Let me give you some history. On Labor Day, 2009, I came home and talked to Dave about moving. He's not been a big fan of Cincinnati for a while now. But that day I realized I didn't want to live here for very long, either. Over dinner we talked about wanting to move somewhere we could call home. We listed our top three cities of Nashville, Dallas and Atlanta and decided to move withing three to five years. Neither one of us was pulling for Atlanta, so it quickly fell off the list. By Christmas we decided we wanted to move in the beginning of 2011. I get fully vested in P&G's profit sharing (aka "golden handcuffs") on November 16, 2010 so that date was driving the timeline. By late May 2010 we decided we would start looking for new jobs now. I got news at work that I wouldn't be promoted until around December. I didn't want to stay at P&G another six months later to prove myself at that level before another company would want me/I felt comfortable leaving. So I called Dave from work right after my meeting with my boss and said, "are you ready to start looking?" And he of course said, "YES!" On the way home from work I called the four headhunters I keep in touch with and my two friends at Frito Lay to start the ball rolling. By the Tuesday after Memorial Day we had our resumes out on the internet and in the hands of headhunters and friends. We'll just try and negotiate the profit sharing I'm losing into my new contract if I end up leaving before November 16.
Dave and I are interested in the same kind of work - with consumer products goods companies. I like the brand management side and he is interested in consumer research. We are applying for jobs in both cities. Here is an update on our job progress:
- Mars Petcare. Mars is located in Nashville. Both Dave and I are working with headhunters for these jobs, so we don't have a ton of detail here. I heard back from my headhunter that I should know whether or not the company is interested in my just after July 4th. I don't Dave has heard anything back from his headhunter yet, but he started the process a couple weeks after I did through his headhunter. Dave did drive down to Nashville two weeks ago to meet a Notre Dame alumnus for lunch who works in Marketing at Mars. Unfortunately the guy wasn't very helpful. So it's a waiting game right now with this company.
- Frito Lay. We have both applied for jobs at Frito Lay in Plano (just outside of Dallas). I am applying for a Marketing Manager position (level under a brand manager but above my current position of Assistant Brand Manager). Dave applied for a job in Insights, their consumer research group. Dave has had a ton of success here. He's had two phone interviews and both interviewers recommended to HR that Dave come down to Plano for on site interviews. In fact, Dave has already sent his availability to the HR guy to schedule the visit. I'm a different story. Apparently Frito Lay is just as backed up in promoting people in brand management right now as P&G. So they had to get special permission to interview me because I'm coming in from the outside. The HR guy and my friend Carrie mentioned they had to decide if Frito Lay would take the risk in the fallout of hiring me versus someone who is waiting to get promoted from the inside. I am supposed to have my first phone interview this coming week. Please keep your fingers crossed!
- Hostess Brands. Yes, I applied for a brand manager job of bread. Funny, huh? I noticed the posting on a site called indeed.com. It's a great site, by the way. You just type in what keywords/position you want and the city. It shows a list of all the jobs out there on all sites - so compiles the available jobs in one place. Very convenient. Anyway, I noticed the Hostess Brands job posting, read the description, and thought it was a good fit. I applied that night through the company's website. I got an email the next day asking for my resume again (not sure what happened - but I know the guy could see it because he mentioned he went to Notre Dame, too). The HR guy called me on Thursday and scheduled an interview for Monday at 11am.
At the very earliest we may be gone by Labor Day weekend. We are doing some work on the house to make it presentable (finishing the basement, landscaping), but aren't going overboard.
That's it for now. I'm creating my "Cincinnati Bucket List" which mostly consists of places I want to eat before we go. If anyone is interested in visiting before Labor Day, come on!
