Hire Me!

I was laid off on on February 6. I logged on that Tuesday morning to be met with the dreaded 15-minute meeting invite from HR where the recipients are all BCC’d. To say it was a shock would be an understatement. Which, while an understatement, is a stupid statement. Ever since Pearson sold off the POLS division to a the private equity firm Regent, the writing was on the wall. (Disclaimer: Names have not been changed to protect the guilty.) They’d already laid off 40-50% of the company — of course they were coming for the team that actually creates the product. That sad Tuesday morning I guesstimate that about 85% of the Learning Design Solutions team was let go. They kept just enough people who didn’t break their salary quota to “keep the lights on.” After 20 years of amazing service, I was left with a “you’ll be paid through the end of the week.” Because of course the first thing Regent did after acquiring POLS-to-become-Boundless, July of 2023, was to cut severance.

But I digress. This post is about the immediate aftermath and the need to find a new job. To put it quite simply, job searching sucks. That may seem like an obvious statement, but outside of looking for bar and restaurant jobs in my 20s, I’ve honestly never really had to search for a corporate job that provided benefits and insurance. That’s because about 25 years ago I was fortunate enough to wait on someone who had a connection at a small Denver online education company, and I got the job with a referral and a single interview. From then on (for the most part, but that’s another story) I’ve been essentially employed by the same company for 20 years. I’ve interviewed internally for promotions, but I’ve never really had to submit my resume and hope to get a call back. It’s frustrating, exhausting, disheartening, and just generally sucks. So far I’ve applied for 22 jobs (I seriously thought it was more) which has resulted in 3 phone screens, which netted 1 interview (didn’t get that one), and an upcoming interview on Monday.

In this new world of LinkedIn, Indeed, and customizing your resume to get past the AI bots, it’s a whole new world — at least for me. I’m the first person to embrace the remote workplace — again, I was fortunate to have the opportunity land in my lap 18 years ago — but post-pandemic, it’s made the job market even more competitive. I find it crazy to see every LinkedIn job posting, after 24 hours, state “over 100 applicants.” And that’s not even the most disheartening part. There’s nothing like actually getting through the internet bots and having the HR screening call, only to be ghosted by the recruiter. Seriously! We talked on the phone and had good rapport (I know when it’s going well — I used to be the interviewer) and you can’t send an email? We all know AI is doing the work these days. Even a canned AI email would be better than nothing.

So that’s my rant. I kept it pretty mellow. No sense in burning bridges or going off the deep end. TL;DR — private equity firms suck (Regent, I’m talking about you!); Job searching in the 21st century sucks (LinkedIn I’m talking about you!); I’m looking for a job (people who are hiring, I’m talking to you!). So, if you’re reading this, hire me! I’m pretty kickass at what I do. And I’m fun to hang out with.

Note: This post image was created in Midjourney. My prompt was “a drawing of a 40-year old woman with spiky blonde hair, holding a sign that says ‘hire me'” and I used –stylize 500. I also know how to use modern technology. 😉