

Ask HN: Having few employable skills and only 1 mo of savings left? - ssylee

Thought it may be appropriate here, as there must have been startup founders who are close to that situation.
Here's the context. It's not for myself, but a friend who's in this situation right now.<p>&#60;p&#62;He graduated with an applied physics bachelor's degree 2 years ago. He's had some instrumentation design and support experience, but it's not like these skills are sought after much here (after all, most of it is outsourced to Foxconn these days), and these kinds of jobs are unlikely to be landed quickly. He can drive. He's had some C, C++, and Matlab programming experience, but there isn't much of these opportunities these days. Even if they do show up, he probably can't beat out the competition from various experience levels for the job vacancy. He has only 1 month of runway left.&#60;p&#62;What would you do in his shoes? Glad to hear your suggestions. Thanks in advance.
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technojuicy
You say he's had _some_ experience, which doesn't seem to convey something
that can be applied to a job. Ruby programmers are high in demand, and some
companies even offer bootcamps. I recommend he check those out.

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debacle
Get in contact with a recruiter and be willing to move anywhere in the
country. If he finds a good recruiter he'll have a job in two weeks.

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NonEUCitizen
Since he knows C / C++ / Matlab, he should be able to find a job.

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ssylee
Why do you think that's the case?

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NonEUCitizen
The more difficult the tools he knows (and in the case of Matlab, you actually
need to know math to make real use of it), the less competition there is. For
C/C++, at the very least he can look into Embedded Systems, where you do need
to know C/C++.

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Mz
He can probably extend the runway a bit by swallowing his pride and looking
into getting some free or cheap food from programs in the area, having a yard
sale, etc. One food program found in a lot of areas requires a few bucks and 2
hours per month of volunteer work. I don't think they ask any info about your
finances. (Maybe someone other than me can remember the name.)

If he happens to be in San Diego, I am familiar with some of the services
here.

Best of luck.

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voxx
build something as fast as possible and find a vc.

