=== NYC Ruby Job Fair -- April 25th
The NYC Ruby meetings lately have looked a lot like middle school dances.
On one side of the room is people saying, "Gee, I wish I could work
full-time doing Ruby or Ruby on Rails." On the other side of the room are
companies saying, "Wow, those Ruby people sure look cute, I wish they would
all come work for me." The music is playing, the love if flowing, but
nobody''s dancing.
The April 25th meeting will be a Job Fair where companies or recruiters can
feel safe to talk about what they need while Ruby aficionados can hand out
resumes to try and get their dream gigs.
For this one night and one night only we will be sacrificing the non-profit
purity of the Ruby community to the god of CASH. If you have a problem with
this, then please don''t come. The next Ruby meeting will be the nice
lovable communist group you remember. But April 25th is all about the
greenbacks.
== The Location
If the group is small we''ll still have it at the EastMedia offices like
normal. If the group is large we''ll be looking to move the meeting to
a
larger location near by. If we need a larger location then we may postpone
the job fair until a later meeting so that we can get sponsorship.
== The Details
The general plan is to keep things loose and let companies or recruiters
give a short pitch about what they need. After all the companies have
talked about what they need we''ll have a 30 minute refreshments break
where
people interested in the company can give out their resume and chat further.
To keep things smooth we''ve come up with a few rules:
REPRESENTATIVES
1. There will be NO PROJECTOR. Last thing we want is a 30 minute power
point. If you want to show people something then bring a laptop for after
your presentation. There is wireless internet.
2. Try to keep your pitch quick and to the point and shoot for the softer
sell.
3. Be prepared to answer some difficult technical questions and questions
about the company. This especially applies to recruiters who are notorious
for not being allowed to say anything about the company.
4. There will be a bunch of talk about Canada on Rails after the Job Fair.
You may not be terribly interested in it, but if you''re serious about
hiring
a Ruby person you might want to stick around and listen.
5. Many programmers have been burned by the dot-com bust a few years back.
Be prepared to talk about benefits, expected work hours, whether people get
paid for working extra, and longevity.
RUBYISTS
1. Be fair to other people and let others talk to the representatives too.
2. Don''t be mean or insulting to representatives because of where they
work
or whether they are a recruiter or not. We want everyone to have a positive
experience.
3. Make sure your resume is clean, has your required information, and that
you bring enough copies.
4. Don''t run around like a whore giving your resume out to everyone
with a
business card. It''s degrading.
EVERYBODY
1. Don''t talk salary at the meeting, save that for later. This tends
to
make everyone uncomfortable.
2. People interested in talking more after we start to go over Canada on
Rails should probably go hit a bar, restaurant or coffee shop in the area to
talk shop more privately.
These "rules" are open for suggestion since this is our very first job
fair.
If anything makes you uncomfortable or you think should be done different
then feel free to e-mail me (see below).
== Representatives RSVP With Zed
In order to judge what kind of space we''ll need we''d like the
representatives (companies or recruiters) to RSVP. After we have all the
requests we''ll determine a time limit and maybe possibly look for a
larger
venue.
Send a short e-mail to me (Zed A. Shaw) with what company you''ll
represent
or whether you''re a recruiter for many companies and if you''d
like a little
blurb in the listing we''ll post later.
My e-mail address is zedshaw@zedshaw.com.
== Interested Rubyists RSVP With Francis
You don''t *have* to do this but we''d like to judge whether we
have enough
space. Please send a short e-mail to Francis Hwang just saying you''ll
attend. This is mostly for a head count.
Francis'' e-mail is sera@fhwang.net.
