Well, Whats your job?

[Madison]

I am now working as a 'Search Engine Marketing Specialist,' or so my business cards say, for a leading sort of online retailing company. We're in a niche market, I guess.

I can't say more only because the program I'm working on is still in development, both at my company and within the industry, and could risk sharing more information about what we're doing -- or that we're doing it at all -- when I'm not really meant to.

Now, I'm helping to develop and launch the product by working with a core team of management to identify what resources are needed to make it work effectively, what processes ought to be followed, and what metrics we should use to measure success. My work will become the basis for the work done by all who follow me. It's exciting to think that my weird work habits are going to drive someone crazy in six month's time.

Essentially, I develop and manage advertising campaigns that run as sponsored search listings for search engines such as Google and Yahoo!. I write the advertising text and monitor its performance, testing and adjusting as I go along to get the largest return on investment possible.

Fancy, huh?

[Matt_Kaplan1902]

My last two years of high school I worked at the local ice cream store (Larry's--best ice cream in the world) and now in college I work at QuikDrop. It is an eBay drop off store, so I basically am putting up auctions all day, and we take out a percentage of the sale. It is pretty cool because I am doing something new everyday (I've sold everything from a set of Disney pins to a Limo).

[Wetzel]

I babysat to start.
My first 'real' job was a holiday "fluffer and folder" at Lord and Taylor. It was my job to make everything look neat and pretty during the holiday season. I worked well enough (and some guy just stopped showing up) that they moved me to receiving. I unloaded trucks and distributed merchandise around the store as well as any other "special projects" management came up with. I worked there for 2 years while I finished high school.

My next job was as a music seller at Barnes and Noble.

After this I started as a full time college student.
After that, I worked for a small computer company. I mostly drove around the metropolitan DC area picking up broken computers/returning them, or delivering large amounts of computers to schools. I got to drive a forklift there.
Now I work for Loudoun-Fairfax Ambulance, and drive people places when they need to go by ambulance. Hospital->hospital or hospital->nursing home.


Wetzel

[Mark McLeod]

It's kind of fun thinking again about all the jobs you've had.

• Candy/drink stand (2 years) (don’t laugh I made a lot of money for an 8 year-old. I financed my older brother's first car.)
• 3 newspaper delivery routes (4 years)
• Page at the city library (4 years)
• Night shift at Jack-in-the-box (1 summer)
• Technical Director for a blackbox summer theater (2 summers)
• Grumman - Systems programmer/designer/architect, engineering manager
• Northrop Grumman – Manager:Real-Time Simulation Laboratory, Manager:Cyber Warfare Integration Network (25 years total)

[Danny Diaz]

I started out in fast food as well, working at Hardee's cooking up fried chicken (back before they were bought by Carl's Jr. when they served fried chicken). I agree with Billfred 100%, you really understand what people go through on the opposite side of the counter.

In college I was fortunate enough to work at the Georgia Tech Research Institute with a brilliant researcher on millimeter wave Rotman Lens antennas, neural networks, and radar simulation software.

Once I got my CmpE degree from Georgia Tech, I came to work in Austin, Texas at National Instruments. Here I develop platform abstraction libraries for drivers and the real-time ethernet drivers.

-Danny

[Jay H 237]

My first job was at a small local body shop cleaning and detailing vehicles before they were returned to the customers. I also moved the vehicles around getting them ready to go into the shop, leave the shop and keeping the vehicles in the fenced in storage lot. They kept me doing this because I was one of the few they had that had no problems driving a standard including a "three on the tree" (I learned to drive on a standard plus my first 2 cars were standard). Between doing that they gave me other odd jobs to do including keeping the supplies stocked and making sure as all the replacement parts came in they went to the proper vehicle. It was fun getting to drive all the different vehicles and machinery that came in. They would even repaint UPS trucks and construction machinery.

My second job was doing cabinetry and furniture. I built cabinets and furniture and did repairs on these pieces. Some of this was on the road. I would drive one of the companys Dodge vans to do installs or repairs at the customers houses or if the pieces were small enough bring them back to the shop if other work was required. Most of the work was where the money was, the southwestern part of CT, and New York city. This required a good part of my day as travel time plus trying to find parking for a 15 passenger Ram van in Manhattan was even more fun.

