Agreed and that was also my one exception to that comment.
If someone’s really worried about having a super compact kit for smaller, light duty jobs, the 12v (and under) options from any major tool manufacturer will fit the bill nicely.
It doesn’t cost you a dime to keep your resume up to date and to check Indeed and Linked In one every few weeks for jobs like yours in your area.
Worst case, you look around and find there’s nothing in your area paying much better than you are currently earning. Congrats. You’re in as good a position as you can reasonably expect.
More likely though, you’ll see one or more of a few other trends in your search:
Employers are all looking for a specific skill adjacent to your skill set that you don’t have. Might be time to look into a class or something to pick this skill up and increase your potential.
Employers around you are all willing to pay more than you’re making but want more experience. In this case you can sit tight…or throw your hat into the ring even with less experience. They may take a flier on you, especially in this tight labor market.
Employers around you are willing to pay more for your skills and experience. This is most likely but you now need to check out why, and decide if you’re interested.
Even if you’re not really interested (maybe the specific opening is too far away or not a big pay increase or something) it may still be worth reaching out, even if just for interview practice. Lots of people really struggle with interviews, and being able to do one where you’re not really intent on landing the job may be a valuable experience.
Also, if your employer only bumps you up to where you should be after you threaten to leave after years of under-compensation, they’ve still won, not you. Sure you’re now being paid fairly but you’ll never get back all that pay you should’ve been getting all along. And if you don’t have that money, they do.
And if you left based on that stagnant wage, I bet they gave you the guilt trip about loyalty, and how hard it is to operate a small business, as if that somehow makes it okay to underpay you.
I’m not saying you’re wrong…and as I age, I’m asked more and more about my job hopping history…but I am starting to feel like the negatives of a long history of job hopping are in many ways balanced out by the long history itself.
I’m a CAD drafter with 17 years of experience in 5 different jobs. In interviews it’s more and more common to get questions about my plans for the future and how long I plan to stay with (company that is interviewing me). Each time, I tell them that I’m prepared to retire from their company in a few decades as long as they take care of me and keep a good working environment and competitive compensation.
Whether I’m just in a good market for my skills, or job hopping isn’t the deterrent some people seem to think it is, I have been getting a constant stream of recruiters filling my inbox for the past decade, whether I’ve been looking or not, and I’ve honestly never not gotten an offer for any position I was actually interested in.
If I felt it was a good fit and was interested in talking to them, it has always led to an interview, and if I was still interested after that, an offer. Every time. Granted, often the offer was way less than I was currently making or in the interview we realize it’s not a good fit…but never once has my job history been an issue that comes between a position that’s a good fit and a job offer.
That’s interesting. I’ve never once had that happen.
The bigger employers I’ve left just didn’t care and were already looking into how to replace me while I was finishing out my last two weeks. The smaller ones always were concerned with squeezing as much production out of my last few hours as they possibly could.
In neither case were they ever interested in my career beyond their doors.
Nobody asks for references outside of minimum wage positions unless they’re a small shop.
I’ve found this to be highly variable over my past few career moves.
My resume indicates that professional references are available upon request.
In my last two job searches, I’ve had responses ranging from absolutely zero interest in references, to not only requesting the ones I indicated but also asking for even more names and contacts.
Obviously your mind is already made up, but in my experience, it seems the wise move to stay professional in your professional life, even when leaving a bad job.
It’s definitely not the way to go for taste but I’ve heard of boiled chicken pretty often.
Usually it’s in the context of health reasons (a friend that is a fitness and nutrition guy basically just adds diced boiled chicken breast to fresh salads to add protein with few/any nutrition drawbacks), for babies/young children to add some soft and healthy meat to their diet, other dietary restrictions (can’t have spices or salt, etc.), or it’s going to be added to some other dish that will provide moisture, flavor, etc. My mom will boil chicken to make stock, then use the chicken in Buffalo dip or stir fry or shred it up and toss it in bbq sauce for sandwiches and stuff.
About a decade ago, my grandfather fell ill around Thanksgiving and they found he was full of cancer, had a few weeks left, and sent him home for hospice care.
I was unexpectedly laid off just before that, so, jobless, it became my job to pull the overnight shift there, tending to him, sleeping in 1.5h spells, and the next morning, being expected to stick around to keep company with relatives coming to visit my grandfather, playing host, etc. even though my dad and other family members were there.
I was basically living on coffee and grief.
That Christmas was an incredibly hollow ‘celebration’, and my grandfather passed in the early morning hours of new years eve.
What helped me was just forcing myself to go through the holiday motions in the following years. I’m not a super Christmas person anyway, but just going to the parties, smiling, listening to the music, etc. Fake it till you make it.
I still always think of my pap every Christmas/new years, and I’ll still have a few moments where it makes me super sad… but I managed to avoid having the whole season become “sit alone and mope in useless grief for a few weeks”, which is where my mind likely would have gone, had I not made the active conscious effort to avoid it.
I don’t think anyone thinks store bought pierogi are as good as homemade, just that they’re so labor intensive that the store bought still have their place, being not as good, but still good…and the increase in quality to do homemade is real…but not worth the fuss to make one meal of them.
It’s absolutely one of those “get the family together once a year and make zillions of them as a social event” type things.
My dad used to get together with a few buddies to make homemade sauerkraut each year and he often said that for the production, for a single meal, just buy it from the store…but as an excuse to hang out with old friends, catch up, tell off color jokes, and drink cheap beer for a few hours each year, it was totally worth it to make homemade.
I had to laugh when I read this, since it’s apparently impossible for me to make the correct amount of rice for a meal. I’ve never once in my life not had leftover rice haha.
For me, it usually becomes tomorrow’s breakfast: reheated in the pot on the stove with a bit of water, then put it in a bowl, crack a raw egg on it, and drizzle with soy sauce and sprinkle on a few toasted sesame seeds.
That seems like one of those cases where the production is only worth it if it’s a group/family tradition to get together and enjoy everyone’s company while you do it.
Like…no part of my family makes baklava, but if I had a friend whose Greek or Turkish family met up once a year and made it, I would love to come help, as much for the experience as to learn about how to make it.
In my area where I grew up (if not my actual family) that food is pierogi: families will get together and make massive quantities of pierogi, usually with the grandmas of the families directing the process. Everyone goes home with dozens and dozens for the freezer.
From what I gather, it’s not worth making like…one dozen for a meal, but if you’re going to go through the process, you might as well make hundreds.