The Last Post

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to speak with Penelope Trunk, and one of the things that she told me is that a blog should be a shared experience between the writer and audience.  That we should learn things together, develop together, and create a little micro-culture among us.  And I feel that I haven’t really done that.

when I first started writing this blog over eight months ago, I did it for two reasons: as something to fill my time, and as a way to prevent others from having the same experiences in the job market that I did.  So over the past week, I shared some of those experiences with you.  And all of them are true.  It’s never fun to see your business fail, to have to move back with your parents because you don’t have any options, or to send out 150 job applications and not get a single response for an interview.  This blog was created to prevent that from happening again.

But somewhere over the course of the past 250 posts, I realized something: there’s only so much that someone can say about getting a job.  And I was no longer in the unemployed bracket of society.  I wasn’t learning about how to get a job anymore.  Instead, I was learning about creating a business, developing a brand, becoming more creative and finding a balance in my life between my personal and professional obligations.  I’m not in the same place as I was eight months ago (and I hope that none of you are, either).

So I’ll no longer be making any posts here at canhasjob.wordpress.com.

The blog will stay up here for a while, until either the middle of 2010 or whenever WordPress realizes that there are no new posts coming in on the site.  You can read through the archives, share links and do what you do – but I won’t be here.

Because I’ve moved Needle, Meet Haystack to a new site.  New posts will continue at www.NeedleMeetHaystack.com.

I’ve been working for the past few days on setting up the new page, and though it’s not quite finished, you can go over there to see more blog posts starting on Monday (giving myself Sunday off to polish the site, but there might be a link there).  The feed will be updated on Sunday for the new site, so subscribers don’t have to worry about missing out.  And I’ve imported the archives to that site too, so you can peruse on the new site just like on the old one.

So, just to clarify: new posts are moving to a new site, but this one will stay up for a while.

So thank you to all of the subscribers, commenters, bloggers, casual readers and people who stumbled across the site from a Google image search.  I appreciate your support, ideas and views.  It’s been great having the chance to talk to the entire Internet and get feedback.

I hope I’ll see you on twitter and at the new site.

Retreat to Move Forward Part 4: Back to Basics

FOR THOSE JUST TUNING IN: I’m spending the next few days discussing my successes and failures and stereotypical misadventures as a member of Generation Y.  Catch up by reading part one, part two and part three first.  And make sure to catch tomorrow’s post for some exciting news!

As I boarded the plane, I kept thinking of that phrase, “If you can make it in New York City, you can make it anywhere.”  So now it was time to face facts: I couldn’t make it anywhere.

Things hadn’t exactly panned out for me in New York.  After sending out applications to 150 different advertising, public relations and marketing agencies, I found that I couldn’t get even one interview.  Sure, it was nice to walk around Manhattan sometimes and desperately cling to the hope that work would turn up, but nothing materialized.  So after the self-imposed deadline of two months had passed, I packed up again and flew off to Phoenix.

“We’re happy to see you,” my dad said in the car ride home from the airport.  ”Well, we’re not happy that you’re here.  But we’re happy to see you.  You understand what I mean.”

My mom echoed his statements.  ”I’m sorry that you couldn’t get work over there, but it’ll be nice to have you home for longer than a couple of weeks to visit.”

So I set up in my old bedroom and began the process of rebuilding my professional life.  But I didn’t have to look far.

About a week in to my newfound “Boomerang” status, I met up with an old friend from high school.  It turned out that he had started an internet marketing company, but needed help expanding it.  Specifically, he needed someone to write emails, develop site content and take care of customer issues.  And with that, I was once again employed.

Which leads us to now.  Unlike the last time I worked on a business with a friend, this time, I knew what I was getting myself into.  We had discussed (and corrected) many of the problems that had plagued our business lives in the past, and have been able to move forward much more successfully.

This might not have been the life I planned on, but it’s taught me a lot more about myself and my professional abilities than I could have imagined.

Retreat to Move Forward Part 3: The Business of Sounds

FOR THOSE JUST TUNING IN: I’m spending the next few days discussing my successes and failures and stereotypical misadventures as a member of Generation Y.  Catch up by reading part one and part two first.

We were two young, barely experienced, unemployed guys living in a $2400 a month apartment.  And we had a dream.

My roommate (let’s call him Stan) had spent the better part of the past three years building his reputation as a club DJ and producer, though his true hobby was business.  He had been running successful businesses since he was 14 – when we first met, he showed me his new Porsche 911 that he had bought with the spoils of his financial victories.  Stan was a motivated self-starter with the goal to create an entertainment company for our future ventures (publishing for me, music for him) that would set us up for financial security within one year and possible retirement within ten.

