I had lunch today with the two people I consider my peers in job hunting. One, Herb, taught me the importance of relentlessness both in networking and in job search. We really met up in late 1992 even though we had talked on the phone a few times. I was down and out having been laid off from Borland. It was heading into Christmas which is supposedly lousy time to be out of work. Most job seekers go into hibernation.
“I’ll get started after the New Year,” and all that sort of crap.
But this guy wouldn’t let me take that path and he turned out to be right on the money.
“Great time to network,” he said boldly. I was thinking of my home mortgage, my kids private school and our two car payments. I knew instantly that I could not afford to coast through the holidays. I was living on severance and unemployment. Very little savings in the bank.
He really took me under his wing. I was always good at getting new jobs but very bad at getting a good one. I had decided, the hell with it. I was going to be a contract HR person for a while. It was a tough market and contract HR was dominated by the old Turks. They were very clannish and tended not to share leads with anyone out of their group.
So Herb and I partnered on jobs and leads. If it wasn’t right for me then it was right for him and so on.
It worked out for both of us and when he passed on a contract job at Sun, he handed the opportunity to me. It eventually became a full time regular job. Best job I ever had.
Over the passing years he has helped me and I have helped him.
He is still going. He is still relentless.
He asked me if I missed working.
“Not yet,” I said without hesitation.
I knew the next question before he asked it.
“What do you do all day?”
“Whatever I feel like,” I responded. Then I outlined a typical day.
It was like I was speaking a foreign language.
My other lunch mate was The Jackal who recently exited (stage right or left..any stage just to get out of there) a bad, bad job and has quickly transitioned to working a part time contract and is searching for other work.
Three supreme hunters united for an hour at the Palo Alto Airport.
