Unemployed! (1 Viewer)

[GBalcom]

I've never used a forum to vent, but I feel like now's the time. I had been working hard for my company, making several improvements to help. One should even save hundreds of hours per year. Well, I knew the company wasn't doing well, but it came at me like a brick wall when I heard of a downsizing, and 16 people lost their jobs, including me.

I've worked my way up in my industry (wood products) from the shop floor, Project and production management, through to process engineer. I started with Access as a way to improve the software situation, and really enjoy using VBA and creating/deploying reliable applications.

After 2 out of state job interviews, I'm really wondering whether or not to stay in my industry or hop to software programming. The trouble is I can't find any Access Developer positions, and while I've been trying to learn VB.net, I'm just not proficient in it enough to say "yes, I can do that", like I can say with Access and VBA.

2 years of hard work with Access and VBA have led me to develop 4 applications that save a 15 million dollar company time every day, and I'm sure it would have taken me much longer to accomplish in VB.net or some other solution.

I appreciate any responses or advice for my situation. Above all, thank you for letting me vent. :banghead:

 

[ButtonMoon]

GBalcom,

Software development is a very broad and diverse field and obviously very competitive. The best advice I can give is try not to be too specialist. If you want to be an application developer then Java, .NET, C, C++ are by far the most common languages and to maximise appeal to future employers those are general purpose languages to know. On the other hand if you want to be a database developer then that market space is dominated by Oracle, SQL Server, Sybase, DB2. One of the downsides of a career in IT is the amount of work you have to put in (often unpaid) to educate yourself in new technologies and ideas. It's essential. Don't bet your career on just one product or technology. On the plus side, the pay in technology is usually above average for white collar jobs and the prospects for mobility between jobs are usually very good.

Getting straight into full time development with only limited experience could be difficult. You might try looking for a software support role first. Those type of roles often have lower entry level requirements but can easily lead on to development roles later on. Good luck!

 

[Lightwave]

I personally think your best bet is some kind of engineering but majoring on an area where you can use both your engineering and programming skills. I certainly always appreciate people that are flexible in their outlook. Small companies often require that kind of practical individual. Depends how desperate you are but you might need to go contract and let them see that you can do a good job and make a difference. Good Luck

 

[catalin.petrut]

1. talk with a layer. Maybe you have some rights over the app that you designed/modified on your years on the job.
2. depending on your social status and responsabilities, you could take into consideration the idea of your own business.

 

[GBalcom]

Thank you everyone for the responses so far.

Catalin,
I've really considered this...In fact, I've written "Copyright 2012, all rights reserved" on every splash screen and all the code has copyright with me as the author.

 

[catalin.petrut]

In this case, i think you have a case Of course, depends on your country laws.