Applying for the recently posted USA Today jobs

Seems there's some activity there:

http://www.sportsjournalists.com/forum/posts/3350571/

So, does the view that everyone applying for these is stepping over corpses, matter? Or is that a quaint notion from back when layoffs were less common?

Does it matter how one secures a solid job these days? Should the new applicants spend a lot of time worrying about the recent bloodletting at USA Today?

I don't do the newspaper thing anymore, but I probably would have applied for these jobs just for fun back when I was still in the newspaper world.

Not even sure I would have felt bad about it. Probably would have given lip service here, of course. But in the end, should it matter how one finds a way to advance their own career and feed their family?

 

My question to you is are suggesting that people should bypass or boycott these USA Today openings because of all the people that have been let go? I say get your head out of your ass and get a whiff of what is really going on out here my friend. If anyone is smart they have dusted off their resumes and cover letters and got them in quickly. It's hard out of here for all of us journalists these days so you take your opportunities when or whenever they come. I feel for those people who were let go but these jobs are going to be filled by someone so why not you or me. My only concern these days is I'm just not willing to relocate anymore for this uncertain newspaper businesss.

 

The question assumes that everyone who applies for these openings knows what happened to create them. The SJ regulars would, of course, and others would, but not everyone. Irrelevant example: When I got my last job, I didn't know until my first day that they had forced three people in the department to reapply for their jobs, and that I was replacing one of them. At that point I was unemployed for 18 months, so whatever empathy I had for the person whose job I now had was more than overcome by the sheer relief of having a job.

I mean, I guess it'd be nice in the abstract to rise up with fists and refuse to even entertain the notion of applying for a job that opened up because of layoffs or forced resignation or compulsory reapplication. But it's hard to limit yourself in an already contracting job pool, especially if you're out of a job.

 

Good point, but one that has been going on for a couple of years.

Anyone working at a Gannett design or editing hub, or who is doing Tribune modules and Hartford and Newport News pages in Chicago, or who is working at a centralized desk anywhere can be said to be stepping on corpses.

I left a job at a place where design/editing was soon to be outsourced and went to a hub that is producing three newspapers from one location.

Did I step on a corpse? Dunno. But I do know that had my old place offered me a 12-year, no-layoff contract that would have gotten me to age 62, I never would have left.

 

My words were clear.

I made no such suggestion.

 

If you're desperate for a job, then apply. If your financial circumstances are such that you can stand on your principles, then don't.

But if they do hire you, rent, don't buy.

 

It's like coaches applying for a vacancy when another coach gets fired. I can guarantee you that near the end of every season, there are plenty of coaches watching the landscape, waiting to see what openings come available. And when a plum job comes open, they pounce. Has nothing to do with feelings for the poor sap who just got canned.

 

If you didn't go for jobs at papers where people have lost their jobs, kind of limits your options, no?

 

What he said.

Every company at some point in its history has laid off employees. If you're limiting your job search to companies who have never laid off a single employee, good luck.

 

My hesitation in many of this situations is that I don't want to put myself in a situation where I could get let go for little reason (other than salary) in a year or so.

There are a number of decent Lee jobs out there, but after the way they laid waist to the staff at the local paper, I have to wonder if there's any benefit at all or any long-term hope.

If they are hiring, they should have kept the people who were working for them. Of course, there's littl eloyalty left.

 

Or at the very least, don't uproot your family. We have no idea how long Gannett will give Beusse and Morgan before they get cold feet about this whole thing. They seem to be expecting a miracle.