With Georgetown out of Stan’s way and the body language job out of mine, we began to build our empire.  Over the course of the next two months, we corralled over a dozen artists, signed distribution deals, recorded radio shows that were heard all over the world and managed to secure almost 70 hours of play time for our DJs at the biggest dance music convention in the country.  The label’s name was on a lot of people’s lips, and it seemed like we were destined for greatness.

Except for one tiny problem: we weren’t making any money.

Because the sales of the music we were selling (singles) were all done digitally, we had to wait for the distributors to compile total sales, which is only done quarterly.  It then takes another month or two for the accounting to be finalized and for checks to be sent out.  Additionally, several promoters had not followed through on payment agreements, so there was less money coming in from club performances than there should have been.

And lastly, Stan decided to keep all of his reserve funds locked up in investments rather than having some set aside in a checking account.  The combined market tumble and the new policy of the online brokerage to take three months to process cash-outs led to the total of our expenses (rent, utilities and food) being hoisted on my shoulders.

So I went broke.

Luckily, our lease was coming due, saving my credit score from taking a permanent nosedive that would kill any hopes of building a stable financial future.  But I knew that I couldn’t afford to stay in DC.

I called my parents to discuss the possibility of moving back to Phoenix to recover, rebuild my finances and find work again.  They agreed that staying in DC would be financial and career suicide, but suggested that I spend a little time with some family near New York City before returning home.

After all, Manhattan is the central hub of the advertising, marketing and PR world.  Maybe I would be able to score a job at one of the hundreds of firms there and get to use my marketing degree for the purpose it was intended.  I had hit rock bottom, but it looked like I had come across a way out.

Retreat to Move Forward Part 2: Go East, Young Man

FOR THOSE JUST TUNING IN: I’m spending the next few days discussing my successes and failures and stereotypical misadventures as a member of Generation Y.  Read part one here.

So there I was: a 21-year-old fresh out of college with no solid job prospects and just over $2,000 in the bank.  The dark cloud of student loans was still building up off in the distance, and without a second thought, I hopped on a plane and made my way to Washington, DC to seek my fortune.

My once and future roommate and soon-to-be business partner and I had scouted out apartments online, and we had decided on a charming $2,400 a month (minus utilities) two-bedroom place in the northwestern (read: safe) part of DC.  He was going to go to Georgetown and pursue an MBA in  finance by day while I would find work in advertising or marketing.  And at night, we would build our music empire.  Or at least that was the plan.

By the time I had lived in the District for two months, my bank account was exhausted and my credit card was nearly maxed out.  I’d sent out hundreds of applications, attended networking events, talked with industry professionals, begged and pleaded with employed friends and even considered working for the post office – but nothing was working.  My personal deadline for finding employment was about to expire, when, miraculously, I got an interview.  And even more astonishingly, I got the job!

So for the next few months, I helped secure media placement for advertisements for political candidates and causes all over the country.  The hours were long, but the amazing staff, challenging work and excellent pay definitely made up for it.  Unfortunately, there were two problems with the job.  The more pressing problem was that it was only a contract position that ended once the election had passed.  But personally, telling people what I did involved conversations about politics.  And as the party affiliation of most of the candidates was called into question, I often got looks from people that are usually reserved for those who steal candy from babies or punt kittens across a city block.

So as the election passed by and the new year approached, I once again found myself unemployed.  And yet within six weeks, gainful employment was again mine.  This was especially fortunate, as my roommate had decided to put his MBA plans on hold and start focusing more seriously on music.

I was hired to find bookings for a self-help and body language guru, but wound up writing newsletters and articles, helping her coach classes (most notably a dating class for busy professionals) and developing content for her book.  This job was not as enjoyable as the last one, and my pay was much lower – I had the misfortune to be one of the few people in DC who had to commute to Virginia for work, so public transportation ate up most of the paycheck.  Since I was scrambling to make rent with my meager earnings, I decided to seek opportunities elsewhere.

It was about this time that my roommate and I realized that we had yet to fulfill our original goal of starting the record label.  But once my schedule had opened up from leaving the body language job, that all changed.

Retreat to Move Forward Part 1: Post-Grad

I was talking with my cousin yesterday, and he mentioned how my generation is going to have a very different view of work and employment.  And while I’m not the strongest advocate of generation gaps, he does have a point.  After all, my experiences in the working world are a good example of that.  So now, I present to you the first of several installments detailing my successes and failures and stereotypical misadventures as a member of Generation Y.  Or as a Millennial.  Or whatever we’re supposed to be called this week.

I hadn’t bothered to apply for any jobs until about three weeks before I graduated from college.  The HR representatives and hiring managers at the career fairs I’d been attending for the better part of the past five months had instilled me with the belief that doing so any earlier would yield negative results.  After all, advertising is a capricious field in which hiring practices are based on obtaining and retaining clients.

So as I was putting the finishing touches on my financial aid closeout forms and pulling all-nighters for my remaining classes, I desperately clung to the belief that one of these magical applications would get me a job that I would start the week after graduation.

