Category Archives: What Just Happened

I completed my first week of work at the Ohio State University. It’s a very large organization and the group I work for, The Office of the Chief Information Officer, is a large group. I spent the first couple of days being introduced to team members and attempting to set up my PC with all the required development software required for me to do my job. By mid afternoon Wednesday I was able to log on to a database and log on to the development environment. I was given my first project Tuesday to get started once I thought I had everything in place. It was a simple project just to make sure I had proper access to everything I needed, which we ended up having to adjust my access. That first project also helps to start learning the Development Processes used at Ohio State. I was able to complete the project and started testing Friday, but access held me up from completing my testing on Friday. I have also been assigned a larger project already and I look forward to getting back to work on Monday and having work lined up for me. The last half of the week went by a lot quicker as I had project work to keep me busy throughout the day.

The team seems to be a good group of people and my mentor for learning the processes at Ohio State, Jason Richards, has been very helpful during this transition process.

It’s official now. I have accepted a position at the Ohio State University as a PeopleSoft Programmer/Analyst Sr.. I know this will be a shock to anyone that knows me. I have always been a Michigan State and Michigan sports fan, but I don’t think that has to change. I can a fan of the university and not their sports. Anyway, I am excited to start work for OSU and help the university with their visions and projects as well as helping them resolve day to day issues. Since I have a daughter that is attending their Pharmacy program there, we will both be able to enjoy the benefits of reduced tuition starting her next semester.

The people that I have meet in the interview appear to be upstanding individuals and I look forward to meeting them all on a more personal level and making a new set of friends. I will always cherish the friends that I have made at Longaberger and I will remain in contact with my extended Longaberger family.

Friday I was given good news and bad news.  Good news is that I was offered another position at a well respected institution.  Bad news is that the position that I accepted last week is going to be delayed another week, which would cause my health benefits to be delayed another month.  Although, that might actually be a blessing as it gives me more time to make up my mind on which position I really want to pursue.  The benefits on the new position are a lot better than any others I have been offered.  I will be talking to the person I have been interviewing with to get a better idea on what the job entails as I was left a little confused after the last interviewer’s round of questioning.  I will also be talking to the HR person to see if I have enough leverage to even the playing field, since I do have another offer on the table.  If the playing field is leveled, I think I would have to take the new offer as the benefits appear to be better.

After almost 3 weeks of being unemployed, I have landed a job doing software development at a Fortune 100 company.  Things really progressed quickly from last Friday afternoon when I first heard the news that such a great company wanted to bring me in.

This starts a new chapter in my professional career and I’m hoping it’s the place I end my professional career.  I would like to thank all my friends and family who have helped me in my job search.  It’s great to know that I must have made a positive impression on those around me because of all the support I received.

I had a few things happen on Friday that are going to help me enjoy my weekend.  I had some interest in job opportunities from some prospective employers and it looks like I am moving forward from an interview I had last week .  I have a couple of interviews scheduled for next week as well, so activity is really starting to pick up.  If things continue to progress the way they are, I should be back on my feet soon.

I had a few interviews last week. One of which didn’t pan out right now, but since it is a consulting firm, they still might come through for me. I also interviewed at a very large company that I’m hoping will work out. It’s a long drive compared to what I have, but it only took 35 minutes to get there, so that isn’t really much longer than I had before. The drive home took about 50 minutes though because of an accident. When I got up to the police cruisers it looked like the rider was already in an ambulance and on his way to the hospital, but the motorcycle was drug to the shoulder of the highway. I guess I won’t be riding my motorcycle there much! Anyway the people I interviewed with were nice and I felt like I could definitely get along with that group. Keep your fingers crossed and I will update again next week

April 3rd, 2013 was my last day at Longaberger. Not the way I wanted it to end, and I thought I would have some time to evaluate my options, but sometimes things were not the way you planned. We were going to be implementing some new software and I knew my job could be in jeopardy at the end of the project, but we just made the decision and I thought I would be able to evaluate the new software package and determine if I was going to be needed at the end of the project. I thought they would need my skills to write the interfaces into the new software package. I thought wrong. Nothing against Longaberger, they have given me almost 15 years of making friends along the way and building a network of people that would soon come to my aid. I contacted a number of people from my Longaberger network and everyone I contacted was eager to see what they could do for me. Some helped me polish up my resume, some gave much needed support, and some got me interviews. It’s been a full week now and I can tell you, it’s hard when your family depends on you to provide for them and you are caught off guard and unable to do so.