Well, not as many as previous job hunting (read: job hopping) process. Got about 4 interviews, 2 offers. I accepted one of the offers, thank God the process wasn’t too complicated this time.n
nThe first interview was abt 2 months ago with a consulting company, I did an interview with the HR guy, he was very nice, he sort of sells the company by stating that the company really look after the employees and they really promote work and life balance and how they don’t want to overwork you etc2, pretty good I guess. Then I came for the test the week after, I’m pretty confident abt the test too. So I was terribly upset and dissapointed when he did not call me nor email me about the result. I sent 2 emails no reply, called him once, he said he’s been busy but he’d surely call me back and he didn’t. That is just rude I reckon, I mean if I didn’t get the position, a mere email would be nice.Then came another interview with another consulting company. The process was very long, the day before I was meant for interview with the HR lady, she broke her hand, thus interview was postponed till 2-3 weeks. Interview with the HR lady went very good, booked in for interview with the boss for the week after. Then my dad pass away on the Sunday and I was due for interview for Tuesday, so the interview was pushed for another 3 weeks. Came for interview, the boss was late for 1 hour, apparently this is his custom so my friends that work there told me. He didn’t know my name, I guess he just got an entry on his diary from the HR lady, meeting with someone for job interview, he hadn’t read my resume either.. Sigh, I wonder how much he values his employees. Anyway, did interview with him, very technical, J2EE, web services, design patterns and networking stuffs. I am very interested in joining the company particularly because they put a lot of emphasis on training and certifications and the opportunity to work with web services (apparently the next big thing). They offer instant salary increase for every certification done, one guy managed to get 10k salary increase in one week as he finished 4 certifications. The catch is the starting salary is very low, they said it’s in the middle range of IT salary, but I say it’s in the bottom end. He offered me the same salary as my current job, he will pay for the rest of my uni tuition fee and he’ll raise the salary by the time I finished my postgrad. Seems to be quite good offer I think and he asked me to think about it first and get back to him the week after. The next day, another company rang me for an interview. It’s a web development position, honestly I wasn’t really looking for a web development position as I wanted to move on Java programming and more on software architecturing. But the salary is quite good so I guess why not, i’ll give it a try. Went to interview, the boss told me that he’s a Christian and the lead programmer there is also a Christian. The interview was very casual and short, apparently not many of the applicants have web dev experience, so they’re quire impressed although my skill set is probably be different with what they are after. The office is quite nice, it’s an open office and very neat, way roomier than my current “desk”. * sidetracking * Yes I only have a desk and a chair, there’s an empty room in the office that I thought was going to be my room when the partner left. But they never offered me, wonder why, such a waste of good room and a good chair.. :( Hm, if you can’t offer me a good salary, at least offer me some other benefits.. Me not getting the room is one of the mysteries that I keep on thinking but I can’t seem to find the answer, the other mystery is what’s the fight is all about, I don’t dare to ask, but I thought it’s a pity that it has to end that way. But hey, I learned a lot from this job and I think I contributed a lot too to the company, so it’s all good in the end. * sidetracking finished *Anyway the next day the boss offered me the position. I was weighing the factors now, the salary is good, the boss seems nice, he’s approachable evidenced by our correspondence. Also on the interview day which was at 8am, he was there before I came, not coming late like habit of some bosses, so there’s a little bit of respect there. Might not much in the benefits side of things like training and certifications, but I can do those myself if I want to. I hope that I can stay here long, I really getting tired of changing companies every 1 year. The longest I’ve ever stayed with a company is 1.5 years.. Wife definetely likes this one better than the consulting one, she said to me why the heck I want to do extra learning just to get salary increase when you can get a better paid job without having to chase certifications. Well she’s got a point there, I guess she knows myself well, if I take the other job, I would definetely spend lots of time studying at home thus little time for God and the family. Lucky to have a wise wife, that’s not a lover of money.So decided to take it, but before that I asked first whether the consulting company can do better on their offer, they won’t do anything to match it, so that settles it, I took the web dev position. Then came another interview for another Java development company, the interview was really bad, firstly I went to their postal address not the office address, I wonder why I was so stupid, hence late for 15 mins. Then interview with one of the leading architect, he’s so smart, asked me lots of J2EE questions, to my shame I really did bad in this interview, I said lots of “um I don’t know, I’m not sure, I can’t remember”. Luckily he’s very nice, he kept on saying that’s ok. So it’s natural that I assume that I wasn’t unsuccesful for this one, but today to my surprise he rang me for a second interview with another tech guy in the company. I don’t know why I said yes for the interview as I already got an offer anyway, so maybe tomorrow I need to call him back thanking him for the invite but I am no longer looking.