Overview

The nineties job quest

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Redundancies and freelancing

There is a widespread misconception among employers, the government, the News media and the general public that anybody who is unemployed for any length of time obviously lacks either the desire or ability to work and is therefore beneath contempt. While there is a growing acceptance that redundancy can strike anybody at any time, most people find new jobs relatively quickly. Indeed, I've suffered three redundancies and found work quickly (in less than a month each time) following the first two of them in 1981 and 1988.

In different ways, my first two redundancies took their toll and ultimately, but indirectly, contributed to a situation where I decided to take a complete break from work for a few months. The first redundancy forced me to go freelance. While this was a good thing in some ways, it meant that as I rely on public transport, I spent much of my time living in bed-and-breakfast establishments during the week, only going home at weekends. I hoped one day to return to orthodox employment, but when I finally secured such a job, it was with an organisation that was in trouble and the job only lasted six months. So I ended up contracting again, but there came a point where I needed a break.

A costly decision

That decision, which seemed sensible at the time, cost me dearly. At the time, I had my own house and plenty of money, all of which I ended up losing. My guess is that if I'd secured employment again within a year or two, I'd have been OK. By now, I might have paid off the mortgage and be living in a property worth over 200,000 pounds. More likely, I might have moved to a better property and still be paying a mortgage. Either way, I'd be worth a lot of money. Instead, I have no assets (even the Bankruptcy court couldn't take anything off me) and my future job prospects appear bleak.

February 1990

In February 1990, I finished my contract with Yellow Pages in Reading and took things easy for a few months. When I started looking for work again, there were not a large number of vacancies but I expected to get work again fairly quickly. How wrong I was. The recession was clearly a factor but the majority of available work seemed to be on new technology. The limited vacancies on projects utilising ICL computers mainly required experience of TPMS or Application Master, neither of which I had. Although I could learn easily enough, there was then no shortage of people available with these skills and employers did not want to consider me in those circumstances. Even when I had all the skills required for a particular vacancy, I sometimes lost out because employers wanted younger staff. I was 39 at the time. In later years, some employers set aside their prejudices, but even with 2007 legislation dealing with the issue, ageism will take a long time to eradicate.

Interviews

Here is a complete list of all the formal interviews that I attended during the nineties job quest. In some cases, I refer to them elsewhere in the blog. And yes, I really did attend two separate interviews with Experian, but I was interviewed by a different person on the second occasion.

Interviews attended

Computer programming and related jobs
10/93	British Gas	Solihull
11/95	Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council	Dudley
11/96	JBA Consulting	Studley near Redditch
12/96	Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council	Stockport
01/97	Westminster Collection	Watford
04/97	Midlands Electricity	Dudley
07/97	Experian	Nottingham
07/97	Avery Berkel	Walsall
08/97	Co-operative Insurance Society	Manchester
08/97	Stockton on Tees Borough Council	Stockton
09/97	IRS Recruitment for Systems Union	Reading Dogmersfield
09/97	IT Net at Birmingham City Council	Birmingham
10/97	Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council	Oldbury
12/97	EDS at Inland Revenue	Telford
02/98	North Tyneside Council	North Shields
02/98	Aberdeenshire Council	Aberdeen
02/98	Plymouth City Council	Plymouth
05/98	System Lynx	Walsall
05/98	Traderman	Tamworth
06/98	Experian	Nottingham
06/98	CP Computer Systems	Narborough

CP Computer Systems sold out to XKO Software, which merged with another business to become Solarsoft.

Now for the detail

The remainder of this blog explains in detail how I eventually secured a job in 1998, more than eight years after I decided to take a career break.

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