scott wrote:

> You need to learn to come across more positive, almost every comment 
> you've made in this thread has been negative.  People give helpful 
> suggestions and almost every time you just throw it back to them with 
> some trivial made-up excuse why it won't work.

Actually I agreed with quite a few of the comments (e.g., your 
suggestion that I remove the ancient history from my CV).

> No wonder you can't find 
> another job if that attitude comes across in your CV/letter/interview.
> 
> You seem to be under this delusion that for every job advertised there 
> will be hundreds of people applying with the perfect match of experience 
> and qualifications.  Get real, that hardly ever happens even in large 
> companies.

Given the spectacular lack of success I've experienced during the course 
of my entire career - nay, my entire *life* - I guess that's not so 
surprising, eh?

I take your point. It's just rather hard to believe something when all 
the available evidence consistently points to the contrary. Even if, 
rationally, you know the available evidence is somewhat skewed.

Still, you'd think that a huge, well-known company like Google or Nokia 
would constantly have far more applicants than they know what to do 
with. It is most unlikely that *I* would be the best of the entire pack.

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>>> No, how on Earth do you imagine that they could find out your salary?
>>
>> They call my employer and ask them? It's not rocket science.
> 
> There is no way your employer would give out such information to anyone 
> outside the company.  Even to internal employees they would never give 
> out such information, unless authorised to do so by someone quite senior.

Well, it depends on how badly they don't want me to leave, doesn't it?

Thinking about it... my MD is probably far too stupid to realise how 
important I am, so he probably won't care. So maybe you're right.

> DO NOT tell them your motivation for moving is the pay.

Right. So you suggest I go with the "not enough technical challenge" 
route then?

>> Benny seems to think I should be earning 30K - 40K. (Working for 
>> somebody else, that is.) Personally I think that's a little ambitious 
>> for somebody of my limited skill.
> 
> Not at all, if you had spent 2 years working at your company, then maybe 
> moved up and taken some more responsibility for the networking etc (or 
> moved to a different company with a more responsible job) you could 
> easily be earning that much or more.

Heh, damn. My *mum* doesn't even earn that much, and she's seriously 
good at her job.

> The problem you have is that 
> you've spent 6 years doing essentially the same job

Agreed.

> Google "average graduate salary" and hit the first link, it's 24K euro. 

...so that's about £20?

(I don't know if Google is giving you different result from where you 
are, but mine says £23k-£24k.)

> Even with only 3% pay rises and no promotion you should be on almost 30K 
> after six years.

I don't think we've ever had a pay rise that big here. Roughly once 
every 3 years they add maybe 1.5%. (And oddly, when we get a raise 
everybody complains...?)

> I think you just started out on an exceptionally under paid job, and 
> because you've stuck at it for so long you're kind of out of touch with 
> what other technical people with 6 years experience are being paid.

Well, they did hire me explicitly because they were forced to hire 
somebody and "I'm cheap". As you say, I'm still here, so why should they 
pay me any more?

Given that I don't know anybody else, never mind anybody who works in 
computing, I have nothing to compare to...

> BTW just being a manager doesn't mean you're not technical, my manager 
> does essentially the same job as me, he just has a lot more experience 
> and does more stuff like budget and reporting with senior people.

The "traditional" approach seems to be that when you need find the 
person who's best at their job, and then make them a manager and give 
them a sack more money. Which I always thought was a bit strange, given 
that (say) knowing how to diagnose line faults really well isn't 
particularly correlated with knowing how to manage people...

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> It is most unlikely that *I* would be the best of the entire pack.

Why not? How many people do you think know Haskell?  If you turned up for 
interview with 4 other people, do you really think they would all also know 
Haskell?  How many of them do you think would have written a working 
function parser (is that what it is called?) like the one you did?  That's 
not trivial stuff.

Wasn't there some job someone posted here a while ago that specifically 
mentioned Haskell?  I'm sure that in the large companies like Nokia, MS, 
Google etc they have plenty of areas where you would fit in perfectly.

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scott wrote:
>> It is most unlikely that *I* would be the best of the entire pack.
> 
> Why not? How many people do you think know Haskell?  If you turned up 
> for interview with 4 other people, do you really think they would all 
> also know Haskell?  How many of them do you think would have written a 
> working function parser (is that what it is called?) like the one you 
> did?  That's not trivial stuff.

Sure. But if I turn out for an interview with 4,000 other people, what 
are the chances that I'm the *only* person who knows Haskell?

> Wasn't there some job someone posted here a while ago that specifically 
> mentioned Haskell?

Yeah. I applied. And I never heard a word in reply...

(But then, it was posted on the Haskell mailing list. There I'm just a 
mino; there are people on that list who comprehend System F and so forth.)

> I'm sure that in the large companies like Nokia, MS, 
> Google etc they have plenty of areas where you would fit in perfectly.

I did actually take a look at Microsoft Research Cambridge the other 
day... but I couldn't figure out what the hell they were talking about. Heh.

