On Sat, 15 Apr 2006 16:56:00 -0400, Scott Gates <[log in to unmask]>

>
>
> Hello.
>
> I've been going on two years on the sidelines.  Been trying desperately
> to re-start a career. I'm willing to start at the bottom--where there
> are plenty of jobs, or even in the middle, where there nearly none. I'm
> NOT really suited to management.
>
> ... Mostly I get dumb looks--you have PLENTY of education. In
> otherwords, "No, you'll STILL BE OVERQUALIFIED".
> ...
>
> Does anyone else have suggestions?
>

The problem is that you really are at the top, albeit in within a narrow
band of professional competence.  Businesses have many more hierarchies
than the simple 3-tier bossman, ubertechie, and makeelearnee.  Your
experience and education thus marks you as a potential threat to most
middle ranker, up-and-coming management types.  Few people possess the
self-confidence to admit a potential rival for authority into their
society.

Your difficulty is that you are dealing with people that; 1. consciously
or unconsciously fear the problems that your experience might pose to
their authority if you are hired; 2. Possibly see you as a potential
morale problem for the other bright young sparks that they prefer, who if
exposed to you may have occassion to wonder, "If this can happen to him
then why can it not happen to me?"   Thus, you are "overqualified" in
terms of potential for sowing discord.

Past your mid to late-thirties there are not many options really.  You can
continue to hunt for work in your field at a level that you find
comfortable, with apparently dismal results.  You can start your own
business, usually outside of the profession in which you have spent your
life and at considerable risk of failure unless you have a consuming
passion for whatever you choose to do.  Or, you can become a volunteer
with one or more organizations that would love to have your skills put at
their disposal.

The last approach can prove fruitful in that it may provide you with
opportunities to meet people that you will never get to speak to in a
formalized job interview.  Many volunteers in the administrative side of
organizations are frequently in positions of some influence in their
companies.  Over the years I have served as a volunteer alongside
vice-presidents, controllers, and senior managers of some of Canada's
largest companies in not-for-profit organizations that charitably only
could be described as "obscure."   You probably won't run into Bill Gates
but, if you make a useful contribution at the administrative level and
display some of your skills to that audience and let your desire for work
be known then you may discover that there is more opportunity to find
permenant employment than you might expect.

Of course, you need to research potential volunteer organizations as
throughly as you would a potential employeer.  You need to find a couple
that have board members that could conceievably assist you if they so
desired.  The organizations must have a need that you can satisfy, even if
they do not recognize it yet.  You will probably have to get involved with
more than one group. And, it may not work in any case.

I wish you the best of luck.

Sincerely
Jim

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