Crunchbase.com – Insights on Companies and Potential Employers

This is in no way “the” only way to research potential employers and companies, but in all the years that I have been using Crunchbase.com, I’ve found the information on company profiles and key personnel to be valuable.

Here’s a typical example:

• Go to: www.crunchbase.com
• In the search field, type the name of the company you are researching about, then click on the Search button to the right. In the example below, I wanted to get more information about a company called, ‘Clorox‘:
• A search result list will appear. Click on the company information for Clorox (click the blue hyperlink on the word, Clorox to view company information):
  
• Details of the Clorox company, and related links:

  

• Some companies that have public records of investor funding are also available, such as the example below:

  

The information above tells me that, the example company was awarded a series of funds initially on 2005, and currently is funded for another $20 million, starting on year 2011. It is up to you to interpret the numbers and research additional, relevant information regarding the company. It is also up to you to determine if the potential employer is worth sending your resume to. Good luck with the job hunt!

 

Windows 8 Consumer Preview Test Drive

Windows 8 Consumer Preview Test Drive, a set on Flickr.

My test drive of Windows 8 Consumer Preview on an Acer One (model: ZG5) netbook. The screenshots were taken from a Mac OS X laptop (Lion 10.7.3), using a remote desktop connection to the netbook.

Company Profile Search Tip – Marketwatch

Disclaimer: This post is for informational purposes only, and should not be used for professional company research profiling.

Here’s a quick tip when looking up public company financial statistics:

• Go to Google.com
• To start off, let’s go through the following search example: On Google.com, type the following key words in the search field: “company profile microsoft marketwatch“(type it without the quotes!)
• A search result list will appear. Select the first search result, which may look similar to this:
• Click on the search result, then locate the section that says “At a Glance“, similar to this:

   

• Looking at this publicly available information, the company has about $70 billion in revenue, and that their last reported income is $23.15 billion. One would think, that the company may be doing well, and may indicate a steady increase in hiring.
• If a company is not doing well, one would infer, that a negative number in the Net Income and Revenue sections may mean that the company is experiencing a tight financial season.
• Note: The information provided is speculative, and should not be used for real-world job search criteria.

Apartment Multiple Search – Padmapper

Padmapper.com is a multi-site search of apartment and house rental listings, with filters that allow you to narrow down your next residential move. One of the unique features of Padmapper.com is its search filter option (available in the Super Secret Advanced Features section) that displays apartments that are within 20 minutes walking distance from your work place address.

Head over to Padmapper.com, (you do not even need to sign up for an account, unless you want to save your search history), and begin your search by entering an area that you want to live in. You can start by entering a zip code for a search parameter, or begin by entering a name of a city and state.

IT-Related Job Search Tools

DISCLAIMER: The salary projections from Payscale.com and living standards estimates from Salary.com, are not accurate, and do not represent real-world situations. Estimates from both sites are based on user submitted data. Real-world figures are based on your experience in a specific industry, skill set, and location. If you live in the United States, visit the Bureau of Labor Statistics site, which uses area wage survey data collected by the government. Note, that survey data from the government is dated, and may not reflect current salary and living standards data.

If you are an IT worker and in the market for job offers, consider a few (and largely free) tools to help with your next career move:

Check Average Hourly Rates/Salaries – Use Payscale.com to check for salaries for a future job.

Here’s an example search.

I want to search for Technology Support jobs in the Los Angeles area:

1. Go to www.payscale.com
2. Select Job Seeker and click on the red button for Continue
3. Enter an Expected Job Title – this field will automatically display the most common job titles related to your search. For this example, I chose Technical Support Specialist
4. Enter years of technical support experience
5. For Country, City, Sate/Province/Region, you can enter your current residence, or check salaries for different states or countries. You’ll be amazed at the estimates you’ll receive at the end of the report
6. You will be asked for three top critical skills related to your job title – enter your three top skills and strengths. You can enter more than three skills if you like. Hint: After entering a skill in the first field, click on the Add another Skills/Specialties link to continue adding more skills
7. You also have the opportunity to add your certifications
8. hit Next –>
9. Type of Employer – usually, I select Company in this field, unless you are planning to work for a government or non-profit group
10. For Employer’s Product/Business, you can enter the industry in which you want to work in, eg: Computing Solutions – Hardware
11. For education information, enter your school in the School You Attended field
12. Enter a Major, then a degree, and the year you graduated
13. Want to see your Payscale profile? Click on No thanks… just show my salary report
14. Click on the Continue button at the bottom one last time. Payscale will now display your job seeker profile
15. If you are seeking to become an hourly employee at your next work place, you may see a graph similar to this one: 
16. Let’s read more into the graph above: the average hourly rate for a Technical Support Specialist position in Los Angeles, with ## years of experience, skills, years in the industry, and other factors, earns about $22.25 per hour. The lowest reported hourly wage is $15.86, and the highest reported hourly wage is $30.87 per hour. Tip: If you are about to write a cover letter and submit your resume via e-mail, you may want to use this feature of Payscale.com to negotiate a starting hourly rate
17. If you are looking to fill a full time, annually salaried position, click on the Salary link to the right to see an estimated annual salary range: 
18. Let’s read into this scenario a little bit more (see the annual, Salary graph below). As an annual employee for a company in Los Angeles, under the role of Technical Support Specialist, the lowest reported annual salary offered by a company is $34,119 annually. What does this mean? It means that whoever reported this salary to Payscale.com, was offered an annual salary of $34,119 – but note, that some companies will have different budgets, needs, support structures, and environments, which will vary greatly from the estimates you will receive on Payscale.com. The average annual salary for this role is $51,027, and the highest reported annual salary is $73,310.

Check and Compare Standards of Living for two Locations using Salary.com

Salary.com helps you plan your next career move if you are planning to move out of your current residence. In the following example, we will compare the standard of living at my current area against a target area.

I currently live in Los Angeles, and I want to compare the standards of living between Los Angeles and Tacoma. Here we go…

1. Use Salary.com’s Cost of Living Wizard to begin
2. Enter your starting annual salary (use Payscale.com’s tool above to convert your hourly rate into an annual salary figure)
3. For Present Location, and under Home, I chose California – Los Angeles, and for Work, I chose California – Long Beach
4. For New Location, I want to move to Tacoma, and I chose Washington – Tacoma for Home, and plan to work in Washington – Seattle
5. Click on Calculate at the bottom
6. A side-by-side bar chart will be displayed, summarizing the differences in cost of living between your current area, and an area in which you plan to move into. The interesting information from this result is that, in order to maintain your standard of living in Los Angeles, you would need to earn, at a minimum, an annual salary of $52,449. This suggests that you should not accept any job offers below the annual minimum of $52,449 in Seattle: 

How Valuable is it to be Certified?

This site breaks down salary reports by certification level (year 2010 data)

Do you have any tools that you would like to share for job hunting and career planning? Leave a comment.

Buy a Mac, or a PC?

Do you have trouble deciding which type of computer to buy?

From personal and work experience, I have learned that this question is best answered by answering these three basic questions:

1. How much can I afford?
2. Will my printer, camera, or fax machine work on a Mac or a PC?
3. Does the software I use everyday work on a Mac or a PC?

I am sure there are other things to consider, but by honestly answering the three questions above, you will be able to make an enlightened decision.

Want to get started?

For Mac computers, start with the Apple Store

For Windows computers, check out Dell, HP, ASUS, Samsung, Toshiba, Lenovo (IBM)

– Ken