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> (I don't know if Google is giving you different result from where you are, 
> but mine says £23k-£24k.)

Oops sorry getting confused with euros and pounds there, mine says 24K 
POUNDS too lol.

> I don't think we've ever had a pay rise that big here. Roughly once every 
> 3 years they add maybe 1.5%. (And oddly, when we get a raise everybody 
> complains...?)

That's terrible, haven't you noticed that the price of everything around you 
is going up by far more than 1.5% every 3 years? So you're actually earning 
LESS now than 6 years ago!

> Well, they did hire me explicitly because they were forced to hire 
> somebody and "I'm cheap". As you say, I'm still here, so why should they 
> pay me any more?

Exactly.  You never know, once you tell them you are leaving for another 
job, they might offer you a pay rise to keep you.  But by the sounds of it 
they would probably just try to get by without replacing you ;-)

> The "traditional" approach seems to be that when you need find the person 
> who's best at their job, and then make them a manager and give them a sack 
> more money.

Usually you choose the person who you think is going to be best at being 
manager, not necessarily (and often not) the best outright technical guy.

> Which I always thought was a bit strange, given that (say) knowing how to 
> diagnose line faults really well isn't particularly correlated with 
> knowing how to manage people...

But being really bad about diagnosing line faults is a far worse situation. 
I guess there are "technical managers" and purely "admin managers". 
Technical managers need to know their stuff well, otherwise what do they say 
when one of their employees has a question?

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> Sure. But if I turn out for an interview with 4,000 other people, what are 
> the chances that I'm the *only* person who knows Haskell?

If a company is interviewing 4000 people they usually have considerably more 
than 1 place up for grabs.

> (But then, it was posted on the Haskell mailing list. There I'm just a 
> mino; there are people on that list who comprehend System F and so forth.)

Yeh, applying for a Haskell job that is posted on the Haskell mailing list 
is perhaps not the most sure way to get a job!  Besides, you didn't have a 
cool updated CV back then like you have now thanks to all our input here :-)

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>> I don't think we've ever had a pay rise that big here. Roughly once 
>> every 3 years they add maybe 1.5%. (And oddly, when we get a raise 
>> everybody complains...?)
> 
> That's terrible, haven't you noticed that the price of everything around 
> you is going up by far more than 1.5% every 3 years? So you're actually 
> earning LESS now than 6 years ago!

...and I would notice prices, why? I never buy anything, remember? ;-)

(Well, except petrol. When I got my first car, it used to cost £30 to 
fill it up. Last time I did that, it cost me £60. OUCH!)

But yeah, every time a pay rise is announced, everybody complains about 
it being "a pay cut". Surely *not* getting a rise would be worse??

>> Well, they did hire me explicitly because they were forced to hire 
>> somebody and "I'm cheap". As you say, I'm still here, so why should 
>> they pay me any more?
> 
> Exactly.  You never know, once you tell them you are leaving for another 
> job, they might offer you a pay rise to keep you.  But by the sounds of 
> it they would probably just try to get by without replacing you ;-)

Heh. Part of me wants to see the look on their stupid faces when they 
find out how much a "normal" technical expert wants to be paid to do the 
job I do. ;-)

But hey, I'm sure they'll find a monkey who can do the job on my salary. 
I doubt they'll be as good as me, but will the company care?

(We're talking about the company that paid for a support contract from a 
firm who's employees clearly haven't got a clue how to fix an air 
conditioning system. When we called them out, they spent 2 hours 
standing outside playing football!)

>> The "traditional" approach seems to be that when you need find the 
>> person who's best at their job, and then make them a manager and give 
>> them a sack more money.
> 
> Usually you choose the person who you think is going to be best at being 
> manager, not necessarily (and often not) the best outright technical guy.

This would make far more sense. As I understand it, being a manager is 
primarily about people skills.

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scott wrote:
>> Sure. But if I turn out for an interview with 4,000 other people, what 
>> are the chances that I'm the *only* person who knows Haskell?
> 
> If a company is interviewing 4000 people they usually have considerably 
> more than 1 place up for grabs.

True. But it wouldn't surprise me if somewhere popular had 4,000 
applications and only a handful of actual vacancies. How many people 
apply to Nokia just in case they're hiring?

> Yeh, applying for a Haskell job that is posted on the Haskell mailing 
> list is perhaps not the most sure way to get a job!  Besides, you didn't 
> have a cool updated CV back then like you have now thanks to all our 
> input here :-)

So true! ;-)

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Invisible wrote:
> Sure. But if I turn out for an interview with 4,000 other people, what
> are the chances that I'm the *only* person who knows Haskell?

What are the chances they'd choose only ONE person out of 4000 in such an
interview?

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Invisible wrote:
>> That Haskell parser thing I don't even remember the name of. I understood
>> it without even knowing Haskell. I insist: put that in the Haskell wiki!
> 
> Oh, you *liked* Parsec, eh?

Not quite, more like I liked your explanation of it.

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