Job Hunting

[Ben X]

Yeah, see, the problem is I'm more of an "ideas man"...

[syntheticgerbil]

But you drawl the pitchers too!

[Ben X]

But you drawl the pitchers too!

 

??

[Twig]

he's just letting you know yer drawers are wet cause you spilled a picture of beer on 'em

[tegan]

I still don't feel like I'm ready to go back to work because I keep having really severe anxiety issues, but I'm trying to get back into the idea out of financial necessity. Then I spent some time browsing the job bank to day and... fuck, it's discouraging. Atlantic Canada has a famously bad job situation. Most young people move west to pursue their careers and the only thing the area has going for it is that it's unusually cheap to outsource call center jobs here, which I never want to do again after my experience doing call center work at the insurance company. I don't know what I can do.

[syntheticgerbil]

??

Nevermind, I thought you shared some art duties with Dan on the games, but mobygames seems to confirm not.

 

Didn't you draw the comics you were trying to scan earlier this year in that other thread?

 

You should just write and draw comics. You will be rich I guarantee it.

[Ben X]

Nevermind, I thought you shared some art duties with Dan on the games, but mobygames seems to confirm not.

 

Didn't you draw the comics you were trying to scan earlier this year in that other thread?

 

You should just write and draw comics. You will be rich I guarantee it.

 

Yeah, Dan did all the in-game art (I did some concept stuff). We did draw the comics together, in alternating panels - but Dan is better at that art than me too, I was just aping his style.  Maybe I'll do a Harvey Pekar style comic about my job hunting...

[Griddlelol]

What can someone do with an English degree? In all seriousness. A buddy has just got his masters and I had literally no idea what he could do, other than work in the service industry: which he refuses to do.

[Dewar]

Editing or some other work for a publishing house maybe? 

[Bjorn]

Kind of depends on what the focus of the degree was. Being able to write and communicate well are skills that are applicable to so many fields. If you know how to market yourself well, an English or Writing degree can be useful.

[Griddlelol]

I believe he focused on creative writing.

I'll mention editing to him. His world is alien to me, but I know how shit it feels to be unemployed so I promised I'd help.

[Twig]

I have a friend who also got a master's in English and looked into localization for a while (knowledge of foreign language not so much required, as I understand it, since it'll already be translated? you just make it sound Good or whatever), and then ended up moving to Japan to teach English (not a requirement to have a master's, but he wanted to, anyway), and now I think he might actually be localizing? Not sure, haven't talked to him for a while!!!

[SuperBiasedMan]

An animation studio followed me on twitter, their current twitter handle is "We're hiring!"
They're crewing up across all levels and disciplines... weirdly that makes me feel almost like it's suspiciously aggressive.

[Nachimir]

What can someone do with an English degree? In all seriousness. A buddy has just got his masters and I had literally no idea what he could do, other than work in the service industry: which he refuses to do.

 

A friend did her PGCE after an English studies degree and an English Lit. Master's. She now teaches and she's pretty happy with that.

[RubixsQube]

Griddle, if your buddy is interested in getting a PhD with his English degree, I'd recommend maybe not doing that, since the job market for english/lit/comp lit people is far, far worse than the STEM academic job market. It's a damn nightmare. I tend to think that people with English degrees should work for cool non-profits, especially ones like 826 that focus on writing. 

 

I got an interview last week for a job working on the science for one of the James Webb Space Telescope instruments (NIRCam), and while it's highly unlikely that I'll get the job, it was neat to be considered. I hate this job search! I hate not knowing where I'll be next year! 

[miffy495]

A friend did her PGCE after an English studies degree and an English Lit. Master's. She now teaches and she's pretty happy with that.

 

Worked for me. Not English, but Philosophy. Another equally jobless discipline. Becoming a teacher was rad and I now make more money than many of my friends who used to poke fun at me for studying Philosophy and having no job prospects.

[Griddlelol]

I have a friend who also got a master's in English and looked into localization for a while (knowledge of foreign language not so much required, as I understand it, since it'll already be translated? you just make it sound Good or whatever), and then ended up moving to Japan to teach English (not a requirement to have a master's, but he wanted to, anyway), and now I think he might actually be localizing? Not sure, haven't talked to him for a while!!!

He speaks a central European language, and done some translating before, so this could be an option, but I already mentioned it and he absolutely hates translating. So I don't think it would be for him (it doesn't help with his hunt that he's incredibly picky).

 

A friend did her PGCE after an English studies degree and an English Lit. Master's. She now teaches and she's pretty happy with that.

 

He doesn't want to teach. I know it's a viable option, but I understand why he wouldn't want to, certainly not a job for everyone.

