Job Search Methods

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As a follow-up to my post entitled "Free Job Search Advice Links (tips, hints and more)", I thought it would be helpful to others if I listed some Job search methods that can be used.

First, some stories, then the links and stuff
Note: Everyone will tell you that finding people at your target companies is at least 4 (and as much as 8) times more effective than applying online. You want to get to the decision makers. These methods are ways of doing that. They recommend spending far more time on these types of efforts than on submitting your resume into online job listing sites (which many refer to as the "Black hole").

I had interviews with 5 companies, 3 of them came from recruiters who found me through searching LinkedIn and finding my profile. I believe what I've been told that being more active on LinkedIn and making sure you have keywords in your profile are a big help. I believe that is why these recruiters found me. I was making posts quite often: usually every working day of the week at prime internet times and using #hastags to draw attention to them. Also, make sure you change your settings to say if you are actively looking (and this flag is automatically reset after some time, so check it every few weeks).

The other two companies I had interviews with came from relationships I started and nurtured. Once came from when LinkedIn gave me the name of a recruiter who posted a job I applied to. Although, that perticular job didn't work out, I followed up often with that recruiter and we had several phone calls. Eventually they got to know me and helped me gain an interview for another position I saw that they posted. The other came from a technical meeting with that company. There are many meetups on Meetup.com and other sites that you can attend and build real strong relationships with people.

It's important to remember to be reciprocal and offer help to these people who are helping you.

1. Network with a focus
1. Network with generosity, giving, and listening.
2. The goal is to find (and develop) folks to be advocates and champions for you. Sometimes you'll find people that you never knew before will help you a lot.
3. Meet with people - preferably face-to-face for coffee or lunch. If you can't meet in person, then talk on the phone. Asking for a job isn't always going to help them to be successful in helping you. Ask for something that they can successfully help you with.
4. Ask them for job search advice and referrals to other people you can meet for job search advice. You can say "I know you're a successful person, can you introduce me to other successful people that I can meet with and explain my career goals and hear about theirs"
5. Go to Networking meetings, meetup groups - make valuable introductions, listen to their needs first and ask questions. Provide a paper that shows the parameters of your search (where, when, what, goal, target companies). Offer to help them in some way. Follow up with them.
6. Connect to people who you usually meet: neighbors, churches, charitible organizations, volunteering activities, the gym, the barber/hairdresser, grocery store
7. Go to Meetup.com events to find people with like interests or hobbies. Or, find a technical or business group in meetup.com - you may even find that a target employer has meetup events
8.  Reach out to people you have worked with before. Do they have a contact at a particular customer you want to contact? Do they have contact information?
2. Connect to people on linkedin - 
1. You can search for people at your target company who are doing what you are looking for or manage those roles. Always include a personallized message when inviting them to connect.
2. Lisa Rangel suggests you can send a message along the lines of "In the spirit of networking, I hope you will agree to connect with me" - then, once you are connected, ask them questions and offer to help them. You can ask about getting together for coffee or lunch. You can ask about the company culture or how to find connectiions there. 
3. Try making a connection with HR folks in your target companies. If you can get an advocate there, then you'll have help to get to a position.
4. Make connections with recruiters and talk to them on a regular basis
5. Post information (use hashtags) on LinkedIn, Comment and share articles, "like" posts to that you are more active. I've heard that this puts you higher in search rankings when recruiters look for people.
