Not Liking New Job, What would you do?

Remedymp

I would definitely get another Security cert before leaving. The down time you may accrue would be beneficial for your study time.

markulous

Well I emailed the managers of my last two jobs inquiring about different roles than when I was there previously.

The previous one looked for me but said no. He asked if I wanted my former role but I declined. I told him it wouldn't be fair to him unless they can give me infosec experience because I'd leave the first good opportunity that I got.

The other job was at a MSP in a NOC environment as a senior technician. He said after he fills this graveyard shift, then he'll be hiring for day shifts on that. I said I'd be open to that. I figure that would at least get me more networking exposure on my journey into infosec. But that may be a few weeks. I'm hoping this hospital analyst job goes well, but if not sounds like I have a fall back if I'm still in this situation.

jeremywatts2005

I feel your pain Markulous. I switched jobs and it has been hell. They want me an IR/Digital Forensics guy to basically do software Dev work for IR and Digital Forensics? The thing is that is not what I was told I was going to be doing. Plus I am supposed to be internal and now they are talking about doing stuff for external customers in retail. Plus to make it worse my benefit package has been a nightmare. I went from a no deductible medical plan to a high deductible with no money in HSA. I have a special needs daughter so this has been a nightmare for me. Tons of stress but I cannot leave because I have to maintain coverage for my daughter and at least I managed to buy a supplement they offer to get some of her therapy covered.

Remedymp

People should be able to (legally) sue the corporation that falsely advertises positions to applicants as a way to hire them for positions they other wise would not have worked.

Remedymp

What about this role here: https://www.linkedin.com/jobs2/view/105740832?refId=4122777961462491415111&trk=vsrp_jobs_res_name&trkInfo=VSRPsearchId%3A4122777961462491415111%2CVSRPtargetId%3A105740832%2CVSRPcmpt%3Aprimary

?


With your background, I think you'll nail that position after an interview.

thomas_

Remedymp wrote: »

People should be able to (legally) sue the corporation that falsely advertises positions to applicants as a way to hire them for positions they other wise would not have worked.

Anyone can sue anyone for anything, whether you win or have the money to spend on a lawsuit is a different story. I remember from a business law class the legal doctrine of "detrimental reliance", but I'm not sure if it would be applicable in this case.

markulous

Remedymp wrote: »

What about this role here: https://www.linkedin.com/jobs2/view/105740832?refId=4122777961462491415111&trk=vsrp_jobs_res_name&trkInfo=VSRPsearchId%3A4122777961462491415111%2CVSRPtargetId%3A105740832%2CVSRPcmpt%3Aprimary

?


With your background, I think you'll nail that position after an interview.

Thanks for looking into this to help me out.

So I actually applied to that job a couple of months ago. They said the most that they could offer me was about 40k. I'm not sure I can take that kind of pay cut. My wife is in school full time and she isn't able to work. That was the only thing holding me back from that role.

Remedymp

thomas_ wrote: »

Anyone can sue anyone for anything, whether you win or have the money to spend on a lawsuit is a different story. I remember from a business law class the legal doctrine of "detrimental reliance", but I'm not sure if it would be applicable in this case.

I guess what I am getting at is there should be a Lemon Law for the employees to file against a company for false advertising these positions. Judging by the comments in this thread and some of the dialogue on Linkedin, this seems to rampant problem in the tech space.

If car dealership says that they're looking for auto mechanics and the applicant is hired only to find out he'll be either washing customer cars or just changing oil, surely there would be hell to pay in that line of business!

scaredoftests

Remedymp wrote: »

People should be able to (legally) sue the corporation that falsely advertises positions to applicants as a way to hire them for positions they other wise would not have worked.

That'd be a slippery slope there..like demanding a $15 minimum wage. Jobs would get scarce. My 2 cents.

DustyBlue

scaredoftests wrote: »

That'd be a slippery slope there..like demanding a $15 minimum wage. Jobs would get scarce. My 2 cents.

