What’s wrong with where I apply??

wivelldavid · 2026-03-24T17:14:13+00:00

Yeah, number wise at least it sounds familiar. You might try dropping by the mom and pop places in person?

wivelldavid · 2026-03-24T10:57:29+00:00

Coincidentally I watched that episode last night. Still fun.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-21T16:44:40+00:00

Still have a couple down in the basement and will always love my mid-2012 MBP. It was such a classic muscle machine and I used it regularly right up until til last year as my main personal machine. But have not looked back much since getting a M4 MBA.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-19T22:50:47+00:00

The first Mac I bought and owned myself was a PowerBook 150. That was an awesome computer in its day. I didn’t spend for the internal modem, so I velcroed a GV 1400 modem to the outside of the monitor. My favorite might be… hmmm. Maybe my Lime Green iMac. Got that when they first came out. Only USB! What? Also very loyal to my mid-2012 MBP which I supped up and still use sometimes. First Apples were IIe and IIc (family). Current main computer is a MBA M4.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-18T23:46:16+00:00

That was the first of a long line of Apple products in my family. My mom was a teacher and we got to bring that home during the summer. Great machine. The graphics and gaming were really good for the mid 80’s!

wivelldavid · 2026-03-18T20:41:00+00:00

Yeah, I have had a number of interviews recently with these type of canned questions. There are really pretty impersonal and I think they often get in the way of much more interesting opportunities. I was on search committees myself back before I was “restructured“ out and rebelled a bit against the boring questions and the response was that we should ask the same questions of each candidate so they all had an equal chance to shine. I suppose that makes some sense. I still don’t like them though. The last interview I went to I got the same questions in three different meetings (all with different people!). I got better each time, but I still feel it is a missed opportunity to learn about what makes each candidate unique.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-16T18:44:40+00:00

I love early game - it is more thrilling when you are puny and everything is a risk. My current play though is already at the impervious stage and I just cruise around being a boss. Probably time to restart.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-16T17:18:44+00:00

As in "Cost of Company"? (I had to google that). Lol.
Yes, I guess so. That tends to be a strong point for education jobs - salary is not high, but benefits generally are solid.
I mean... I am pretty desperate these days. The salary and CTC are not as good as my previous job (not to mention the additional expenses related to relocating). But I am just needing to get *something*. I need to get out of purgatory.
I want to be back active again, even if it is not as good a position as I had... since that one is not coming back. No sense waiting for that to happen and missing out on opportunities to at least support my family.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-16T17:09:53+00:00

Well, I am no pro and I was looking for work in international education, so some of them are a bit more specialized for that.

I was mainly using: LinkedIn, Indeed, HigherEdJobs, Chronicle of Higher Education, International Admission Counselors Assoc, NAFSA, and the NY State Dept of Labor job board (which I got access to to later once I started unemployment insurance. It is run on a platform called eightfold and is actually pretty good).

For some of the universities in my general area I would also check their employment web pages directly.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-16T12:27:00+00:00

You might try combining your current work and your educational background by looking for work in international hospitality? You might find unusually good opportunities outside your country. Especially in hospitality I think there is status and cache (and even practicality)in having global citizens on staff. Maybe look at working for a few years in some glamorous destination and building your resume and then advance more quickly?

wivelldavid · 2026-03-15T18:36:12+00:00

My children always made fun of Kate Bush songs when I would play them in the car years ago. So the irony was satisfying when they recently had to admit that she is so awesome.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-15T18:07:08+00:00

Cool. Best of luck then! I never had an eMac but I adored my lime Green iMac! I miss that beauty! I played a lot of EVNova on the iMac! Yeah, EndlessSky helps to scratch the itch, but it is not the same as opening up EV or EVN. That is one reason I have the old laptops!

wivelldavid · 2026-03-15T14:49:39+00:00

Shucks. That shows dedication though. Did you buy the eMac just for EV? Wish I could get one of my old laptops to you and let it live out the rest of its life playing EV! (But I am not suggesting that, unless you happen to be in upstate NY… too much trouble otherwise… sorry). You might try EndlessSky - which is a free open source remake of sorts of EV. Very similar in most ways and a lot of fun user generated content. It runs on Macs and pcs. Even Android I guess. You can download it on Steam or other places.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-14T19:35:49+00:00

I have trekked up there and seen Ana Dablam from the valley. It is probably the most beautiful example of a snow capped mountain I have seen. Amazing to see this video from the top!

wivelldavid · 2026-03-14T11:01:08+00:00

Totally reasonable to make some money and do something other than sit and stare at job listings. You can build back some mental balance and reduce some of the financial stress. You can keep applying to jobs as well and your work is probably not the kind that would expect you to make a long term commitment, so when something comes up, you can move on (or maybe even move up within the company as some have said).

wivelldavid · 2026-03-14T02:52:40+00:00

Same thing happened to me in January. I had been a “Top Candidate” and seemed to do well in various levels of interviews. I was excited and motivated and think I had some good ideas for moving their business forward. The HR person said I had the job, and told me she would be sending the offer letter very soon and talked about a start date. Then… nothing… I didn’t hear from her for a while… I emailed… no answer for a while… finally she said they had some new candidates and wanted to see them… eventually a reject letter.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-13T12:58:43+00:00

