Tech Job Market in Oregon? Thinking about moving without a job (Portland: house, salary)

[timn420]

I’ve been trying to find a job in Oregon for quite some time but it seems you have to be a local to be even considered.

I currently live in Arkansas and sold my house a few months ago. I have about 10 years experience in database development/programming and am considering moving to Oregon without a job in hand. I have enough money to live a off of for a year easily. I was wondering what the job situation looks like in the Tech industry around the Portland area and if the job market is good right now.

My other option is to move to Seattle, where I understand the Tech jobs are a little easier to come by. I still don’t know if I can get into the mindset to move without a job, but I’m just living with friends right now and it wouldn’t be too much to just go.

[wtg]

I can't speak for Oregon, but I made a similar move to Seattle without a job.

There are a lot of tech placement firms that place people in temporary-to-permanent assignments with the big companies (Microsoft, Amazon, etc) out there. If you go to Seattle, they should be your first stop. I spent months applying directly to companies with no luck; once I signed on with a placement firm, I was employed in no time.

[bluekoi777]

Yeah Oregons unemployment rate right now is at its absolute worst, even in bigger metro ares like portland. I would definatly try seattle first, if your flying by the seat of your pants. They do have some of the bigger companies, then maybe if you decide you dont like it. You could then look into the portland area.

[hamellr]

If you have Ruby or IOS skills, you'll have no problems what so ever. All my linkedin contacts who have those skills are constantly being contacted by recruiters.

If you don't have those skills, PDX is not the place to come too right now. I'd go to Seattle first.

[Random_Walk]

I can help a bit... I'm originally from Arkansas (Fayetteville), and am working tech out here in the PDX metro area. Not sure where you;re from, but I'll base my assumptions on my neck of the woods, which may help.

First and foremost, start hitting Monster.com, Dice.com, and even a few local ones to PDX that you may not know about (e.g. jobdango), and any job board you can think of with open positions out here. Get your resume out there and start taking calls. Also, start hitting up some of the local/regional Pacific NW recruiting agencies, such as Robert Half, CompuCom, ACS, and the like. Contacting the recruiters directly helps bypass the jobs board mills, and helps you find things more tailored to your needs and wants.

For tech jobs, you're in luck... there's still lots of them out here, with one caveat: you better have the skills that pay the bills. The largest employer in the state, Intel, hires on an almost continuous basis, but prefers to hire contract before converting you to full-time.

Some hints:

* The cost of living is way higher out here than in the Ozarks. If you're a mid-range code-monkey or admin, demand at least $75k, and anything that demands over 10 years' experience should have you demanding $85-90k or higher. Add $10-15k to that if you're a DBA, and $10-15k more if the words "Oracle" and "certified" sit in the same sentence. One of the mistakes I made in moving out here was in settling for a somewhat lower salary than the going rate in these parts (thinking I got a huge raise), and I was full-on angry once I found out what folks really pay out here. I quickly moved jobs and got a proper raise doing it, but I wasted 18 months at a lower rate that I really shouldn't have. What would be cozy for $45k in the Ozarks had better get you $95k out here.

* Most employers out here prefer to take you on as contract-to-hire, since it gives them time to figure out if they want to keep you around or not. Don't be afraid of it, and use it as a trial period to see if you want to stick around with a given company or not. However, take a good hard look at the company's financials and market before accepting a position (that, or you'd better start working on Plan B as soon as you've finished with orientation).

* Hope you have Linux skills. There are a few Windows-only shops out here, but any sysadmin out here w/o Linux skills (that isn't working for Microsoft) is going to find both his salary and options very limited.

* On the code side, C++, .NET, and Ruby (esp. Rails) are king. Python also features fairly prominently, as does Perl and various other languages, but options start slimming as you go down the list.

* Don't just shoot for Intel. You would be amazed at the number of places out here needing highly-skilled tech help.

That should be a good start.

Shout if anything pops to mind.

[Steve Pickering]

I disagree on Linux. It is touted by Microsoft Bashers, but Microsoft is still king and don't let any Linux guru convince you otherwise.

No need to shout at him as this is almost a five year old thread. If he has no job by now it is useless.

[Random_Walk]

Originally Posted by Steve Pickering

I disagree on Linux. It is touted by Microsoft Bashers, but Microsoft is still king and don't let any Linux guru convince you otherwise.

If your organization has any of the following, you'd better have the skills in Linux if you want to maintain it:

Oracle
VMWare ESXi, ESX (and as of v.5, vSphere no longer needs a Windows server)
NetApp
EMC
Cisco Nexus (10gE) switch gear

Oracle aside (which has its own distro), the rest runs on Linux exclusively now.

...and that's just the surface. Intel routinely packages its PDK (Product Dev Kits) in Linux VMs now (due to the need to provide a 'golden box' dev server without the licensing hassles).

No doubt there is still a majority Windows/Microsoft presence. On the other hand, it has diminished a lot over the years, and continues to do so... and anyone who would limit themselves to any one vendor is begging for unemployment.