Jobs wouldn't get scarce but applicants sure would.


I've had similar events happen to me.
One time, I had several job offers on the table and I took one that not only paid 10-25% less than the other 2 offers on the table but it was also in the city so I had to pay the 3.5% city wage tax to boot. I took it because I was convinced it was the better opportunity for my career growth. It was only a 6 month contract and I bought it hook, line and sinker when they told me they managed all IT systems at the company including the servers, switches and phones.

It was a mid-sized non-profit company so it was fairly believable as they only had 100 desktops and 10 servers which is completely manageable by a competent IT team. When I got on the job I found out that "managing the servers" meant changing the backup tape every day and calling a 3rd party MSP when something more complicated happened, same for managing the phone system. They never made any switch changes and it was a completely flat network with everyone being in the same vlan. None of the IT team were "IT Professionals" as they all just sort of found themselves in the role be dint of "knowing something about computers."

It was not the learning experience for me that I had hoped but it was a learning experience. I also at least was able to get them to implement some changes such as using a standardized naming convention for desktops and to use images for desktop deployment instead of spending all day building new desktops from scratch but it was a long 6-months.

At the end, I ended up with a bad review from the company because
1. I didnt complete a project as requested. The project was completed but I automated everything about it via wardialers, network scans and remote scripting; unbeknownst to me as they never stated as much, they actually expected me to physically locate and manually audit every computer and phone so according to them the project was not completed

2. I refused work and/or violated policy. They wanted me to do domain admin type things without giving my user account domain admin access. Their solution was to have me use the username and password of another admin on the team; while I was still somewhat new to security and really only just getting started in IT, it was a complete non-starter to me and I told them as much (this was even before I started taking on security roles and learning the importance of SOX). When they insisted I do the domain admin type things and refused to accept no, I went and used the domain admin credentials to give myself domain admin rights and then completed the tasks under my username. I got yelled at for "violating security policy" by giving myself domain admin access... Of course the initial violation of security policy of giving me another user's username and password went uncommented on.


I had another position that was more similar to the ops and Kohr-Ar's issues and in the end, I secured a severance package and left the company with no backup plan rather than deal with a demeaning manager who kept promising that he "planned to do 2 or 3 lunch-and-learns soon" which were never delivered and would have barely scratched the surface of the system inter-dependencies of the truly massive application.

markulous

So just a quick update.

I had an interview on Tuesday. I thought it went pretty well. There was just one tech question I couldn't answer and wasn't familiar with (He asked what if I saw an SNMP community string that was public). Everything else I answered pretty well I think. I got a good vibe from the manager (and the CISO when he made a brief appearance). He didn't want someone that didn't know anything about IT/networking but didn't want someone senior either that would get bored, wanted to teach them a little bit. I should hopefully hear something next week he said. He was pretty impressed that I was working on my Master's when he hasn't gotten any applicants (two open positions) that even have a Bachelor's.

The place I'm at is getting worse it seems unfortunately.

scaredoftests

@markulous:sending good thoughts!

cyberguypr

Bring it home, or you'll be banned FOREVER!

markulous

Thanks! I've got a phone interview Monday but I really want this other job. Would be a dream position.

Remedymp

DustyBlue wrote: »

Jobs wouldn't get scarce but applicants sure would.


I've had similar events happen to me.
One time, I had several job offers on the table and I took one that not only paid 10-25% less than the other 2 offers on the table but it was also in the city so I had to pay the 3.5% city wage tax to boot. I took it because I was convinced it was the better opportunity for my career growth. It was only a 6 month contract and I bought it hook, line and sinker when they told me they managed all IT systems at the company including the servers, switches and phones.

It was a mid-sized non-profit company so it was fairly believable as they only had 100 desktops and 10 servers which is completely manageable by a competent IT team. When I got on the job I found out that "managing the servers" meant changing the backup tape every day and calling a 3rd party MSP when something more complicated happened, same for managing the phone system. They never made any switch changes and it was a completely flat network with everyone being in the same vlan. None of the IT team were "IT Professionals" as they all just sort of found themselves in the role be dint of "knowing something about computers."