6.  Update your LinkedIn profile with keywords that recruiters would look for to find you (you can find these keywords in job descriptions you are interested in. You can also look for people who are in positions you are looking for and see what makes their LinkedIn profiles great. Do the same types of things with your own profile.
7. Use LinkedIn groups to contact people with similar interests and goals (by industry, professional affiliation, professional groups, hobbies). Post and comment on articles in these groups.
8. NEW 2019-03-21: A friend told me that when he found a job he was interested in, he looked on linkedin and found 2 dozen people at that one company. He either sent them email (if it was on their profile) or sent them a nicely worded invitation to connect and told him he applied to the particular job and asked for them to put in a good word for him and forward his resume. One of the people forwarded his resume to the hiring manager and he was hired!
3.  Contact recruiters (internal to companies and external, like executive recruiters): remember, they are working for the companies who seek applicants, they don't work for you. But, you can search linkedin for recruiters who have positions you are interested in.
1. optional: find recruiters that work with the companies you are targetting -use a LinkedIn search to find them.
2. You can use searchfirm.com to find recruiters
3. 2019-06-20 I just heard from someone that they use LinkedIn.com to search for recruiters and reach out to them (write a customer request to join).
4. Letter writing campaign - find people in the target company who would be the hiring manager for the position you are interested in. Ask people you are connected to in the target company for contacts or use google or LinkedIn to find these perspective hiring managers. Or, better yet, aim high to get someone at a level above your position to advocate for you. Send these people a postal letter, fedex, or USPS Priority mail explaining how you can help them. Tell them who you are in addition to what you can do for them. Tell something unique about yourself (maybe a hobby or volunteer work) and how it relates to your business strength. tell them how you differentiate yourself. Tell them you'll follow up in a week or two. Do that follow-up (find their phone number, email or use LinkedIn inmail). Ask for a meeting. Tell them that you're a successful professional as they are and you'd like to get to know each other by meeting.
5. Unemployment or employement offices in your state might have services you can use. Also, if you attended college, many colleges provide help.
6. Volunteer: By volunteering to do work you will gain people who know you, see your quality of work, see how you treat people, and want to be your champion.
7.  Look at eventbrite, meetup, or other places for events your target company might hold (or that people from those companies might attend). Attend and speak with people. Ask for follow-up meetings to get to know each other.
8. Direct Connections and Circle the Hiring Manager (2019-06-10 New addition) :  After identifying your target companies to work for, make connections with many people who would interface with the hiring manager for a position there. Do a google search (or linkedin search) for the probable title of the hiring manager for a position you would want in your target company (it doesn't have to be a posted position).  Look in LinkedIn for people connected to that hiring manager, or search for titles of people who would work with them (those who would manage them, those they would collaborate with, those they would manage). Make contact with them (search for their contact info) and ask for some time to get their input on the type of work you're interested in. Meet in person or on the phone. Continue this process until you have spent time with everyone near to the hiring manager. Eventually, you will be able to make contact with the hiring manager by using these people to introduce you.
9. The "Two Hour Job Search" - see https://2hourjobsearch.com/ - Steve Dalton also posts in Huffington Post.  
10. Informational Interviews. Here's an article about them:  https://www.shimmeringcareers.com/blog/job-interview-preparation-informational-interview/
11. Referrals:  see https://cultivatedculture.com/how-to-get-a-job-anywhere-no-connections/
 

