Last December, I posted my I-series resume on Monster and the following day I received about a dozen inquiries. One of them produced a firm offer a few days later. RPG and the AS/400 have had their doom and gloom predictions for decades. Been in IT since 1967 and I have never had any issues finding a job/contract when needed. Still working full-time and been collecting Social Security since I met the age cap requirements.
Everyone's situation is likely unique, however, if you/anyone truly wants to do I-series work, it is out there. You may have to travel, or, take a rate that you feel is below your actual worth, either way, there is work out there. Lots of it.
Use the internet to your benefit and stop all the doom and gloom. If I can get work and perform as expected, and, at my advanced age, I'm sure that experience pays. Just find the right fit, no matter what the salary or rate is. Supply and demand is the name of the game and there is still a lot of demand.
IBM I-SERIES IS THE BEST THING THAT HAPPENED IN MYECAREER. MAYBE IT WILL GO AWAY AT SOME POINT, HOWEVER, YOU MAY STILL FIND SOME S-36 MODEL-D'S BEING USED. IBM EQUIPMENT WILL RUN FOREVER AND AS LONG AS IT DOES, IT WILL NEED PROGRAMMERS.
An ethereal optimist.
________________________________
From: Don <dr2@xxxxxxxx>
To: 'Consulting on the IBM i (AS/400 and iSeries)' <consult400@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, February 5, 2014 8:29 PM
Subject: Re: [Consult400] AS400/iseries/midrange/RPG experience no longer marketable?
Indeed.com is your friend. Best job aggregator out there.
iSeries(or whatever) jobs are getting predictably much harder to find, and
in some metro areas IMPOSSIBLE to find. Many iSeries shoppes have been told
"move to windows or go job hunting..."...but then, thanks to Gerstner, this
was predictable.
I HEAVILY suggest that if at all possible you find a way to retool.
Business analytics is a good option to look at. If you want to stay in the
programming realm, you're going to be programming in some variation of C,
java, python, php, etc... You may want to pickup R and python when you get
the time anyway as I have a feeling that they will be near term big players
in the data analytics realm...cognos and spss are IBM, yes, but...the world
is finally waking up to the reality that what's good for IBM isn't
necessarily best for them...
Good luck dude, you've joined a very big club of ex-iSeries'ers that are
having to retool and regroup...thanks to IBM...
-----Original Message-----
From: consult400-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:consult400-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of CRPence
Sent: Wednesday, February 5, 2014 6:40 PM
To: consult400@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [Consult400] AS400/iseries/midrange/RPG experience no longer
marketable?
On 05-Feb-2014 08:04 -0800, Robert Lancaster wrote:
<<SNIP>> now live in Salem, Oregon.
If anyone has any thoughts on the market, and/or suggestions on how I
can get back into programming after more than five years "on the
bench", I would greatly appreciate it.
There seems to be a dearth of IBM i in the PNW; I presume, supplanted
long ago by the MS tentacles from Redmond. Most mainframe work will be
COBOL instead of RPG, based on most anything I have read. Being in the
capital city, I would suggest to visit and talk with somebody with the state
employment agency, about what they can do to assist; i.e. a visit, as in
physical presence. As I recall [from job listings], the OR state DoJ uses
IBM i, but all positions [there and throughout OR state gov't] are
"represented" by the interests of those already employed by the state.
Given it is legal to volunteer for a government or non-profit [i.e. the
gov't grants only certain class of /business/ to profit from slavery much as
it does for discrimination], so that may be an option to get some experience
to appear on the resume, since the gap.
--
Regards, Chuck
--
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