Thirsty Thursday Eve - The Last Beer Cart Thursday

I expected February's Thirsty Thursday Eve to be another cocktail, probably a Cuba Libre. However, much like getting laid off from work, sometimes unexpected things happen.

Beer Cart was a Lima staple. When we were in office, it was the highlight of the week. After we went remote, I still went in occasionally on Thursdays when it lined up with manager training or an important meeting with the IT department. Over the past few months, I started trying to go into the office at least once per week for visibility and collaboration. If it wasn't on Coffee Monday, it was typically Beer Cart Thursday. As I left the office on Thursday, January 8, I had no clue it would be my last Beer Cart.

Earlier that afternoon, I sent a picture of the beer fridge to some friends to gauge what I should get. I wanted a Ranch Water, but the officially branded ones weren't available. Instead, the Senior Director of Operations and official beer stocker recommended the High Noon Tequila Seltzer. Good call, Chris, it was very similar.

One friend asked about the Highland Brewing options. I only noticed Cold Mountain originally, which I had just gotten plenty of at the release party. On second look, I noticed the other row was Black Watch, a double chocolate milk stout. That friend spoke highly of it, and I decided to try it. It was super dark and malty, which is right up my alley.

I liked it so much, I went back to grab another. Normally, the beer cart was limited to two per employee, but I would regularly grab a third if there was still plenty of work day left. I didn't get a chance to drink that one, so I threw it in my bag to take home. What are they gonna do, fire me?

Almost a week later on the 14th, they did. Or rather, they didn't fire me, I got laid off. Unrelated to my beer cart shenanigans, my 1:1 with my boss got shifted up from Thursday to Wednesday, less than an hour away. That wasn't a surprise, he regularly shifted meetings around to fit his busy schedule. What was surprising was the Director of Human Resources also on the call when I joined.

I've been through this song and dance before. I knew the situation the moment I got on the call. The stressed and slightly grim face on the CIO, the practiced and controlled look of calm from the HR lady; I was getting terminated. The first time it happened, I was shocked and confused. This time? I was just angry.

What about my team? "We can't share that information." Are you going to provide any kind of severance or placement services? "You'll get severance and we'll send along any referrals that we can on open positions." Cool. What else could I say? Not like they were going to entertain the idea of keeping me on if I begged and pleaded. They locked me out of all systems and changed my password immediately.

I immediately poured a shot of the good rum for motivation and started putting in job applications. I didn't even update my work history to past tense at first, just started applying at literally every recommended job on LinkedIn. Local hybrid? Sure. Remote? That's what I would prefer. Onsite somewhere that would require relocation? At this point, beggars can't be choosers.

In contrast to the first time I got laid off, I was in a substantially better position. I had multiple years of experience in a modern and popular tech stack, as both an individual contributor and a manager. I had an actual master's degree, rather than just a few classes toward a master's. I had spoke at a tech conference, and made multiple connections across many different organizations that could vouch for my ability. I won't say that getting laid off didn't suck, but I was much more prepared for it this time.

After getting notice of my termination at the end of the day on Wednesday and putting my application in at multiple places, I landed my first TWO interviews two days later on Friday. Talk about a confidence booster. Both were listed as onsite out of Charleston, so I wasn't really interested in either, but I figured some interview practice would be nice.

One of the interviews was for an e-commerce position, which I have zero experience with. You know you've made it in your career when you can cut off an interviewer and tell them you don't think it's a good fit. Huge props to John White from Maxwood Furniture. Super nice guy, but they wanted something that I can't offer. I'm mature enough to admit when I can't deliver what you need.

Johnson & Johnson, Inc. (unrelated to the baby oil company) went from "I don't care" to "please hire me" faster than any company I've ever talked to. I had a nice conversation with the HR lady, but then she got to the compensation question. "I was at (salary) before, but this is going to be a pretty significant shift for myself and my family. I would probably need some kind of sign on bonus to relocate." She shook her head and explained, "Oh, no, this job is remote. We just list the job as onsite to reduce the number of applications we get."

Wait, I don't have to be in Charleston every single day? I learned that the job was fully remote aside from one day in office each month. My family frequently drove down to Isle of Palms for a day trip, a monthly drive to Charleston would be nothing. Sign me up.

I tried to curb my enthusiasm. Despite my immensely increased interest in the job, it was still just a first round interview. We can't count our chickens before they hatch. Johnson & Johnson became my top job, but it couldn't be my only application. I learned that from the previous layoff.