If you know of other methods, please reply here with your comments!

 

 

The Value of Networking During the Holidays

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Today I attended the CIT networking event.  I sat in on a discussion led by Marty Latman (career coach and consultant) about networking.

 He said that there are several reasons why it's good to keep networking during the holidays. I've also added a few that I've heard before.

• People want to talk and get together at this time of the year.
• People are generous at this time of the year.
• You can usually find higher level people at their offices. Since many people are out, it's easier to get in touch with higher level people. The "gate keepers" are out on holiday.
• You usually find people have more time. People are not as busy at work.
• You have less "competition" because many people are not thinking about networking at this time of the year.

Here are some of the tips that he mentioned (and some related ones I've heard before). I've numbered them so you can refer to them, but these are not in any particular order.

1. The holidays are a good time to rejuvinate your network.  Reach out to someone you haven't spoken to in a while. Wish them a Happy Holiday and ask to get together to reconnect.
2. Send out holiday greetings: mail, email, ecards - This gets you back on people's minds. They will be happy that you are thinking of them.
3. Call people on the phone and catch up on things
4. If someone looks at your linkedin profile, send them a message telling them you saw that they viewed your profile and ask if there is anything you can help them with.
5. If someone connects, send them a message to welcome them and ask them why and if there is anything you can do to help them.
6.   Look at your resume and write down the names of people you worked with. Then, try to contact them. 
7. When you ask someone for help, ask for something that they can be successful at. Don't just ask them for a job or work or to sign up for your services. Ask them for something they can be successful at, like giving you a reference, some information, or advice. Then, they can feel good that they helped you. Be very specific too! Don't just say I am looking for work. What type of work? Or, if you want a contact, tell what type of contact.
8. People who you wouldn't think would help you (sometimes people you didn't know), might be the ones who help you the most. And, sometimes those who you think would help, don't help you. And, then there are those who are just "takers." They may never want to help you, just take from you. If they ever ask for help, you can decide if you will help them or not. No one is obligated to help anyone. If someone doesn't want to help you, just move on.
9. Be clear, concise and brief in your elevator speech so people know exactly what you need.
10. Don't just rely on linkedin. You can also do a google search on people
11. Google search yourself too! This way you'll know what people might find out about you and you'll be ready to answer them if they ask you about something they saw.

I hope all these tips help. If you have any comments, questions, or additional suggestions, please comment below.

(note: this article is also cross-posted in LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/value-networking-during-holidays-henry-will-iv-pmp/ )

Courses on Cloud: Google GCP, AWS, Azure

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People have asked about some of the cloud courses that I've taken. Here is a list:

• Google Cloud:
• https://www.coursera.org/learn/gcp-fundamentals/home/welcome
• Amazon AWS
• AWS Free Cloud Training: https://aws.amazon.com/training/course-descriptions/cloud-practitioner-essentials
•  Microsoft Azure
• https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/learning/azure-training.aspx
• https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/azure/
• https://mva.microsoft.com/product-training/microsoft-azure#!lang=1033
• https://www.udemy.com/courses/search/?src=ukw&q=azure
• https://www.udemy.com/join/login-popup/?next=/70534-azure/learn/v4/content
• Here's some bonus courses on AI, Maching learning and Deep Learning 
• Crash course: https://developers.google.com/machine-learning/crash-course/
•  https://google.qwiklabs.com/quests/34?qlcampaign=77-618-wwdml-36

You Can Make a Positive Difference!

You can make a positive difference in this world!

Today I led another meal packaging event with church, volunteers from the community, and Rise Against Hunger! Together we packaged 20,000 meals!

I had a great team of people from the church who worked tirelessly to raise over $5800 to fund the meal packaging.



Someone asked how we raised the funds.  
We had two bake sales, a fundraising day with Panera, and a fundraising day with Fuddruckers. One of our team members sold over $20,000 of ShopRite cards over the past year. ShopRite gives 5% of the sale of those cards to us for the fundraiser ($1000 this year). A church group, Hillside3d, gave over $1100. We also had a tent at Suckasunny Day and collected funds from folks from town stopping by.

We had several businesses donate funds (and Flanders Bagels donated dozens of bagels for the event)!  We created a banner for our supporters (we used printastic to print it). We hung the banner at the event and took photos of everyone with it. The banner will be hung at the Rise Against Hunger warehouse in Kearney New Jersey where it will be seen by all of the groups who come there to package meals (I'll post a photo here later showing the banner in it's new home).

You can make a difference too!
  How?  You can contact Rise Against Hunger and they'll work with you. If you can raise enough for 10,000 meals, then you can package them at your location. If you don't have a location big enough (or if you can't raise enough for 10,000 meals), then you can pack meals at their local warehouse. There are dozens of warehouses across the country. Our local warehouse is in Kearney, New Jersey.

How I started
I started doing this in 2016 after I volunteered at a meal packing event that was sponsored by IBM and Arrow electronics at a conference in Las Vegas that I did a few presentations at. I was very interested because our church had done something very similar with GAIN USA a few years ago. I enjoyed working side-by-side with people so much at those events that I wanted to do it again. I stepped up to make it happen! You can too!

Here's what I've been able to lead:

• October 22, 2016 Hillside Church:  $3,633.12 = 12,528 meals packed by about 60 people (shipped to Uganda)
• Feb 25, 2017: IBM Club NJ at RAH Kearney Warehouse: $2,944 given by IBM Club NJ = 10,152 meals packed by about 50 people
• May 13, 2017: IBM Club NJ at RAH Kearney Warehouse: $2,000 IBM Grant = 6,696 meals packed by about 40 people (shopped to Haiti)
• October 28, 2017: Hillside Church: Raised $3,382.56= 11,664 meals plus 1,512 meals that Heinz donated to match the same amount we went over our 10,000 meal goal = 13,176 meals total packed by 80 people. (Shipped to Swaziland)
•  October 27, 2018: Hillside Church: Raised $5,888.16 = 20,304 meals packed by about 80 people. We will hear soon where these are shipped to. I'll post a comment here when they ship.