 

Griddle, if your buddy is interested in getting a PhD with his English degree, I'd recommend maybe not doing that, since the job market for english/lit/comp lit people is far, far worse than the STEM academic job market. It's a damn nightmare. I tend to think that people with English degrees should work for cool non-profits, especially ones like 826 that focus on writing. 

Yeah I've advised him against a PhD already. He knows a few people who are going on to do them, but I agree with you, it makes you look over qualified for most jobs, you get no translational skills like you do in STEM, and as you said, the academic job market is basically non-existent. 

[Twig]

He speaks a central European language, and done some translating before, so this could be an option, but I already mentioned it and he absolutely hates translating. So I don't think it would be for him (it doesn't help with his hunt that he's incredibly picky).

Well, that's what I was trying to get at. There's a difference between translating and localizing (as I understand it). Localizing tends to flex your creative muscles more than just translating, which is more often than not just a 1:1... translation. With localization you actually need to work to make it sound right. Like back in the day (or even sometimes still today) when you'd get a video game that just had really stiff and awkward writing was fairly often because the localization was poor, and not because the original writing was bad.

 

A good example (based on some interviews I've read in the past, unless I'm making this all up) would be, like, Treehouse and the Mario RPG games. They take a lot of liberties with their "translations" in order to make it more appealing or less nonsensical than the original writing would be to Western, English-speaking audiences.

 

But I guess if he hates that too then well whatever.

[Griddlelol]

I think localising would be difficult considering he's not a native English speaker. I've helped him with translations before by basically doing the localisation with him. I'll mention it though, the only real reason I helped out was because I was there.

[Twig]

Ahhh okay, I understand.

 

To be honest, I have no idea what the job market even is for stuff like that, so it may be a wash, anyway. D:

[Ben X]

I've got an interview for a job which required me to do psychometric tests in my own time, then another test on the day of the interview. It's ridiculous. The psychometric tests were numerical and verbal analytical reasoning skills and incredibly frustrating. I'm pretty good at both those things, but I just got constantly thrown by the format and timed element of the test. I don't know what they're supposed to show except for how good someone is at these exact tests. Companies are pissing money away on these things and being led to give jobs to people who may not actually be any good at them unless they consist of doing stupid tests all day.

[Hermie]

I've got an interview for a job which required me to do psychometric tests in my own time, then another test on the day of the interview. It's ridiculous. The psychometric tests were numerical and verbal analytical reasoning skills and incredibly frustrating. I'm pretty good at both those things, but I just got constantly thrown by the format and timed element of the test. I don't know what they're supposed to show except for how good someone is at these exact tests. Companies are pissing money away on these things and being led to give jobs to people who may not actually be any good at them unless they consist of doing stupid tests all day.

 

I did something similar before getting hired at my current job. There was a pure logic part, a concentration part, an "odd one out" part, and a personality test kinda like Meyers-Briggs.

 

All of this was arranged by the recruiter from the giant HR department, I don't think my actual boss cared much about them.

 

I'm like you, I'm usually good at those and I often play little puzzle games on my phone, so in the interview I half-jokingly asked if I could do more.

 

Oh, during the interview the recruiter asked a bunch of true/false statements regarding the result of my personality test. "There's no right or wrong, we just want to find out if the qualities we are looking for for this position are found in you".

[dibs]

Oh, during the interview the recruiter asked a bunch of true/false statements regarding the result of my personality test. "There's no right or wrong, we just want to find out if the qualities we are looking for for this position are found in you".

 

Yes.

 

Wait, NO.

[Griddlelol]

I did something similar before getting hired at my current job. There was a pure logic part, a concentration part, an "odd one out" part, and a personality test kinda like Meyers-Briggs.

 

All of this was arranged by the recruiter from the giant HR department, I don't think my actual boss cared much about them.

 

Haha! I remember being told I wasn't qualified for a job by a company's HR department and that I wouldn't get an interview. I called the interviewer directly and she told me to come in anyway, which led to me getting the job. HR knows nothing, and are generally hated by the actual staff in every company/university I've worked in.

 

The Meyers-Briggs thing pisses me off. Why would a company need that information? Wouldn't it be discrimination to not choose someone based on that test? Not to mention that those tests have been proven to be pseudoscientific bullshit multiple times. I have no idea why they're so popular - they're all over the internet, and clearly in large companies too. 

[Nachimir]

Of those, Myers-Briggs is especially wooey. Between that and the closed doors sessions at GDC, if I didn't know people who worked in HR departments, they'd seem like a really weird priesthood.