Recession Proof Graduate - How to get any job after college

Google + 30 seconds.

FIRST POINT

Somewhere in the part of the economy he is depending on, the 'rubber has to meet the road'. That is, someone has to have a business with customers and revenue. So, he wants to work for that business. So, when the business brings in, say, $1 million, he gets maybe $10,000 of it, eventually, if his plans all go well.

So, his work really is providing crucial value for the business, but he is getting only a tiny fraction of the money from that value. Bummer for him.

So, he would be much better off just being the person running the business and doing the work that is providing the business value and then keeping all the revenue for himself.

E.g., if the business is a Web site with ad revenue and if he is a Web developer, then HE should be the one running the Web site instead of the other guy who likely doesn't know how to do the technical work for the Web site.

Or, mowing grass is hard work with some value. But why just mow grass for someone else running a lawn service? Instead, start a lawn service, mow grass much as before, and keep all the revenue for yourself. That is, once are good at mowing grass, which is the real work, the extra to start your own grass mowing service can add a lot of revenue and need not be too difficult.

SECOND POINT

Basically he is advising people to be 'free lancers', that is, with a 'portfolio', 'clients', etc. For what he is suggesting here, that is, software usage and/or development, there is a big, HUGE problem: Suppose it takes, on average 1000 times as long to write some software as to learn to use it. So, roughly 1000 programmers can write enough software that it takes one person all their time just to learn to use all that software. But the world has many more than 1000 programmers writing software. So, it is easy to spend more than full time just learning to use software. Indeed, new software comes forward so fast that it could be more than a full time job just being a 'librarian' getting the materials, cataloging them, and arranging them on shelves, DVDs, or hard disk.

So, it is crucial to reduce, even minimize, the 'overhead' time for learning to use software.

Here's the BIG RUB: As a free lancer, mostly he must use the software his clients want used. So, this week it's Windows Vista, next week Debian Linux, next week Mac, then Windows Server, Android, iPhone, etc. Or it's Excel, SAS, SPSS, R, Mathematica. Or it's Word, TeX, LaTeX, or some high end thing from Adobe for making PDF files. There is no end of such nonsense.

Fundamentally, the free lancer has to pay for the learning overhead and gets paid only for using it. So, it's crucial to keep down the overhead. There's no shame in this: No one can hope to learn all that junk; just being a librarian for all it would be more than a full time job.

Yes, maybe Fortran, Cobol, Algol, PL/I, Pascal, C, C++, Visual Basic .NET, and C# are closer to each other than English, French, Spanish, and Italian. Similarly for DB2, SQL Server, Informix, and Oracle. Similarly for SPSS, SAS, R, etc. Windows and Linux are both multiple virtual memory operating systems on x86 processors with a TCP/IP stack. So, there is a lot of overlap so that learning 1000 programs is much less than 1000 times the work of learning just one program.

STILL, learning all that software is TOO DARNED MUCH overhead.

Here's how to cut down the overhead: Don't be just the free lancer; instead, be the entrepreneur where the rubber meets the road. Then pick ONE of Windows or Linux and f'get about the other one. Say pick Windows. Then pick ONE of C++, C#, or Visual Basic .NET and f'get about the other ones. Pick just ONE relational data base, say, SQL Server. For some 'non-SQL', likely on really simple operations as for non-SQL, the real bottleneck is disk I/O, and, net, SQL Server can be about as fast as 'non-SQL'. If at times need more than 'non-SQL', and the history of computing strongly indicates that you will, then you are better off with a serious relational data base manager than just some key-value pair system. Pick just ONE way to develop Web pages, say, ASP.NET. So, just pick tools sufficient and good for the work where the rubber meets the road and f'get about competitive tools and their overhead. E.g., my tools just now are Windows, KEdit, ObjectRexx, Visual Basic .NET, a little C (HORRIBLE language), SQL Server, ADO.NET, and ASP.NET, and I've never touched Python, Apache, Ruby, Linux, or even C++. And I don't use an 'interactive development environment' (IDE) since I use KEdit and ObjectRexx for as much as possible.