It was not the learning experience for me that I had hoped but it was a learning experience. I also at least was able to get them to implement some changes such as using a standardized naming convention for desktops and to use images for desktop deployment instead of spending all day building new desktops from scratch but it was a long 6-months.

At the end, I ended up with a bad review from the company because
1. I didnt complete a project as requested. The project was completed but I automated everything about it via wardialers, network scans and remote scripting; unbeknownst to me as they never stated as much, they actually expected me to physically locate and manually audit every computer and phone so according to them the project was not completed

2. I refused work and/or violated policy. They wanted me to do domain admin type things without giving my user account domain admin access. Their solution was to have me use the username and password of another admin on the team; while I was still somewhat new to security and really only just getting started in IT, it was a complete non-starter to me and I told them as much (this was even before I started taking on security roles and learning the importance of SOX). When they insisted I do the domain admin type things and refused to accept no, I went and used the domain admin credentials to give myself domain admin rights and then completed the tasks under my username. I got yelled at for "violating security policy" by giving myself domain admin access... Of course the initial violation of security policy of giving me another user's username and password went uncommented on.


I had another position that was more similar to the ops and Kohr-Ar's issues and in the end, I secured a severance package and left the company with no backup plan rather than deal with a demeaning manager who kept promising that he "planned to do 2 or 3 lunch-and-learns soon" which were never delivered and would have barely scratched the surface of the system inter-dependencies of the truly massive application.

You see, this is just criminal in my humble opinion. The companies are working with government to write policy that protects them from being sued in a situation like this. Basically, stripping the employee of any council or recourse. What a shame.

SpetsRepair

markulous wrote: »

Thanks for looking into this to help me out.

So I actually applied to that job a couple of months ago. They said the most that they could offer me was about 40k. I'm not sure I can take that kind of pay cut. My wife is in school full time and she isn't able to work. That was the only thing holding me back from that role.

That's a lot less than most people make here. I'm not sure why they offered you 40k, with your experience/certs?

markulous

SpetsRepair wrote: »

That's a lot less than most people make here. I'm not sure why they offered you 40k, with your experience/certs?

I don't think it's a very technical position so that's about where it caps out. It was that place and one other one (I can't remember which is which) that called me up. One said 40 was the absolute most and the other said 25k-33k to which I obviously said no way.

EDIT: Now that I think about it, I'm going to apply anyway and either see if I can get into the 60k range or if there's like a level 2 position for that. At least talk to someone. What's the harm at this point?

techfiend

I recently met a newer security analyst at trustwave. What he described was configuring firewalls and pentesting seemed interesting to me. Most infosec positions come across as boring to me but this one didn't.

He makes $50k, likely underpaid, but it's a step that can lead to bigger things down the road.

markulous

If I was single it wouldn't be an issue but with me being the sole source of income at the moment I'm not sure about a pay cut. Maybe they can do a sign on bonus. Either way doesn't hurt to talk to them.

Dakinggamer87

markulous wrote: »

If I was single it wouldn't be an issue but with me being the sole source of income at the moment I'm not sure about a pay cut. Maybe they can do a sign on bonus. Either way doesn't hurt to talk to them.

Never hurts to ask. Negotiation is key and selling your skills/experience.

markulous

Exactly. I applied Friday so maybe next week I'll hear something. Might be a fallback for this other job if it doesn't pan out

kohr-ah

As a side note mine is working out a bit.

I approached my boss and told them that I have a great skill that I feel they can use. That skill is I stabilize companies. I create standards. Documentation. Etc.

They are all for it. I am to stabilize my branch and create standards after we split in October.

So it is at least tolerable for now. With my extra income I am going to try to do WGU bachelor's this fall and finish that up.

