had to consider the remote possibility of a job search - networking is everything when it comes to finding a job.

And now, in the age of the internet and an economic downturn, we hear once again how important Networking is, even moreso now.

I'm arguing with none of these points.  In fact, I fully agree Networking is important in your career, and gets more and more important as your career goes on.  I also agree it's even more important now.  But I want to add one more thing.

Networking is also cheaper.  Today, people are going to pay even more attention to that.  More, I think it's become even cheaper because of changes in the job search.

Job Search, Social Media, and Payoff.

The Job search changed.  We know that.  We hear about it.  We're probably sick of hearing it.

We've also heard that Job Searches are different because of social media.  We're also probably sick of that.

So I'm going to discuss both these things.  Chalk it up to the two-wrongs-make-a-right approach.

Fandom: The Project Edge

You're a geek, a fangirl, fanboy, otaku, otariiman, sports nut, etc.  You're in a job search.  You'd like to leverage your fannish interests for your next job, but you're busy trying to get the whole search thing working right.

Good job searches are like projects - organized, measured, evaluated, with goals in mind.  Being a fan, you're probably far better at this than many people - and maybe more than you realize.

If you feel disorganized or aren't sure how to approach your job search, step back for a moment and look at the fannish projects you've done.

• Did you organize a convention or part of a convention?
• Do you oversee and run a role-play group?
• Do you manage a community with events?
• Do you sit down and reguarly and consistently make AMVs, fanfic, fanart, etc.?

Then guess what - you know how to do a project.  In fact, I'd lay odds that everyone reading this right now is, on average, better at organizing and getting results than they realize.  It's just that this is so often expressed in our hobbies and fannish activities that we never realize, frankly, how good we are at it.

So, if you're trying to organize your job search (and organized job searches are successful job searches), step back for a moment and look at what you organized in your hobbies.  What lessons did you learn?  What skills do you have?  Who can you call on for help?  What resources did you use?

If you want that geeky job, make your job search a project.  To make that project, take a moment and look at your hobbies and the projects you've done there.  You're probably far more organized than you ever realized - leverage that.

- Steven Savage

Geek Jobs In Your Backyard

We've often spoken on this blog about the need to be open to moving for your career, and that's something that's important. However, there's another side to that coin – there could be "geek career" places right in your vicinity that you don't know about yet.