Have I talked about Erin on here? Either way, xpost from a journal:
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You can’t make this shit up.
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UNPAID.
Absofuckinglutely not.
Anyway how are the job searchers going? Anyone need a bit of support?
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I need a kick in the butt. Maybe I need a sticker chart
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This might belong more in the “Tiny Complaints” thread, but this is the benefits info from our school district. I know it’s in line with most Colorado school districts, I remember my uncle talking about the same thing when he taught 4th grade at least a decade ago.
I feel like a significant majority of school employees also have families/kids. How can they justify the insane jump in premiums from “Employee” to “Employee + children”? It doesn’t make sense to me at all.
I was looking because I want to have more time with my kids, but I’d love to have decent insurance coverage, because my husband’s job does this same thing. He pays like $40/pp for himself, but to add the rest of us would be another $300-$400/pp, for a super basic HDHP-eligible plan. Do employers not expect their employees to take care of their families?
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It’s really gross, isn’t it?? The US healthcare system does not work for anyone except like, drug companies
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Ironically, I work for a pharmaceutical company, and our health coverage is EXCELLENT 
ETA - But yes, it is gross! My husband works for a giant, multi-national company, and they still don’t subsidize family health care coverage in an appreciable way.
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HAHAHA. Welp!
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So this is a huge huge bummer but in California, teacher healthcare plans tend to look like this because older teachers who aren’t raising families tend to be the ones at the negotiating table, so they aren’t incentivized to negotiate in a way that benefits younger teachers who may be raising kids. Obviously I don’t know if that’s why it works that way here! Maternity leave (when I was doing research on teacher benefits) worked the same, moms giving birth in CA school districts would get boned.
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But also this is how my healthcare plan looks too, and my company makes the stuff hat tthey make the drugs with. So at least it’s bad everywhere 
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Oh man, this was SO GOOD. Erin explains a concept of lifestyle centred vs career centred and how to think about which one you are, and what that means for how you look for a job.
Interestingly I’d describe myself as “career centred” but mine was tweaked out of the many possible career options within my field to be one where i can be part time and don’t have to travel, because i can’t work full time and I’m awful at travel.
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I have a final interview in the next week or so (either this Friday or the next) and I’m not sure yet whether I would take the job if offered.
Pros:
- genuinely good-for-the-world work doing stuff to improve healthcare outcomes. I’ve not seen anything else on the local market that ticks this box so well.
- smaller company, so more room to make changes and just make decisions.
- the big one is that I am currently feeling super uncomfortable at my present job since most of my coworkers got laid off and the temptation to make some sort of change rather than just sitting around with the status quo is strong.
Cons:
- I’d be swapping my 20 min cycle commute for either a 30 min drive (and I’d need to acquire a car), or a ~45 min cycle-train-cycle commute, neither of which I’m wild about.
- It’s a pay cut - obviously don’t have an offer yet but anticipating it would be a tad less than my current base salary, but losing the ~25k in bonuses and stock awards I get currently. It likely would be in line with market salaries, I’ve just been at a big name company that paid more so far. Would push my FIRE date back from about 7 years to about 9 compared to sticking with BigTechCo according to my spreadsheets - but maybe that’s not even a fair comparison, as I can’t see sticking around there in particular for more than another year or so in any case.
- Not sure how I feel about it being a startup - I’ve been reassured from existing interviews that the work-life balance is fine, but there’s inherent instability there. I think they have funding for 1.5 years (it span out of another firm), but then…?
Big unknown at the moment is work culture - hoping to get a sense of that at interview, but I’m feeling anxious about making the decision already.
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Husband had an interview Wednesday before last, they said they’d be sending an offer, and … Crickets for a week and a half.
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Do any of the resume/CV savants on this thread still have energy to consult with internet strangers about their resumes? I know a lot of you got busy with things like having children.
I think my resume needs upgrading because I have applied to like 45 jobs and gotten one interview than I then got an offer on (that I declined). I know the biotech job market is awful, and I haven’t been tailoring my applications that much, but I’m smart and capable and have a lot of experience and was expecting to at least get to the “chat to the recruiter who has no idea of what any of the words they’re saying mean” stage a lot more often.
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While I’m possibly not as much of an expert as some folks here, I’m happy to take a look!
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Thanks! I’ll try and finagle it into sendable form this evening.
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Happy to take a look. I’ve mostly worked on the commercial side of biotech companies but spouse is still in the research side and gives good advice too.
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Thank you! I’m on vacation in a cabin in the woods and so I’m not working on this (sorry to @Panda as well) but I’m still trying to get it together sometime this week.
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Doing some interview prep between sets at this folk fest lol, thinking thru my answers to common questions
One thing I’m struggling with is having a clear, specific example for questions like “talk about a time you made a mistake” because my company is so obtuse and aggressive and weird, like I can’t say, well I have to keep psychotic notes about my thought process for every single choice I make because you can be questioned about anything at any time, even like 8 months later lol, how much detail are hiring managers looking for with questions like this
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Context: The last time I interviewed was 7 years ago and I’m an entirely different person than like, a 24yo who just finished their MLIS and has no other adult work experience. At this point when I am asked what my strengths and weaknesses are, I am annoyed. My weaknesses are I don’t want to do jobs I’m not interested in. I’m not going to make a good corporate accountant or fundraising event planner so I’m not applying to those jobs? I don’t know what to say in this instance other than “I don’t have experience working in a library.”
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