I know of company that is getting a big project soon. Current pm staff is swamped, so they decided to look for a ‘technical’ pm. I didn’t think it would be unusual for a pm to know something about programming or database queries and the like.
They got hundreds of responses to the job posting, but not one qualified by having any technical skills! The job description was pretty explicit about the expected skill set required for the position.
Why would this happen?
Are pm’s so caught up in the latest from PMSI (?sp) that they are ignoring the auxiliary skills needed for the job? How far does that go? Is using Excel a stretch?
Or are all the current technical pm’s with the skill set satisfied with the current employment. Again, unlikely.
Uncategorized
Job Hunt, Project Management
Talked with a big shop in town. Met with a founder and a vp. Got along great.
Job was mid-level, so had to talk to sw director and an architect.
Director went over a standard question list for all developers. Great.
Architect interjected random questions. Most of them did not have an answer, were trick questions, or otherwise pretty off tangent.
And the coup-de-grace: Gee, I graduated about the same time you did. We must be the same age.
Gee, if I known you guys were jerks I would have taken my tape recorder.
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Interviewing, Job Hunt
Talking to a number of companies that are looking for software people. I guess the first thing to notice is: there are quite a few postings out there these days. Take a glance at craigslist for your area, guaranteed at least a hundred jobs per day.
Secondly, talking to a small shop in town they are turning down work below a certain $N,000. Talking further, the bigger shops in town are turning down work for less than $N0,000.
It really feels like the press has been so caught up with the stupidness of banks lending money to people that could never pay. The result is they are ignoring the apparent large scale demand for services, at least for technical people.
Third hit point was a survey run by a pretty good outfit that should only have gone to hiring managers. The number one question was “how are you dealing with the shortage of technical pool?”.
I guess things are still in pretty good shape (for s/w companies anyway).
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Economics, Industry, Job Hunt