My third job, where I've been for the past 6+ years, is Wittmann, Inc (formally Wittmann Robot and Automation). The company is based in Vienna, Austria and makes robots and automation systems for the plastic injection molding industry. We can supply everything except a molding machine. We bought out and now own Nucon (material handling, located in Toronto, Canada), CMB (granulators, located near Paris, France), and Capitol Temptrol (tempature control units). It's a multi-national company now. We sell products and do installations around the world. I do mostly assembly and shipping but at times I have gone into the field for service and also done trade shows (Chicago! )
I should also mention (so no one gets confused ) we don't make the actual parts that are molded, rather we make, install, and service the robots and automation systems (conveyors, shuttles, hoppers, ect) that are used to make the parts. As examples we did systems for the lids for Columbo yogurt with the spoon in them, the front grille assembly for the Chevy Avalanche, and Motorola cell phone skins. Today I was working on a conveyor for a large medical supplier. I won't say who the company is but as a hint I can tell you that one of the mentors from Who'sCTEKS (716) works for them.

[Veselin Kolev]

Past 3 years: worked at Hartco Machining Tooling Prototype. Basically, a machine shop job where I use things like welders, CNC mills, and lathes.

Past 1 year: materials science R&D for Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Our work requires working with injection molding, CNC fabrication, and *oh no* microfabrication, electroplating, lithography, and all sorts of other nasty stuff. My stuff: microfluidics. The final goal of our group's R&D: credit card sized microfliudic chips that can be used for micrototal analysis aka electrophoresis, separations, dna polymerization, etc...

[skimoose]

High School worked for a now defunct grocery chain unloading trucks and stocking shelves.

College apprentice electrician and apprentice lineman. Passed my tests and hold licenses in both still.

After college worked for an additional year as lineman before an engineering position opened up. Now 16 years (Wow am I the only guy who found a place to work that I liked! ) Distribution Engineer for local Municipal Electric Utility. Design electric distribution systems and developer on our GIS (Geographic Information System).

The nice thing about working at one place a long time, I'll retire at 52 (full pension) to start another career!

[coreyjon]

Alright, I'll play.

high school/college
-radio shack
-target
-price chopper produce

Currently:

USAF Heavy Flight Crew Chief LC-130H - When I get back home it'll be Operation: Deep Freeze.

I still get to play with other jets like f-16s and stuff, thats cause I'm still in training, my class room is a combination of hangers, and flight line. I still have 6 months to go before I get my degree, and get unleashed, I mean, graduate and go home.

Being in the Air Force, I get to play with some cool technology. The down side, I pretty much miss the entire FIRST season this year, but - "I'll be back".

[Mini-D67]

In the mornings I work at a smaller resturaunt for a few hours getting the kitchen ready to open, then at night I run food at a bigger resturaunt. Both are owend by the same people... I make $10 an hour at the small place and $7.50 an hour + tips at the big one ( usually works out to around $11-13 an hour ); all under the table!

the money is good, but my life is uber hectick at times : Work from 9-11am, go to classe from 12am-4pm, go back to work from 5pm-10pm... urg I dont know how I find time to do anything fun anymore, lol

[Katie Reynolds]

Hopefully, I'll be interning at a zoo around here this summer, as an animal care-taker. Cross your fingers for me! Here's a list of past (and current) jobs:

11/05-Present ... Steve & Barry’s (Head Cashier) ... It's an alright job. I don't really agree with some of the corporate policies, but they're not enough to make me leave. I need the money so I work here.

09/05-Present ... Michigan Tech Fund (Fundraiser) ... Again, cool job but the hours weren't so great. We only worked Monday-Thursday from 6-10 pm. I have FIRST related meetings on both Wednesday and Thursday nights, so I could only work 8 hours per week. Not enough. I still call if I have a free evening, though.

05/05-08/05 ... Petco (Sales Associate) ... This was a cool job, and I'll be working here over Christmas break, unless I stay in Houghton for the summer. I love talking to people about animals and love pets - it just fits.