The next week was an enormous amount of first-contact conversations. I reached out to many old colleagues. I put in multiple applications every day, through LinkedIn and other platforms. It's much easier to pare down a few guaranteed options, rather than bank on a single option working out for you. In the end, I put in 101 applications on LinkedIn alone.

Starting the week of January 26, I had one or two interviews a day basically the entire week. It was comforting to know that, even if I didn't have a job, I still had the skills to make myself marketable. Obviously, I knew that nothing would pan out immediately, but starting those early conversations would be critical in having more substantial job prospects later on.

During interview phase, I ran into an unexpected scam. Twice, I got contacted out of the blue, from a recruiter asking what type of work I was looking for. Entertaining all prospects, I gave them the same spiel: been a developer for years, looking for development or leadership. Anyone willing to hook me up, I would give the time of day.

With both of these recruiters, they asked for my resume, as expected for the situation. In both cases, they "took a moment" to look at my resume, then asked if I had it optimized for some acronyms that were supposedly industry standard for the job market. They conveniently had connections with people that offered resume improvement services that could help me get significantly more traction with my experience and education.

I might have been born during the day, but I wasn't born yesterday. I'm not going to pay you to fix up my resume with "improvements" that may or may not actually have a tangible effect on my ability to pull interviews. In both cases, they were super high pressure. I've been scammed before, so I tend to be exceedingly cautious since then. Neither of them seemed reasonable or valid, so I told both that I wasn't interested. Word to the wise, your own credentials and experience are plenty, don't trust some random recruiter that you need to pay for a service to improve your resume.

In the weeks that followed, I attacked the job market. I put in applications for any jobs that seemed relevant on LinkedIn. If there were recruiters listed as a point of contact, I attempted to connect with them. I learned long ago that you can't depend on the goodwill of others for your own wellbeing. If someone wanted me, I had to come to them.

My sister-in-law worked for a company that was hiring a Chief Technology Officer. I was woefully underqualified for it, but I figured it was worth a shot. She put in a good word for me, and I ended up getting an interview with the President of Fintech Banking. Phil Bianco was a super talented guy, and we had a great conversation, but I ultimately didn't have the experience that he wanted for the job. No worries, you miss 100% of the shots you don't take. Also, thanks Summer. You put your name on the line for me. I won't forget that.

Two companies in particular seemed like easy offers. Coming from a software engineering manager for a mortgage lender, banks and fintech companies seemed like an obvious fit for me. One company, Builders Capital, was brought to my attention by the previous recruiter from Lima One Capital. The other, Purpose Financial, was recommended by no less than three colleagues. I felt like one of the two was bound to give me an offer.

Builders Capital out of Florida felt like "Lima Two," or so I called it. When I spoke to the recruiter, she really liked my background and scheduled another call for me with the team. I interviewed with the team and I was asked multiple times, "are you sure you don't already work here?" It felt like an obvious choice. I was already very familiar with their strengths and their challenges.

Color me surprised when I got a generic rejection email from them. I have no problem with a canned email, telling a candidate that the company has decided to proceed with other candidates. However, if I've already spoken with the team and they seem to like me, I expect at least a phone call and a personalized email. Receiving the standard "no thanks" email from the recruiter was both unexpected and disheartening. Maybe they didn't like me as well as I thought they did.

Purpose Financial was a case study in "power in numbers." One of my previous devs (Thanks, Kate!) shared a LinkedIn post with me about the position. I put in for it then and commented on the post. Then, the legal director (Hey Abigail!) from Lima reached out to a colleague of hers in Purpose Financial. Finally, a friend from an old job (Hey Tran!) sent me the LinkedIn profile of a recruiter he knew from the company. I was literally showing up on their radar from three different fronts.

With such a deluge of support, the Director of Software Engineering Jason decided he had to reach out to me. We scheduled a call together, and I did my research in the meantime. While I waited for our call, I discovered that I had interviewed him half a decade prior when I got laid off from a previous job. Like two ships passing in the night, we had crossed paths far before our destined meeting. He liked me well enough with our second interview that he scheduled some time for me to meet the team.

I got on a call with the Purpose Financial team, and although the people seemed awesome, it felt super corporate. Two of the team members were in office, which felt already like a bit of a red flag for me. I would entertain in-office work if I had to, but remote is where my heart stays. I get to spend time with my family, I avoid contributing to pollution, and I have a coffee machine 20 steps from my desk. What's not to love?

