Career paths

I have heard that my generation typically stays in a job for about five years, and that is definitely true for me. Several of the changes were due to life circumstances, only one because I outgrew the job, but even that one I ended up leaving due to life circumstances and not because of a career move.

For me, the life circumstances of what I've heard academics call the "two body problem" are what have driven several decisions that have affected my career. When my partner won a fellowship in his field, we packed our bags and moved across the country in what turned out to be a spectacularly fortuitous career move for me. My career opportunity didn't manifest till 18 months after the move, but it led me down a path I probably never would have chosen otherwise and I learned so much.

That's what work is all about for me, how much I can learn in any job I have. That is what makes it exciting. I remember three different times in my career when I felt i needed something new and each time when I presented myself as open and interested in taking on new challenges, the opportunities were given to me. Now, for the fourth time, I definitely recognize where I am at personally, and given the reorganization, am looking both within and without for new opportunities.

In all my jobs, when I have reached this point I have been lucky to have supportive managers and colleagues and this time proves no exception. My director has offered for me to go to two conference that are new to me, to expand my horizons. ELI: Educause Learning Initiative in Austin, TX and NMC: New Media Consortium in Boston, MA. I met with HR to review my resume and some jobs that I wasn't feeling confident I qualified for and came out of the meeting feeling like a million bucks after close analysis comparing my cv and various job descriptions. I was reminded that no one has EVERYTHING a job description is looking for, and some jd's I was hesitating on applying for matched up with a majority of my skills. So it's exciting to be putting myself out there in all kinds of ways, conferences, hopefully interviewing, and finally I want to look at assisting in other departments along the lines of the Google 20% (more on that in the future).

I'll leave you with a partial view of my favorites from a fantastic list of job sites my HR guru put together:

http://joblist.ala.org
http://www.libraryjobpostings.org/
http://libgig.com/
www.higheredjobs.com/
http://www.indeed.com/