Losing my job – part II

I figured out around June that I wasn’t going to get my Visa to stay in the states, and that I could only work till end of September at my former firm.

That give me around 3 – 4 months of time to search. Fortunately, the firm was very understanding, and even paid me for the last 2 months to just search for a job at work. That meant that I didn’t need to do any real work – just search all day long.

That turned out to be very helpful – there are so many more avenues and possibilities, when you’re not faced with squeezing in your job search after you get home at 8pm every night. My VP was most kind, and went through 3 iterations of my resume / cover letters with me. That was tremendously helpful – there was quite a stark contrast between my resume: before, and after. He was instrumental as well in pardoning me from work, and never stopped checking in on my job search, frequently also providing words of comfort, and contacts he’d remember.

I really owe a lot to him. I remember being very deflated and scared my first month of my job search – at that point, I was looking at all these other industries as well, simply because I wasn’t sure I’d be able to land a job in consulting (my field of choice). When I told him that during one of my catch up sessions, he told me very sincerely that he felt I should apply for the top 4 firms. His belief really moved me, and I think that extra boost of confidence in myself was really helpful, and kept me going through those few difficult months.

Needless to say, it was a little awkward at work – I tried to tell as few people as possible that I was actively job searching, and didn’t have to do work. Which made for uncomfortable answers to innocuous questions about what I had been up to. But I did tell my closer friends at work, and they were all really understanding, which was nice.

But anyway, the first two months of the job search was pretty tough and disheartening. I tried all sorts of avenues – calling Dartmouth alums, looking on job sites, asking for friends’ contacts, calling up headhunter agencies, etc. I heard back from very few firms, though I did make it through to the second round for a financial analyst position at Google. Unfortunately the job description really didn’t match my interests, nor my skillset, and I think the interviewer could tell. One thing I do want to say though, is that Google’s interview process left much to be desired in terms of professionalism – the first round interviewer failed to call me at the scheduled time 3 times, and barely responded to emails. Disappointing experience overall with the supposed tech giant. Others seem to have had similar experiences, based on some of the blogs I found on the internet.

August was slightly more productive – I think some firms were beginning their recruiting cycle, though by this time I had found out that quite a number of large firms were not hiring for the next year – the economy was souring at this point, though things weren’t as bad as they are now. Chances were growing increasingly slim at this point – none of the top firms seemed to be getting back to me.

I do have to say though, that the alumni network was amazingly helpful! These were people that are at VP / Managing Directing / President levels at top firms (like Citibank, McKinsey, etc). They had all volunteered to be part of the alumni career advisory network, but it was still very very scary calling them at first. But after the first few calls, I came to realise that they’re people too, albeit powerful ones! They were very supportive, and gave me tips, contacts, and feedback on my resume. Although substantive help was still sparse, I managed to improve my resume, and reach out to some contacts.

So that’s what August looked like to me. I’d started hearing back from some firms, and the Dartmouth alumni were being a good source of support. I was willing to settle for any firm at this point, since I was 1 month + away from unemployment, and an uncertain future.

It was REALLY stressful, but my girlfriend was super understanding. =) She helped me prepare for case interviews, and never complained when I would get depressed and whine (occasionally).

I was at the point where I’d be happy one moment, and then I’d think of my work situation, and be totally bummed again. It’s like a rock dropping in the pits of your stomach every few hours…

And with that, I headed into September, my last month in the US.