My 2 cents, having gone through a few job searches in off markets...
1 - You may need to go lateral or a half step back from what you want, but don't take 3 steps back. There's no reason to be a waiter or a shop assistant unless you want to do that for the next 20 years, or want to automate those industries.
2 - Find your way into the industry or company that you ultimately want to work for. Even if the job isn't perfect. If you want to learn PHP or .Net, get a job doing QA at a shop that uses them.
3 - Small companies are much more likely to respond to resumes tossed over the transom than big ones. This is only based on anecdotal evidence.
4 - Searching for a job needs to be your full time job until you get one. If you're not doing it 8+ hours a day, you're not trying hard enough.
5 - It's best to do both high contact (meeting people you know for coffee, and asking them to introduce you to their friends) and low contact (sending 100s, yes 100s of resumes every week) searching.
Good luck! If you have technical skills, it will all be good in a couple months.
Comments
My 2 cents, having gone through a few job searches in off markets...
1 - You may need to go lateral or a half step back from what you want, but don't take 3 steps back. There's no reason to be a waiter or a shop assistant unless you want to do that for the next 20 years, or want to automate those industries.
2 - Find your way into the industry or company that you ultimately want to work for. Even if the job isn't perfect. If you want to learn PHP or .Net, get a job doing QA at a shop that uses them.
3 - Small companies are much more likely to respond to resumes tossed over the transom than big ones. This is only based on anecdotal evidence.
4 - Searching for a job needs to be your full time job until you get one. If you're not doing it 8+ hours a day, you're not trying hard enough.
5 - It's best to do both high contact (meeting people you know for coffee, and asking them to introduce you to their friends) and low contact (sending 100s, yes 100s of resumes every week) searching.
Good luck! If you have technical skills, it will all be good in a couple months.