I Guess You'd Better Come In
Hello. Like many of you, I lost my job this year.
I live in New York State, over an hour north of New York City. I pay $3100 per month in rent.
I receive $504 per week from New York State in unemployment benefits.
As you can see, the math ain’t mathin’.
Like Robert Townsend’s tale of making Hollywood Shuffle on a credit card, I bet on myself. I’ve risked it all. But after December 2024, I will not be able to pay for rent or the basics of life.
Get a job!
I live in New York State, over an hour north of New York City.
NYC is loaded with opportunities, right?
Nope. Not unless you know someone or you’re willing to spend all of your money commuting to NYC for a low-wage role.
Also here’s an ugly truth: most positions you’ve applied for – particularly those with “Senior” in the title – were never meant for you. They’re intended for an existing team member who’s already paid their dues in that company.
Where have you applied?
I’m glad you asked!
What started as a simple To-Do list in Notion became difficult to update and increasingly meaningless because I’ve applied for so many roles.
Since I have to meet with a new contact at New York State’s Department of Labor on December 4, I decided to refactor that To-Do list into a Database.
Here it is – Isaac T.’s Job Search:
https://valiant-wrench-7be.notion.site/Isaac-T-s-Job-Search-14396e322e7280c29deed41bb3376350
This is published in Read Only mode, but feel free to tinker and explore as you please. For example, I sorted the Complete List view by Date Applied > Ascending, but you can change that. You’ll probably find the Days Until Outcome Reached column and the Board view the most interesting.
Depending on your local web browser and computer, you may need to click Load more once you reach the end of the list.
I’ll continually update this doc until I find my next role, so feel free to follow along at home.
You’ve applied for so many roles – don’t you know what you wanna be when you grow up?
I’ve had a few well-meaning people look at my job submissions and conclude I lack focus or vision.
Nope.
All my professional life I’ve worked in small-but-mighty teams. In those environments, you have to get comfortable wearing multiple hats and context switching. This job search revealed just how many hats I’ve worn, and how many of those hats contained even more hats.
So what do you want to do?
I’m re-dubbing myself a Creative Technologist, which seems to combine or intersect somewhere between a:
- Sales Engineer (perhaps Pre- or Post-Sales)
- Solutions Architect (the no-code variety)
- Technical Writer
Simply put:
I want to keep helping teams work together from anywhere, in better and faster ways, using their favorite technologies.
What have you been doing in the meantime?
Working in and around Avid Technology’s ecosystem for decades now (really really), I decided to niche down on helping Avid-based teams demystify or simplify their workflows.
I’ve written articles aimed at boots-on-the-ground folks in Media & Entertainment – Digital Imaging Technicians (DITs), Lab Technicians, and Assistant Editors – but I can confirm they’ve impacted others in unexpected ways.
Those articles may not look like much, but they represent days – sometimes weeks – of research and testing to write and publish something useful that doesn’t add noise to the Avid community.
Of course, I’m also trying to keep my finger on the pulse of other workflows and environments such as Apple’s Pro Apps (Final Cut Pro, Motion, Compressor), Adobe Creative Cloud (Premiere Pro, After Effects), and Blackmagic Design’s DaVinci Resolve.
My mind keeps coming back to this scene from Ron Howard’s Cinderella Man:
https://youtu.be/e4fb7N_ICj0?si=K3OXYIJkEGtXn3jj&t=16
I have a feeling a lot of us live this way now, but don’t want to talk about it.
Well, starting this week, the business world enters the holiday season. That means I’ll keep applying for new roles, but I don’t expect to hear back about any of them until January 2025.
Maybe that’s not you.
Maybe you’ve been following my work and you like the cut of my jib.
Or maybe your department needs to spend that remaining budget on someone like me by December 31.
If so, let me make this plain:
I need a job. On January 1, 2025, I’m all out of quarters.
Do you need me? Know someone who needs me? Would you be willing to vouch for me in a specific role?
Feel free to email me – hey@isaact.co – or schedule a chat on my Calendly to talk about some possibilities: http://calendly.com/isaactdotco/30min
👋🏽