Tuesday, July 26, 2011

R*M Job Turns Survivor Island

I got this contract in mid-May when I was just about to go to Sunnyvale, CA on another contract. Not quite in my line of work but not bad, solid work.

Six weeks ago they had a round of lay-offs just for show to pump up the share price. This Monday they have started in earnest. To me this looks like peristalsis.

However the top bicephalous job has not been cut and IMNSHO many of the failings come from there (lack of direction, uninspiring locked-in products, overinflated head count).

The unpleasant part is that my boss quit (apparently he was made an offer made-for-refusal) and with him went the business reason(s) I am here as he stormed out the door and did not do perform an orderly handover of tasks.

So this is turning into Survivor Island... I've been thru this kind or crap in 2001 and I definitely think I need to set sail to a calmer island.

-ulianov

Jan 23, 2012 update: The dynamic duo of clowns at the top is gone but they installed as CEO Mr.Herr More of the Same, former COO, aka henchman.

One of the clowns now heads an Innovation Committee which is worse than useless as lately innovation around here was done ostrich style: plunge head in the sand and hope Android and iPhone implode. Ditto for the bladeless knife which lacks the handle, aka. Playbook.

Monday, July 25, 2011

No Go for f/t Job in San Francisco

I got approached by a recruiter from R*verbed on Friday; he had an old copy of my Resume. I've interviewed with these folks about 5 years ago and somehow we did not click.

He was very skilled at selling the company, the work environment and job perspectives. He even assuaged my desire for a job that's not a dead-end (which is hard to get for a hands-on grunt like meself).

Anyways I would only take a f/t job in the US if and only if it came with a green card and I made it clear to the recruiter.

The technical interview was brief, general things about L2 (Ethernet)-L7 and UDP/IP. Another question was how an ELF binary gets loaded/executed in Linux. Nice stuff, made my cogs turn.

Near its end I started asking questions about the nature of the work and apparently it was a support/extend type of gig [i.e. a mid-stream product].

Alas this is not what I am looking for. R&D with new development and hardware, hardware, hardware is much more interesting tho after two years of that I cannot say I am better off.

-ulianov