We had a really good conversation, and I sent the typical "Hey, great speaking with you guys!" email after the interview was over. When I was prompted for additional questions, I asked what the hybrid balance was. Industry standard seemed like 3 in office, 2 remote for most jobs. One lady responded that they are typically in office for 4 days, with 1 remote day per week.

I didn't respond to the email, but Purpose Financial immediately dropped to the bottom of my preference list. Driving to Greenville four days a week felt like some punishment out of Dante's Inferno. Lima was lucky to get me in office once a week. Only being home one day per week would be used exclusively for interviewing, if it came to that.

During the interim, I met with the Director of Software Engineering at Johnson & Johnson, and that went well. I met with the team, and even taught them about planning poker with my Scrum history at QS/1. Everything seemed to be going swell there. I knew I couldn't count my chickens before they hatched, but that seemed like an obvious choice.

As we entered the first week of February, the mood started to change. I was unemployed for two weeks. I still had plenty of severance left, but I was approaching the halfway point. None of my interviews had yet materialized to a likely offer. I was still applying to 10+ jobs per day on LinkedIn. SC unemployment was going to give me pennies on each dollar I made during my last role. My wife joked about putting in 100 applications during our kids' swim lesson and I snapped at her. She didn't deserve that. I'm sorry, I was wrong for that, and I love you. Thanks for standing by me.

On Friday, I had a "meet the leaders" interview with Johnson & Johnson. It was my 4th and final interview with the company, and I was glad to be finished with that process, but it was out of my hands. "We'll get back to you late next week or early the following week." Not super helpful, but I appreciate the timeline. It's on y'all now.

At this point, we weren't in a negative situation, but it wasn't certain either. I originally had three prospects in J&J, Builders Capital, and Purpose Financial. Builders Capital rejected me, but then First Bank of the Lake joined the fray. I though I was entering the weekend with three solid options, but the CTO position hit me with the rejection letter. "We really liked you, but you don't have the experience." You know what, that's fair.

I entered the weekend of February 6 with unfortunate job prospects. Two jobs had rejected me, one ghosted me for over a week, and the other seemingly would get back to me at some point. I'm glad I still had some new and active interviews ongoing, and I would continue to apply, but some of the possibilities that had me so confident were starting to dissolve.

On Monday, I had nothing. On Tuesday, I had a phone interview with Red Ventures. One of the random applications I put in on LinkedIn, they actually came through with an interview. The listed salary was way higher, and the tech stack was very similar to what I worked in at Lima, but I was beyond counting anything as guaranteed. "I'm interviewing. You guys are awesome, but we'll play it by ear."

Not two hours later, I got an email from Cathi, the HR lady at Johnson & Johnson. "I am waiting for (manager) to connect but will 100% be connecting with you this week!!!" Well shoot, that sounds amazing. "Jake – Is there a best time to call?" RIGHT NOW. LITERALLY AS SOON AS YOU CAN CALL.

At 11:00am on Tuesday, February 10, the HR lady from Johnson & Johnson sent me an invitation for a Teams call. I knew at that point, it would be the offer or rejection. I wasn't sure what direction the team had decided, but I knew I would have a resolution post haste.

I joined the call and got some much-needed news. "We want to offer you the position." Oh, that's amazing. Salary wasn't flexible, and it was lower than what I was shooting for, but it offered some benefits that could potentially put it above my previous role.

Was it a huge step up? No, not by a long shot. But it was guaranteed employment. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and a job offer on paper is worth 50 promising interviews. I accepted the offer. Could I get a better job elsewhere? Maybe, but that was a problem for later.

On my 27th day of unemployment, almost 4 weeks after I was terminated, I got a job offer that I accepted on the spot. I have plenty of colleagues that have been unemployed for longer, so it could absolutely be worse. Just know that there are options out there. Keep your head up!

Oh, and that Highland Brewing Black Watch that I brought home from the last beer cart? I saved it. Felt like a fitting end to my tenure at Lima One Capital. It was a good time; I learned a lot and got the opportunity to try my hand at leadership. I met some very cool people, many of which I will continue to keep in touch with.

Closing this chapter of my life is bittersweet. I'm excited to move on to new experiences and challenges, but I'll also miss where I was before. Different organizations are going to have various perks and benefits, but I don't think any of them are as cool as beer cart. Cheers, Lima!