You just never know who might turn up from your past...
1999: I was a sysadmin at an ISP in Austin. One day we had a tour come through, people looking to see if they wanted to colo in our datacenter. In walks in the former CEO and most of the technical staff from the Oklahoma City-based ISP I'd started my career at and left in '96. We laughed, shook hands.. and they headhunted me away a couple months later with a 200% salary increase for their new Austin-based startup.
2015: interviewing for a remote sysadmin position at a firm in California. They knew of me through some mailing lists I've run for a couple of decades. A couple of interviews in, I mention that I'd need to get off early on Thursdays to attend Lodge as I was a Freemason. Turns out two other execs interviewing me were also Masons. It certainly didn't hurt my job prospects.. And then after I started the CEO
asked "Weren't you mr_bill on efnet #unix IRC in the 90s?" I gulped and said "Yeah..." and he said "Cool! I was on there too..."
And, at my current job, after I got hired, my team lead said "Yeah, (other coworker) said you were cool and said you'd fit in well here..." - turns out the other coworker was another EFNet IRC buddy that I'd never met in person..
So, never lie about a contact or reference and never burn bridges if you can avoid it - you never know when someone from your past may be in a position to influence your future.
1999: I was a sysadmin at an ISP in Austin. One day we had a tour come through, people looking to see if they wanted to colo in our datacenter. In walks in the former CEO and most of the technical staff from the Oklahoma City-based ISP I'd started my career at and left in '96. We laughed, shook hands.. and they headhunted me away a couple months later with a 200% salary increase for their new Austin-based startup.
2015: interviewing for a remote sysadmin position at a firm in California. They knew of me through some mailing lists I've run for a couple of decades. A couple of interviews in, I mention that I'd need to get off early on Thursdays to attend Lodge as I was a Freemason. Turns out two other execs interviewing me were also Masons. It certainly didn't hurt my job prospects.. And then after I started the CEO asked "Weren't you mr_bill on efnet #unix IRC in the 90s?" I gulped and said "Yeah..." and he said "Cool! I was on there too..."
And, at my current job, after I got hired, my team lead said "Yeah, (other coworker) said you were cool and said you'd fit in well here..." - turns out the other coworker was another EFNet IRC buddy that I'd never met in person..
So, never lie about a contact or reference and never burn bridges if you can avoid it - you never know when someone from your past may be in a position to influence your future.