It's Different NowIt's different now. Just showing up and slamming out code isn't enough these days.Two years ago you compared the sign-on bonuses, salaries and stock options of the four companies bidding for you. Today you're told to wait, and given a seat next to 20 intimidated people filling out applications for the job you're seeking. Recessions aren't fun. Unemployment rates often approach 10% in recessions. With 10% unemployment, even if you're in the 90% who have jobs, both you and management are constantly aware of the hoards knocking on the door seeking your job. There's little room for negotiation. If management ups your work hours by 20%, you do it. Because you know the guys knocking at the door will do it, and for 10% less. Remember the free technical training that companies gave their employees back in the 1990's? Remember the days when you let management know you'd get another job if your company didn't give you the training you wanted? Try that today and you'll be unemployed by 5 PM. After all, some of the guys knocking on the door already have the training you're seeking. So what's a technologist to do? With technology obsoleting every 18 months, your career dies without constant training. If management won't give you the training, you need to get it yourself. But how? There's no end of training companies and certification mills promising "a bright future" if you'll only hand over a few thousand dollars. Trouble is, you know that these training programs teach a specific curriculum that only partially matches your career needs. And you also know that the unemployment lines are full of people with certs and training. Throwing away thousands of dollars in good times is painful, but in a recession it's career suicide. Without that financial cushion, you're forced to accept the first job that comes your way, even if it's driving a cab. It can take 5 years to catch up. You could ride out the recession by obtaining an advanced degree. Recessions are a great time to be in school, because the opportunity cost of missed income is minimal. But few can afford to stop working and pay tuition. And there's always the nagging question -- what if the recession is still in force when you graduate? What you really need is a way of learning on your own. A learning method independent of the whims of your employer. A method that doesn't sap your already stretched finances. A method that fits your time schedule. A method enabling you to learn the exact technologies to keep your job, get a better one, or move from the unemployment lines to a good job. A method enabling you to persue a career strategy instead of settling for a series of low opportunity, low paying jobs. If you've been a Troubleshooters.Com visitor for any length of time you know what that learning method is. It's called the Rapid Learning Process, and it's exactly what you need to survive the recession. The Rapid Learning ProcessThe Rapid Learning Process isn't rocket science. Here's the process diagram:
The preceding diagram is pretty much self-explanatory. Try it today. Pick a technology you need to learn (or learn more about), and use this process. For the step labeled "Do research necessary to gain knowledge necessary to implement the proposed exercise", do the research on the Internet. For the step labeled "Troubleshoot", use the Universal Troubleshooting Process thoroughly documented on the Troubleshooters.Com website. If this process helps you learn more quickly, you might wish to learn more about it. The authoritative text on the Rapid Learning Process is a book titled "Rapid Learning: Secret Weapon of the Successful Technologist". At $39.00, it won't destroy your finances the way training courses and certifications can. And over the course of the recession it just might boost your net worth by tens of thousands. The Recession Won't Last ForeverNo recession lasts forever, and this one is no exception. Sooner or later boom times will be back. There will come another time when showing up and slamming out code will command big salaries. Another time when companies lavish sign-on bonuses, high salaries and stock options on qualified technologists.But will you be able to participate in those boom times, or will your career have been destroyed by the recession? If you were unemployed or severely underemployed for an extended period during the recession, your technological knowledge will be years old. Catching up from such a circumstance could take years -- maybe more than the duration of the next boom times. So use the Rapid Learning Process early and often. Use it to keep your job. Use it to advance your career when others are sliding backward. And if the grim reaper hands you a pinkslip, use the Rapid Learning Process to help get another job before your career is severely damaged. A Word to Older TechnologistsIf you're over 40 you remember the Gulf War Recession, the 1987 post-stock market crash recession, and maybe even the hopelessness of the 10% unemployment in 1982. You've survived recessions before. But you've likely never survived the combination of recession and age discrimination.The best way to envision this combination is to remember back to your older friends during past recessions. Didn't you have an older friend who constantly got laid off? No matter how intelligent he was, or how productive, he'd be the last hired and the first to go. Remember what it did to his confidence? Remember how sometimes even you would doubt his competance? Remember that after the recession had ended, he spent the first half of the boom times just catching up to where he had left off, and never really did get his career on track? You lived well during the 90's. Your career advanced. The waves of 20-somethings who advanced even faster and became your peers just proved that we lived in a meritocracy. There were a few distressing incidents in which you were invisible to tech recruiters, who would look straight through you and woo a young guy you could work circles around. But the heck with him -- you had plenty of options. Today those options are gone, and without something to replace them you'll end up like that older friend from recessions past. You need the technological knowhow and the technological terminology. You need to learn fast, and probably learn on your own, and that learning pace until you retire. Fortunately, it isn't hard... A Word to Younger TechnologistsThis is a really rotten time to be graduating from college. That wonderful job market that catapulted your older brothers and sisters to home ownership and huge net worths is gone. Instead, many of your fellow graduates will settle for tech support jobs paying single digit hourlys. Or possibly even take blue collar jobs or sales jobs. If they ever catch up, it will take years. Don't do that to yourself.Fortunately, it's not hard for a young person to rise to the top. First,
don't sweat the starting salary. As long as you continue learning, you
have a long time to catch up and get ahead. Many of your fellow graduates
are tired of learning, and figure that college taught them all that's necessary.
By using the Rapid Learning Process you can pull ahead of them in months.
Your education is newer than anyone else in the job market. If you are
ready, willing and able to learn, and if you use the Rapid Learning Process
to do well in interviews, you can combine your knowledge, your new education,
and your willingness to work for a reasonable salary to quickly rise. When
the recession is over, you'll be ready to make your run at the top.
Implementing the Rapid Learning ProcessThis is the point where advertising experts advise me to ask for the order, ask for it now, and explain why not ordering instantly will result in missed opportunity.That's silly. You shouldn't order "Rapid Learning: Secret Weapon of the Successful Technologist" now. Instead, start by using the flowchart of the Rapid Learning Process. Analyze the flowchart, and put it into practice. If you gain no benefit, then "Rapid Learning: Secret Weapon of the Successful Technologist" will not help you. But if you find the flowchart helpful in your learning, you'll definitely
want a copy of "Rapid Learning: Secret Weapon of the Successful
Technologist". , because it adds the following to the flowchart:
So if you've tried the flowchart, found it helpful, and want to take the next step, you can order "Rapid Learning: Secret Weapon of the Successful Technologist" at http://www.troubleshooters.com/bookstore/rl.htm. |
