iamacp.com – I Am A Computer Programmer
All about the daily work issues of a Java/J2EE Computer Programmer

I now know what it feels like to be a wanted man.  Recruiters are always seeking me out. It’s like almost sometimes I feel like I am being stalked. Being at my current job for 7 months now I still receive about 1-2 calls a day from recruiters. It truly is a good feeling but it can get very annoying at times.

Finding the time to stop and answer the calls is not something I have considered.  It’s difficult for me to stop for 5 min and explain to the recruiter I’m not looking for work and then get back into the zone so I can continue my work.   My solution to this issue was to just let my voice mail do the talking and say that I’m not looking for work and returning calls from recruiters. This usually solves the problem.

Being a wanted man feels good but it does have it’s disadvantages.  I no longer fear employment because I am a expert at job hunting and that I know recruiters will always seek me out. I know too that the more experiences of a developer I get the more in demand I am becoming.

Do you hate your job? Does it suck so much you want to vomit? I was telling my coworker for some time about my horrible experience at Bank Of America.  He then shared a even worse story about his former employer.

My coworker started the story by elling about how bad his company got to be in it’s micromanaging of it’s employees. I don’t know how he was able to deal with a 7 years of working at a company that treated it’s employees worse and worse as the years went out. Here are some of the things below that his company did to there employees:

• At Christmas time they asked people to give up there vacation time: They also asked if anyone was going to be in town over the holiday’s. Of course everyone said they were out of town.

• Excessive Meetings: There were so many meetings it was a waste of time they people could barley have time to actually do there job.  It’s possible that you could have a 1 hour meeting to fix something that would take 15 minutes to fix.

• 24 Hour/7 day a week expectation: Most people at the company were salary so the company literally expected you to work 24/7 with no time to yourself and expected the company to be your life. My coworker told me of a time when someone posted on a employee’s Facebook wall asking if they could look at something.

• Outsourcing Galore: This company seemed very big on outsourcing.  From what I understand that the outsources workers could not even do the job properly. It would take 2 people to do the work that 1 person should have been able to do. All the company cared about was cheap labor even if it created way more problems than it solved.

So if any of you out there thinks your job sucks it could always be worse as seen from the story my coworker told me!

Your attitude is one of the biggest factors that determines your success in your career. Throughout my several jobs as a developer I have encountered a wide variety of work environments and situations . This even including the challenges of finding a new position several times over the past few years.  The one thing I always did was to remain positive at all times.

Some of the following situations included the following:

• Dealing with and hearing negativity: Just flat out disrespecting me behind my back. People really have nothing better do do than complain.

• Difficulty getting the job done: These included times when I knew my job was ending or would end shortly by choice or not. I would not give up for the most part of admit defeat until the end.

• Trying to resolve a difficult issue: Sometimes bugs are so difficult that they seem impossible. I would always persist and seek out the correct resources to solve the issue.

Not once during any of these situations did I ever let it get to me. I  would always take charge of the situation no matter how bad it was and always prevail. Having a positive attitude and doing what’s best for yourself (and not the company) is the most important thing. You may fail many times before you succeed but its your attitude which will guarantee your success or failure.

The golden rule I live by and follow is that persistence prevails. If you give up you will almost certainly fail. If you keep trying and attempt to learn from your mistake you will eventually succeed not matter what the task may be.