Turning my negative into a positive.

Also pushing for my junior engineers assigned to me to get training. They need to further their knowledge and careers whether they stay under me or quit.

I figure if it doesn't work out I'll leave one hell a dent

markulous

Good on you. Glad you were at least make it something worth doing and turn it around.

markulous

Well the Analyst interview at the hospital I had didn't pan out. I got an email today. I asked him for feedback but haven't heard anything.

Heard back from the phone interview I had and looks like they may want to go further. If not there's a couple applications I have out there for some jobs I know I could nail. Otherwise I'm going to start bugging one of my old bosses more to see if they have an opening yet since I know they'd hire me and it'd be a better job than what I was doing previous.

This job isn't getting any better though. The managers clearly don't care and don't improve the processes despite them being obviously poor. The CEO is I complete denial too which makes it worse.

Remedymp

markulous wrote: »

Well the Analyst interview at the hospital I had didn't pan out. I got an email today. I asked him for feedback but haven't heard anything.

Heard back from the phone interview I had and looks like they may want to go further. If not there's a couple applications I have out there for some jobs I know I could nail. Otherwise I'm going to start bugging one of my old bosses more to see if they have an opening yet since I know they'd hire me and it'd be a better job than what I was doing previous.

This job isn't getting any better though. The managers clearly don't care and don't improve the processes despite them being obviously poor. The CEO is I complete denial too which makes it worse.

They're doing a background check on you worse case scenario.

markulous

Background check for the hospital job? No, he said they were going another direction (or something generic like that) and that he wishes me luck in my job search.

TomkoTech

At least they got back to you lol. I applied to a VA job and did 3 interviews. The first interview was 2 months after the application closed. The next 2 were about a month apart from each other. The last interview was the Monday before Thanksgiving and they stated that someone from HR would let me know one way or another within a few weeks.

I figured since it was the holidays I wouldn't rock the boat after a month. So I emailed them at the end of January(2 months after the final interview) expressing my still having interest in the position and inquiring on the status of whether they had filled it or not.

"I just wanted to touch base about the Supervisory IT Specialist position. I am still very interested in the role. Is there a timeline that you can share as to when I will hear about the next steps in the process?

Thanks,"


Their HR replied in a matter of minutes:

"[FONT=&amp]A selection hasn’t been made yet, and you’ll be notified when one has been."

[/FONT]Here we are 4 months after that and I still haven't been notified lol

markulous

Oh jeez that's awful. I think closure is better than not knowing for sure.

Chevel

TomkoTech wrote: »

At least they got back to you lol. I applied to a VA job and did 3 interviews. The first interview was 2 months after the application closed. The next 2 were about a month apart from each other. The last interview was the Monday before Thanksgiving and they stated that someone from HR would let me know one way or another within a few weeks.

I figured since it was the holidays I wouldn't rock the boat after a month. So I emailed them at the end of January(2 months after the final interview) expressing my still having interest in the position and inquiring on the status of whether they had filled it or not.

"I just wanted to touch base about the Supervisory IT Specialist position. I am still very interested in the role. Is there a timeline that you can share as to when I will hear about the next steps in the process?

Thanks,"


Their HR replied in a matter of minutes:

"[FONT=&amp]A selection hasn’t been made yet, and you’ll be notified when one has been."

[/FONT]Here we are 4 months after that and I still haven't been notified lol

That's sounds like the gov selection process. The longest someone told me was about 6 months.

BlackBeret

@Markulous, it sounds like you have your head screwed on and know your stuff. Just keep an ear to the ground and you'll find something. Have you gone to any local meet-ups or tried to find more ways to network? I was in that area a few weeks ago doing some work, business is booming up there.

@Tomkotech, GS position? That's actually normal, I've known some people to go 12-18 months between the first interview and actually starting. The fact you made it as far as you did though is a good sign. Most people I know in that position will continue looking around if they're in the job market, but jump on the GS position as soon as they get the call back.