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Part of the problem is convincing people that you are legit. I face a few challenges these days first off, I don't have a degree so that's one battle, but i'm

Part of the problem is convincing people that you are legit. I face a few challenges these days first off, I don't have a degree so that's one battle, but i'm an isolationist so that's battle #2 and its much harder to win. During the first half of my career it was easy to find work because i was green and not charging much. towards the middle part i relied on a network of contacts and finding work was super easy. then i decided to isolate myself - i dropped all my contacts, deleted everything i had ever created (several websites that i ran for years), removed myself from social media and now work is very difficult to get. I didn't even realize this was the issue until recently. In order to fix this: 1. I have started to rebuild my social network and have set up references 2. I now view social media apps as Personal Branding applications and use them as such 3. I built a portfolio site and added a bunch of my old projects to it 4. Look for little projects i can knock out in a few hours or days, work on them, and add them to my site

ccajas 8y ago
Are you the same person as the OP? Just checking since account names are similar, but different. Your story hits close to me. I have never been homeless but I have been through excessive dry spells of no work (I think taking a remote job 5 years ago was a mistake in some ways because it killed my interviewing skills) and had to move back to living with one of my parents. At my mid-30s it feels like your life is a shit show. The jobs I get now have been via "non traditional" means, that is very informal chats instead of lengthy interview processes, and only for short gigs and not long term arrangements. When I have been out of work for over a year, I too just stopped everything, shut myself in more, thinking that going into "silent mode" and avoiding most contact with friends was gonna help me concentrate more on the job hunt. But it doesn't. I can tell you to continue what you're doing, building a network and finding ways that people can refer you. You might think that referrals are a cheese way to short-list your way into an interview, but think of referrals as a trust metric- a quantity that convinces people that you're worth the words you speak. Can you show us your portfolio site? Honestly I got some of my interviews just from things I had on Github that caught soemone's interest. But I believe they need some kind of novel quality to them- a rehashed tutorial app won't cut it.
- homelessdev 8y ago
  I am not OP, I'm the person who posted my own story several weeks ago that OP refers to in his own story.

ccajas 8y ago

Are you the same person as the OP? Just checking since account names are similar, but different. Your story hits close to me. I have never been homeless but I have been through excessive dry spells of no work (I think taking a remote job 5 years ago was a mistake in some ways because it killed my interviewing skills) and had to move back to living with one of my parents. At my mid-30s it feels like your life is a shit show. The jobs I get now have been via "non traditional" means, that is very informal chats instead of lengthy interview processes, and only for short gigs and not long term arrangements. When I have been out of work for over a year, I too just stopped everything, shut myself in more, thinking that going into "silent mode" and avoiding most contact with friends was gonna help me concentrate more on the job hunt. But it doesn't. I can tell you to continue what you're doing, building a network and finding ways that people can refer you. You might think that referrals are a cheese way to short-list your way into an interview, but think of referrals as a trust metric- a quantity that convinces people that you're worth the words you speak. Can you show us your portfolio site? Honestly I got some of my interviews just from things I had on Github that caught soemone's interest. But I believe they need some kind of novel quality to them- a rehashed tutorial app won't cut it.

homelessdev 8y ago
I am not OP, I'm the person who posted my own story several weeks ago that OP refers to in his own story.