I lost the best job I’ve ever had…

It has been said to me repeatedly that being happy with you work means finding purpose and fufillment. Seems like you have those two things down pretty good so I'm sorry to hear of your loss. I think the overeducated bit the recruiter told you sounds stupid but thats life, move on to the next job.I'm sure you know that.

Have you ever condsidered a career in the womens lingerie industry? Perhaps you could renovate designs for panythose. Make them fit easier, a product that would cater to crossdressing men with tree trunk legs 😄

gemship said:

It has been said to me repeatedly that being happy with you work means finding purpose and fufillment. Seems like you have those two things down pretty good so I'm sorry to hear of your loss. I think the overeducated bit the recruiter told you sounds stupid but thats life, move on to the next job.I'm sure you know that.

Have you ever condsidered a career in the womens lingerie industry? Perhaps you could renovate designs for panythose. Make them fit easier, a product that would cater to crossdressing men with tree trunk legs 😄

Broadway Joe has already stolen the show in that market years ago. 😄

jhuskey said:

Broadway Joe has already stolen the show in that market years ago. 😄

There is a huge shortage of professional Engineers in Australia, in just about every discipline at the present time. Most of our own young engineers seem to be chasing money in China & Dubai.

A working holiday may be an option if you can find a reasonable airfare to here or there. I retired in December last year and my former employer has just in the last week or so managed to recruit a replacement; He is from UK.

I don't know how long this is likely to continue though with the global slowdown starting to bite.

Kind regards,

Sounds like the best job. NASA, hmmm. Unemployment is better than nothing but you do what you have to do. An engineer, how interesting is that. Yeah I love that one when they say you are over qualified for something. I've heard that. Its like even if you are over qualified, isn't that a form of discrimination? Everyone needs to work. Who the hell cares if someone has more experience than the position requires. I think they assume if something better comes you will just leave them. It is not always the case. Some people are happy to just get something steady and stick to it. I think they call that loyalty. Amazing how some people know nothing about that.

JTE83 said:

My NASA job ended August 15th. There was a big downturn in drafting / detailing work so they laid off two Designer / Detailers, one being me. It was at Jacobs, the 2nd best engineering firm in the nation and a primary NASA contractor. They told me this typically happens every time this year and they do some budget cutting. Then when stuff picks up in October they might rehire again! So I could be back!

But 11 days on unemployment – I did my Careerbuilder and Monster resume and recruiters are calling me for jobs! Houston is so hot to be a Proe Designer or Mechanical Engineer! I was submitted at $68,000 / year for a Proe Designer job – they said I had an awesome resume and they were about to interview me when they cancelled it for me being overqualified with my BSME degree, they wanted an Associates! So I applied for the Mechanical Engineer position and I’m waiting. Other recruiters are calling me for entry level engineer positions at $66,000 to $68,000 year! - You just can’t get that in Chicago!

If I don’t get a job in 3 months in Houston – I’m gonna jump to another city doing these nationwide Proe Designer contract jobs. I turned down Atlanta at $32 to $34 and hour because I’m not ready to move. I got submitted for a 6 month $45 / hr Dallas job but I haven’t heard from them, doesn’t bother me as then I won’t move.

I’m really a Chicago native and I came to Houston March 2007 for a 6 month temp job at Schlumberger. After Schlumberger I got immediately hired at Jacobs, Houston’s job market was so hot! Even now a recruiter said there is a shortage of engineers in Houston!

So now I hope my unemployment doesn’t last long as I’m bleeding $180 a week and didn’t get an unemployment check yet. And they said it’s the worst unemployment situation in America in 6 years! I’ve never done this before – look for a job and pay rent at the same time. In Chicago, no rent!

I’ve rarely had jobs in the past that I really loved and missed when I left them. Three were International Jensen [loudspeaker manufacturer], Schlumberger [oilfield equipment], and Pentair Electronic Packaging [sheet metal mfg firm]. Platt Luggage, a suitcase manufacturer was somewhat interesting but was minimum wage for an engineer – a depressing $25,000 / year back in 1995. Yeah, my early career sucked!

I wanted my career as a Mechanical Engineer to be involved in Product Design, and I like working at interesting companies that make interesting products.

So how about you? What was the best job you ever had? How’d you like it? What was interesting about it? Did you miss it?

Man, I should have applied for the engineer job at SRAM in Chicago! JL Audio in FL – I passed them over because they use Solidworks and pay less, up to $60 k / year. Maybe I should’ve bought JL Audio gear from the company and ebay’ed it! I got passed over by the company that makes most of the machine guns for the military.

What about you people on unemployment? How long have you been unemployed? How the job market treating you where you’re at? Like isn’t America in a recession? What jobs do you apply for?

Too bad I can no longer brag that I work for NASA! Most historic thing I did was work on the Lunar Lander Platform mockup. But we don’t need to go back to the moon! If NASA budgets pick up I might be back!

Sorry to read that your current and best loved job has finished up.

Given the length of the working day, it is important to be at least 51% happy in ones job.
In many cases for people to even have a job is an achievement given the economic turmoil that there is worldwide.

The old values of loyalty, dependability, pride in ones work, a fair days work for a fair days pay, these qualities have been sacrificed in favour of qualifications etc.

Looks like you have an enviable skill set there. There will always be room for people with that experience and skills like yours. It could be very frustrating and devastating for some to lose their jobs I had been in that situation too. It was not easy there were lots of issues stemming from the unemployment. What if you lost your job again do you have plan B? We can not be employees all the time.

That's truly an amazing job that you had. I feel sorry for your predicament and I would feel very depressed if I was in your position. That's just life I guess, some things are only temporary and there's not much we can do about that. At least you worked in a field that few people will ever experience. With your skills and knowledge, you'll be able to move onto greatest things eventually.

That's sad and happens every day in this modern world. But don't worry and search for open positions as soon as possible. With that kind of experience and education I am sure you could find a good job very soon. Just remember that work follows work so if you are working at just any job it will look a much better in CV than doing nothing.