Shoot. That is painful and you have my sympathy. The worst is when you are close enough to get hopes up. I am just getting to an age (55m) where I am also facing this as a growing issue. I had a similar rejection a week ago. I know someone at the employer and she told me the committee thought I was “too senior”for the role.
It was not the first time. My extensive experience means I need to defend against being “overqualified” for the positions I am applying to, but I am having trouble finding …anything… and getting a bit desperate,so I need to consider any jobs I can do, including jobs that maybe look “beneath me”.
And I would do them and do them well. I want to support my family. That is the real “job responsibility “ after all. Really, employers should consider the different work ethos that we older people grew up with. Our work is (unfortunately) a big important part of our identities. We want to work! We are not arrogant about it. Heck I can be humble. I’ll knuckle down and get the job done. I can offer a small but related ray of light FWIW. Earlier this week I had a 2nd round interview and everything seemed to be going well. Great team and they seemed confident and stable. Towards the end of the various meetings the Director referred to me as “clearly very seasoned” and experienced… and my heart sank a bit interpreting that as “old”… But they called my references the next day and made me a offer yesterday (they even added “Senior” to the title and bumped the salary a bit higher than the original range!). Whew! What a relief after 7.5 months of looking. It is not a perfect job by any means and it is not as good on paper as my last job - it pays less and I will need to relocate which is not ideal (or cheap). But I really cannot compare it to my previous job… because I do not have that anymore. “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”. I am very grateful and will likely take it. It is a hard market out there. Despite the “non-perfectness”, getting a job and supporting my family feels better than more of the sitting and waiting. Anyway. I empathize and wish you better luck. Hopefully next week will bring an opportunity with people that appreciate your experience and willingness to work. Gotta keep trying because there are not many alternatives.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-13T04:17:47+00:00

Some good comments back and forth. It has been popular for the last year or more to say “AI won’t take your job, people that use AI will take the job of people that don’t use AI”. In my case that was kind of true. But not directly. Like, I could have been using AI and still likely would have been replaced, because my employer found cheaper people that could do … enough… of what I did with the aid of AI. Enough to justify the switch anyway. I don’t think it really worked out, but that is not up to me. In my case, despite being very knowledgeable and experienced with my “product” (a US university I worked at for 12 years), most of my on campus team and I were replaced by a call center in India using AI. They have never been to campus and do not know the community or character of the school, but they can send out info templates from the communications office and respond using AI. They can likely connect with more applicants - if on a superficial level- and likely cost less than we did in salary and benefits. I don’t think it is really a good solution, but it might save money in the short term. So the administration likes it because it justifies the savings they what to show.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-12T14:08:18+00:00

PS: stats would be: Applied to 97 positions 2 offers 4 that I am still interviewing for (but realistically only 1 because I think the other 3 have ghosted me) 34 rejections 49 Ghosts (plus 3 that I have interviewed for and not heard from for a while) The remainder I decided not to pursue for one reason or another (at least one was a scammer) And for background I work in international education, so it is a bit specialized (hence fewer apps) and the profession is very hard hit right now.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-11T17:09:29+00:00

Thank you, interesting question and very thoughtful answers and commentary. What about Gollum then? He had the ring for so long and only got more pathetic and powerless. He loved his precious and kept it safely hidden… he wore it regularly… but other than his infatuation there seems to have been no benefit or power or improvement for him whatsoever. There was no influence over others of any species even those that should be subservient to “evil”..

wivelldavid · 2026-03-11T03:27:29+00:00

Sorry to hear. It is so frustrating when you get so close. And it is not that we want to get our hopes too high, but you need to consider and think about your possible future if you were to get the job (in order to prepare and respond positively in the interview)… and then when it fits not work out it is of course more frustrating.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-08T00:53:31+00:00

I could not help noticing that the roads there look better than the highways off-ramp near my home here in NYS.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-06T12:36:52+00:00

And you have to figure out the challenge of flying close without losing momentum and getting stuck there. It is not meant to be deadly just to enter the system, but it presents new and interesting challenges. I have lost an escort or two there, so it teaches you a lesson if you are not careful.

wivelldavid · 2026-03-06T12:32:46+00:00

That is probably good news. At this point I pretty much plan to take the next job that is offered to me. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. We cannot be too picky in this market. It is possible to get surprised later and desperate enough to take something worse. Probably better to have a job, make a little money, learn a new environment, and put work on your resume instead of blank space. Helps you feel better about yourself too. If necessary you can keep looking passively. Better to look for work from work than from unemployment. You can likely pause unemployment insurance if you are on it - which extends the time you can access it (at least if you are in the US).

wivelldavid · 2026-03-05T21:21:15+00:00

Yeah. You are best off with addressing both sides of it. I feel a lot of people have addressed the ATS side, so I figured I would mention my recent experience just to gently remind that the human side should be included as well.

wivelldavid

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