That didn’t happen.

So as I finished up school in Tulsa, Oklahoma, I packed up my belongings and moved back home to Phoenix to stay with my parents as I planned out my next move.

For two weeks, I sent out applications to advertising agencies on both coasts and everywhere in between, hoping that one of them would fall in love with my portfolio and resume and scoop me right up.  At best, I would receive a generic response that my application was received and I would be contacted if there was any interest.  My prospects were looking dim.

But then, an old college friend called me up with a proposal: move to Washington, DC and start a record label.  And as an unemployed new graduate with no job prospects, the offer seemed quite appealing…

The Eight Month-iversary: Search Term Roundup

How many ways can you spell “Flavor Flav”?  Let’s find out…

Search	Views
fail	607
hobo	289
val kilmer	191
flavor flav	97
fail pictures	71
the twist	38
mr potato head	35
flava flav	28
twist	27
salvador dali clocks	25
potatoe	17
head	15
1 cent	15
flavor flave	12
mirroring	11
fail!	10
beer splash	10
food stylist	9
potatoe head	9
fail pics	8
love guru	8
flavour flav	8
drunk santa	7
haute couture fashion	7
mr. potato head	7
couch potato watching tv	6
dali clocks	6
new year resolutions	6
aquaman	5
how to decide whether to take a job	5
haystack	5
leg crossing	5
flav o flav	5
sweatin to the oldies	5
budweiser beer	5
ho bo	5
haute couture	5
hipster	5
body language in bars	5
heads	4
mr potatoe head	4
house of cards	4
michael jackson moonwalker	4
the twist-	4
needle meet haystack	4
hobo pictures	4
you are not a beautiful and unique snowf	4
new year new you	4
professional tv watcher	3
sexy food	3

The Other Power of Groups

As I glanced over the new 500 page book in my hands, hoping to find something to ask about before the event started, I felt a pressure on my shoulder.  Glancing over, the source of the pressure was discovered to be a large hand with long, thick, sausage-like fingers at the end.  They belonged to a large man, dressed in a black suit with a white shirt and black tie.  His head was shaved, and he was wearing sunglasses indoors, giving him the impression of a stereotypical bodyguard or secret service agent.  He smiled a wide grin.  ”Hi, I’m Sultan.  Are you excited for the reading?”

Yes, I really should have thought this through more.

The last book signing I had gone to was when I was 11 or 12, and Walter Cronkite had been in Phoenix signing his autobiography.  Having recently learned about the early days of television, I begged and pleaded with my parents to let me go.  Luckily, the persuasion worked, and I soon found shaking hands with the greatest newsman of the 20th Century, who had a surprisingly strong grip for an 80-year-old.  At this signing, people just lined up to have copies of A Reporter’s Life.  But the author that I was going to see was definitely not Walter Cronkite.

Looking around the room, I saw that I might have been the only guy there whose decision was based off of the author’s work rather than his reputation.  All around me, men (and a few grumpy-looking girlfriends) shifted in their seats with nervous anticipation, some wearing leather pants making an almost fart-like noise.  Turning around, I saw that there were even more people standing behind the seats, a cloud of hair products and cologne almost obscuring the crowd.

When Neil Strauss finally arrived, the crowd applauded and cheered loudly for what seemed like a full minute.  Their reactions to his stories and comments seemed almost over exaggerated, like a sitcom laugh track.  But by the time that everyone jumped in line to get their books signed, I was sucked in.  When I finally got the chance to talk to the author, I was a nervous, blubbering mess.

Why?  Because the energy from the crowd caused me to hop on the bandwagon of excitement.  Although I had really only gone to support an author whose work I enjoy, I wound up a drooling fanboy.

Although groups can be more knowledgeable and accurate than experts, they can also suck people in and project their collective feelings onto them.  A group is a powerful social organism and a crucial element of social change.  Think about the times that you’ve bowed down to peer pressure, wondered about how so many people could like something, or made a concentrated effort to be  nonconformist – these are conscious steps taken to resist the pull of a group.

Social media people know this.  Marketers know this.  Hell, most everyone knows this.  And yet, time after time, we fall victim to the power of groups over our individual preferences.  But if you can transition your personal brand into a driving force for a crowd of people, you’ll find that your status goes up considerably.

I’d had little to no interest in seduction community stuff before I came to the book signing, despite it being the field in which Neil is most widely known.  But after my experience with the crowd, I wanted to buy every pick-up artist-type book that was in the store.

Neil Strauss created a personal brand that developed a loyal and passionate following.  Doing so has allowed him to cut his time spent working on his brand, allowing his crowd of fans to do the work for him.  And maybe that’s the goal of creating a personal brand in the first place – to let the group take over, spreading excitement and energy to others, giving your brand even more power than you could have harnessed on your own.