It's that time again!

Hello there, career hackers!

We hope you’ve had a great week and what better way to finish it off than the Futurizm newsletter!

COMING UP:

• Futurizm news

• Dealing with redundancy

• Big tech dad joke

But before we get down to the nitty-gritty, we thought we’d have a bit of fun again with AI-generated art. The “stereotypical Big Tech recruiter” in our last newsletter was questionable at best and pretty damn disturbing at worst! This time we asked it to create an image of a “stereotypical software engineer” and here is what Openart.ai came up with:

I mean….yeah?! I’m trying to think of something witty and biting, but unlike our “Big Tech recruiters” who had toes instead of fingers or huge microphones behind them, this is just a bloke! The computers look odd and he has this weird keyboard flap, but we’ll let Openart.ai off this time. 

Img2Go did come up with the goods though!

Some marks for diversity on this one! But why does he have two watches and a monitor that appears to be showing stocks about to fall off the table?! Ah, well maybe next time!

What are your thoughts? Did AI nail it? Do you also wear a watch on each wrist when you’re programming? Please give us your feedback and if you’re feeling creative send us your own AI-generated Big Tech images to [email protected]. We might showcase your work of AI art in our newsletter!

Anyway, down to business!

FUTURIZM LATEST:

We’re growing!

We’re super excited to welcome the talented Tamara Sekotill Gonzalez to our crack team of Big Tech coaches. 

Tamara cut her teeth as an AWS Senior Recruiter and Senior Leadership Recruiter. She then hopped over to META where she’s worked as a Leadership Recruiter and Executive Technical Recruiter. 

Tanya brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to Futurizm and we know she’s looking forward to sharing her insider knowledge with anyone looking to get into Big Tech or climb the career ladder.

If you or anyone you know is looking to land a job at Amazon or Meta or any of the other top companies and needs some expert career guidance, interview coaching or just a chat, you know where we are.

Our (sort of) website!

Yes, the irony that we’re a company specialising in Big Tech careers and we haven’t yet got a proper website isn’t lost on us.

But we’re working on it!

So bookmark www.futurizm.io, set it as your homepage because, as the page says, something amazing is coming!

DEALING WITH REDUNCANCY

We’re sure many of you are aware, Microsoft announced yet another round of cuts last week.

That comes on top of another 1,000 redundancies the company made in its Azure Cloud unit and Hololens organization last month. Not to mention the continuing industry-wide layoffs.

First of all, we hope that none of our readers have been affected by these cuts because losing your job sucks and I should know…

MY EXPERIENCE

Once upon a time, I worked in Vienna. Having been told my job was safe one day, I found out the next that I’d been let go. Brutal. The expat dream was over. 

My partner and I had moved to Austria together but I didn’t have the heart to tell her straight-away. I felt like a failure. 

Anyway, it was time to pack our bags again and move back in with my mother! Hardly the career trajectory I’d hoped for.

But then came the real fun, the job hunt. If I felt like a failure moving back in with my mother in my 30s, the ghosting and countless rejections took me to rock bottom. 

I was panicked and constantly worried about running out of money with my savings drying up.

Eventually, I managed to land a small consulting gig, it wasn’t exactly what I was doing before, but it was a start. And eventually it led me on to bigger and better things.

I’ll always be grateful for that opportunity.

HERE’S WHAT I LEARNT:

1. You're not the center of the universe: Tough to swallow, but essential.

2. Keep your cool: Even British weather clears up eventually.

3. Desperation is not good: Recruiters can smell it.

4. Know your value: Don't sell yourself at a discount.

5. Tap into your people: Many opportunities aren’t advertised.

6. Freelance: Platforms like Upwork and Fiverr can be great gateways.

7. Upskill: Leverage free resources from companies like Google, Meta, and others available on platforms like Coursera.

If you are going through something similar, we get it, we really do. Hang on in there, things aren’t as bad as they seem. 

If you are on the job market and you do feel you need to polish your resume or LinkedIn profile or brush up on your interview technique. Again, you know where we are.

And on that sobre note…time for our….

BIG TECH DAD JOKE

Why do Java developers wear glasses? BECAUSE THEY CAN’T C#!

Alright everyone, that’s all for this week’s newsletter. Thanks again for sticking with us, we hope we didn’t get you too down with the redundancy talk! Have a fantastic weekend!

Will Grady (Futurizm Founder)