| Jun. 1st, 2009 @ 08:01 am Career history |
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I have had a pretty varied career history. Not as much as some, but more than many people I know. Somebody elses' post today (you know who you are) prompted me to kind of run down that history.
My very first job was as a paperboy. I did this when I was living in Astoria, during High School before I was old enough to get a real job. It was something. The weather was pretty crappy, since this was Astoria and all. But for a very first job it wasn't terrible. It got me some extra money, I met some interesting people.
Once I made it to age 15, I got a job with Burger King. Yeah, not such a great upgrade in job. Absolutely better pay. But the management was ridiculous. Especially since I was still a student and I distinctly remember them trying to schedule me to work mornings during the week multiple times. They just didn't get it.
When I was 16 I made a lateral move (and just almost across the street) to McDonalds. Mostly because I knew almost everyone that worked there. My best friend worked there, I had other friends from school working there. So in the end, it really wasn't too bad. It was a fun job, because I knew the people I was working with and the environment was fairly laid back. But, it was still your typical high school job.
As soon as I graduated high school, which was right before I turned 18, I started working at the local Radio Shack in down town Astoria. I worked here 3 days a week, and went to school at the local community college. The owner knew me because I had known one of his ex employees. Actually... she and I had been... kind of involved. I had a rather intimate knowledge of the back room of the store before I even started working there. But THAT is a whole other story. The owner, and his father who he had bought the business from, were both surfer guys from Seaside. Lots of fun to work for. No benefits, and not the best paying job, but better than food service. And it let me put my technical knowledge to work at least some. Also, a lot of people came through looking for computer help, which kicked off an under-the-table computer repair business for myself. All-in-all, it was a pretty good set up. Enjoyable environment, laid back boss, and something that I enjoyed pretty well.
My second year at Radio Shack, I also started working at the movie theater. I had bought a car, and was planning on moving out. So I had to take on the second job so that I could cover my expenses, my schooling, and to save up to move. I was a projectionist at the new movie theater in Astoria. I actually was employed there before they even opened. I helped with some of the post-construction work to get the place ready. It was an alright job, and definitely served its purpose. I only did it for about 6 months though. Working nearly 60 hours a week between the two jobs AND going to school for 15 credits (which in Oregon is quite a lot) got to me and really burned me out pretty bad.
Not long before summer after my second year of college, I was contacted by Gateway Computers. They had found my resume online, and decided they wanted to interview me to work at a new store opening up in Downtown Portland. This was my chance to get out of Astoria, and to really get out on my own. So I went to Portland, I interviewed, and I was offered one of the two full time sales positions at the store. It was a pretty sizeable increase in pay. I would be making 9.50/hour, plus commissions. And I would have benefits for the first time ever. I took the job, moved to Portland, and started my new life in computer retail. And even after less than a year, I had been promoted and was a sales manager at my store. It wasn't meant to be though. Not long after, our store was closed due to general downsizing within the company, and I had to take a part-time sales position at another store. This wasn't going to work.
While working at Gateway part time, I went into business for myself doing computer repairs again. This time as a contractor. I had another company (at that time WyEast, which is no longer in business) that would contract me out to do the work that they didn't have time for. The pay was great, at $60/hour. Usually jobs didn't take much more than an hour, and were often as simple as computer setup, or basic troubleshooting. This wasn't always the case though. I had a number of jobs where I was on-site for 8 to 10 hours trying to recover data from failing hardware, or doing server upgrades and such. But then the tech market took a dive. Intel laid off a ton of people, and they decided they could do what I did, and for less money. It flooded the market and took away a lot of my work.
My manager at the time at Gateway moved to Best Buy (this happens a lot, moving between companies like this) and I followed him. I got a full time sales position there, that after some time turned into a position at the tech bench doing repairs. This was actually not bad. Decent pay, good hours, didn't have to deal with sales so much. Though pissed off customers occaisionaly. But overall this wasn't too bad. After a while, I became the tech lead and began managing the tech bench. So I had made pretty good progress, and this set me up for my next job.
One of the customers that came in quite often to get computer work done was the CFO of a local fiberglass goods manufacturing company. He liked me and the work I did so much that when the job opened up at the company, they offered me the position of their IS and Purchasing Manager. This was a big step for me, in the right direction. I wanted out of the retail world, and this was going to get me out. So I took the job. Overall it wouldn't have been too bad. I mean, they had archaeic systems (Back Office and Small Business Windows servers running on an old Novell 4.11 network... it was a nightmare), and not a lot of computers. So instead of just doing the IS piece, they also had me doing all the purchasing of raw materials for the company. This kept me pretty busy, more so than the computer piece. I did a lot of things for the company though. Improved their backup story for their servers. I set up a network wide virus scanning system that I could monitor from my work station. And I fixed a number of their database apps that wer not working at the time when I started working there. So I definitely did my work. The hardest part of working there though was dealing with the people. I am pretty moderate, leaning towards liberal in some areas. Conservative in others. But everyone that worked there was a far right wing conservative. There were pictures of the CEO/Owner of the company shaking hands with Bush Sr. and Reagan. When Bush Jr. came through campaigning for re-election, the family that ran the company was all invited to the invite only dinner and campaign stop. I had to keep my mouth shut 90% of the time, and there was a lot of political talk goin on... so that was difficult. But I persevered.
While I was there, I ended up getting very sick. Ended up in the hospital. Was diagnosed with Crohn's disease and told I was going to need a surgery or I was going to die... I got laid off of my job 2 days after coming back from the hospital. The company wasn't doing well, which I knew. And I was the most expendable. I went back to Best Buy part time. I was too sick to do full time. So I worked just enough hours to also keep unemployment until I could go through my surgery and get back to work.
Once my surgery was done and I was able to go back to work full time, I applied for a job with a software development company. Small company that makes sync software for PDA devices (Windows Mobile, Palm, BlackBerry, etc.). I was offered the job and took it. Was full time, had some benefits. It was just doing phone support, but it was in-house at least. And had some advancement options. Over time there I advanced to top-tier support for them, as well as managing their support team. Even started doing software testing for them. But my wage didn't change much. I was getting paid very low for all the work that I was doing.
After about 1-1/2 years of this, a guy I knew that was working as a contractor for Microsoft got ahold of me. Looked like the team he was on was looking for more people. I contacted the recruiter for the contract agency, and they interviewed me, and got me interviews with some people at Microsoft over the phone. These went well and I was asked to come in for face-to-face interviews. This was a big gamble. The pay was excellent, almost doubling what I was currently making. But I would have to up and move to Seattle. And the contract was only 6 months, and I could possibly get an extension, but this wasn't a sure thing. But, I took one of the positions I was offered. I started 2 weeks later.
I worked at my first team for almost 6 months. We finished a bit early and they started cutting contractors. I got an interview with one of the teams within Exchange. I was offered that position and took it. Worked there for over 6 months. At 1 year of work, you have to take a 90 day break from Microsoft. I had already interviewed with a company in Downtown Seattle (Smart Desktop) and had been offered a full time permanent position there. Pay was a bit better than I was doing, better benefits, but it was a startup. You never know what is going to happen with a startup. But, I didn't have to take that job. I got a full interview with Microsoft 2 days before my contract was up. On the last day of my contract, I was offered a full time position at Microsoft. I took it, and that is where I am today, two years later. |
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