Enough for the first two points I mentioned above.

I move on to several smaller points:

COMPUTER CENTER OVERHEAD

He also failed to mention: Now for any very significant work with computers, especially if working as a free lancer for several clients, too soon need multiple computers, an office LAN, etc. So, he's talking a home based 'computer center' with just one person for ALL the work to be done -- hard/software installation, computer and network system management and monitoring, operations, e.g., backup, recovery, repairs, computer and network security, in addition to the 'money' activities. He's talking significant upfront, overhead investments of time, money, and effort not easy for a new college graduate.

FEAST AND FAMINE

People in 'free lance' too soon see that they are in a world of feast and famine. So, can go for two months with no income and suddenly four clients each want four weeks of work in the next two weeks. Bummer.

FEW OR MANY

Not quite the same but closely related, generally (although not always) it's better to have many smaller customers than a few larger ones. A free lancer has a BIG problem here, but many of the free lancer's clients do not. So, it can be better to be the client entrepreneur where the rubber meets the road than the free lancer.

ASYMMETRY

Next, there's the issue of 'asymmetric economic information': A free lancer who works for one client for a week and gets paid $40,000 lets the client know that he just paid about $1000 an hour for the work. Then the client will start to look for cheaper labor. So, the client has too much 'economic information'. And, really, the free lancer does NOT know what the work was really worth to the client, and that might me much more or much less than $40,000; so the free lancer has too little 'economic information'.

Instead it is much better if the customer has no real idea about the supplier's revenue, cost of goods sold, gross margins, net margins, pre-tax earnings, and after-tax earnings. These may be small or large, but when they are large it is important up to crucial for the supplier to keep these numbers confidential. One cute, old example was in the early days of casino Blackjack 'card counting': A guy went to a casino in the Bahamas or some such, dressed like a bum, kept complaining about all the money he was losing and how poor he was. The individual casinos didn't keep careful track of what he was making or losing so didn't know. In fact, he was cleaning up big time. I made a big mistake: I was a good Blackjack player and saw the first 'Sports Illustrated' article and E. Thorpe's book early on but assumed that the casinos would be swamped. They weren't for years! And only a dumb player would show off how much money they were making. Net, if you are making good money, then keep it QUIET. For this, generally it is better to have many customers. E.g., a neighbor had little peanut vending machines -- put in a coin and get out some peanuts. How much was he making? There was no easy way for the customers to know, but he did live in a nicer house than I did!

BARRIER TO ENTRY

There's another big issue, especially over the past 20-40 years in the US economy: He is recommending being a 'virtual business'. This is DANGEROUS in the US. Consider someone in plumbing, HVAC, roofing, grass mowing, auto repair, Chinese carryout, Italian family restaurant, etc. Notice that they are not in competition with anyone more than 100 miles away. So, if they are among the best in a radius of 100 miles, then they can do okay. Many industries cannot have dedicated sales forces so use 'manufacturing representatives' (MRs) that specialize in one industry and stand between many manufacturers and many customers. So, can have MRs in, say, sporting goods, commercial building supplies, etc. Well, typically an MR has a geographical 'territory'. Darned right they have a 'territory': They don't want any close competition. Net, it is important to have a 'geographical barrier to entry', and his idea of a 'virtual business' is not careful about this point.

COLLEGE

He runs down college. Well, maybe didn't learn Ruby in college, but he should have learned some things more important such as how to communicate and analyze effectively; these are important lessons for a lifetime but maybe not for a first job out of college. There may be times in life when these lessons are crucial at a big fork in the road and, then, crucial for the whole life. Also some of the technical material might be quite valuable in the future.

KNOWLEDGE SHOULDN'T KNOW

One of the biggest dangers of 'knowledge' is not the good knowledge you don't yet know and have to learn but the bad knowledge you have been led to believe and then act on. So, 'critical thinking' can be more important than 'skills'. College is one of the best places to get good at 'critical thinking'.