12/04–07/05 ... American Eagle (Sales Associate) ... I *loved* working here. Unfortunately, the 20 hours/week they promised me this summer turned out to be 5 hours per week of unpaid "on call shifts".

03/04–10/04 ... Orbis Corporation (Temporary Employee) ... My dad is the head of engineering at Orbis' corporate office, and they needed someone to check about 3,000 plastic totes for defects. Then I filled in as secretary for a few days and wound up typing in orders for an extra month. I quite because I was bored to tears, and my boss (who wasn't my dad) was not at all understanding that I couldn't work the convential 9-5 every day, because I was also attending a community college.

10/01-01/04 ... Sears (Sales Associate/Cashier) ... I left this job only because my family had to move, because my dad was promoted (see above). I liked this job, and everyone thought it was cute that my at-the-time-boyfriend and I worked for the same company, even though it was in two completely diffent places.

10/00-10/01 ... Copps Food Center (Bagger) ... Scheduling issues. I was offered a job at Sears that paid more money and had better hours.

09/00-10/00 ... Print Shop (T-shirt Printer/Bagger/Shipper) ... This job, well, sucked. My shift was cancelled because there were only 4 people who could work it, and 3 people were needed to run the equipment. So if two people couldn't work, the shift had to be cancelled.

[Al Skierkiewicz]

I started in 3rd grade delivering fruits and veggies from the back of a truck. (can you believe people actually bought food from traveling vendors in the alley.)
Had paper routes through high school. Started working as stockboy in an auto parts store at 15, Delco, Mopar and small engine parts.
Worked at Switchcraft in the final production stockroom and saw manufacturing up close. Learned how good switches and connectors are different from the cheap stuff and got to see metal plating operations and large scale machine shops up close.
Summers in college I worked for a TV manufacturing plant, learned to drive fork trucks, speak a little spanish, and how to read people. This was my first realization that saying "I can do that!" can you get you somewhere.
During college I worked for the A/V dept which eventually became Peoria Public TV and the Central Illinois ITFS (educational to schools) broadcaster. Here I learned that time isn't the same everywhere and the only clock that mattered was in Sister Mary's classroom in Mendota.
When I graduated, I had several job offers from TV stations in Chicago but took a job at Chicago Public TV WTTW, where I have been ever since. I have been lucky to be part of an award winning organization and part of a team that produced the longest running music show (Soundstage), developed stereo for TV in the US and became the first TV station to broadcast in stereo on a regular basis. We developed a lot of equipment to handle audio that wasn't available at the time. I work in Electronic Maintenance and Design and I am responsible for the quality of our audio broadcasts. I also repair, install, test and align equipment and design facilities for new equipment use. I am proud to work with a great bunch of people. While I have been here I have also been active in my union, I.B.E.W. Local 1220, as a steward and President.

[coreyjon]

After high school, during college, and before the air force when I was caught in a kinda , "What do I want" struggle, I actually worked for a company called T&J Electric, as an A1 through the IBEW because i kinda thought that was what I wanted (I honestly didn't know what I wanted at the time, even though I thought I did). It was an awesome job (and payed well too), and I learned a lot from the summer. But like my other post says, USAF Crew chief, probably end up in the inspection dock when I get back to my base, ripping the day lights out of c-130's. At the same time (I'm ANG) I'll be returning to college, I was thinking RIT, but now I'm thinking about Embry Riddle. (been there before, and it is the best college when it comes to Aerospace Engineering).

[lukevanoort]

Well, I just got my first job working for Shodor foundation. It doesn't pay great, but watching the looks on my classmates when I say that I work for a company that develops college curriculum resources is priceless. They're pretty cool, since the origninal source for the name was Short Dorky Foundation, after the founder. I also volunteer at a nearby elementary tutoring kids in reading.

[David Kelly]

Rolls-Royce Corporation
Indianapolis, IN

Helicopter & Small Gas Turbine Engines business unit
T800 Customer Support
Engine Tracking System administrator (web based field tracking system) and project developer

Provide support to foreign military customers all over the world.