So, with the 46,008 meals packed at church and the 16,848 packed through the IBM Club NJ, we've packed 62,856 meals!

Do you want to lead an event like this?
If you are interested in leading an event like this, the folks at Rise Against Hunger would like to work with you. If you would like my input, I would be happy to help! Just contact me! It's loads of fun! You get to meet a lot of great people, connect a lot of people to others, give people a chance to help others, and help so many people to have the food that they need too!

How to Donate for the 2019 Event
If you want to donate to the 2019 event (or volunteer to help), you can donate online at this link:
http://events.stophungernow.org/HillsideLutheran102619

Or, you can mail a check to the church:
Hillside Church; 113 South Hillside Ave, Succasunna, NJ 07876 USA" and put "Rise Against Hunger Meail Packaging" in the note on the check.
Thank you!

Is it Time Management or Task Management?

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Can we really manage time, or can we really only manage our tasks?

I've spoken to so many people on this subject, I realized I should put my notes in a blog post so that others can benefit.

Here are some of the techniques and tools I use for time management.

Techniques:

• Prioritizing work:  7 Habits of Highly Effective people: Habit 3 is putting first things first
• There is a matrix showing important on one axis and urgent on the other. Work falls into one of the four boxes. 
• This is known as the "Eisenhower Matrix" (attributed to President and General Eisenhower): 
• see also:
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_management
  
• https://todoist.com/productivity-methods/eisenhower-matrix
  
• Prioritize the work that is important over work that is urgent.
• It's fairly easy to prioritize work that is important and urgent, but trying to get to work that is important and not urgent is more difficult. So, use a calendar and put it on your calendar.
• There is work that is important 
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_7_Habits_of_Highly_Effective_People
• Getting things done
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done
• Pomodoro technique
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_Technique

Tools:

• You can use paper or a daily planner book or any tool you are comfortable with. Here are some other tools that I have used. I like the first one the most.
• Kanban tool and a bit about personal Kanban (how to use the tool effectively)
•  https://trello.com
• http://personalkanban.com/pk/personal-kanban-101/
• https://www.toodledo.com/
• https://todoist.com/
  
• Google Calendar

What are the methods, techniques, and tools that you use? Please like and comment.

Agile and Scrum Master Certifications

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Agile and Scrum Master Certifications

(For those of you not familiar with agile, you might want to read this first or look up Agile in Wikipedia)

From my research, I've found that there are 3 popular Agile certifications:

1. PMI ACP : Agile Certified Practitioner offered by Project Management Institute
2. Certified Scrum Master - offered by the Scrum Aliance
3. Professional Scrum Master - Offered by Scrum.org

There are others too, but from what I see, these are the ones that are most popular.

I have used various Agile frameworks/methods for many years, but haven't been certified. I did receive an Agile Practitioner badge as a result of spending many hours in 3 comprehensive IBM Agile courses. I really learned a lot from them. I wanted to go further in Agile training.

I was trying to decide which path to take, so I read the information at the following sites:

• Scrum.org vs Scrum Alliance: How to Train in Scrum - a somewhat detailed look at both and some info on training
• CSM or PSM - which Certification to choose? - This post gives a comparison table and speaks about the tests themselves. It has a somewhat detailed analysis of both. 
• PMI ACP vs CSM Comparison: Which One Is Better? - This post takes a comprehensive review of both. It goes into depth about: what they are, who offers them, why to select one over the other, Eligibilty requirements, certification process, exams, pros and cons of each. This article is a very comprehensive one. I recommend reading it.
• PSM Vs. CSM : Note: this is a discussion at scrum.org (PSM), so it may be biased, but I see folks commenting in support of both sides.
• Top 6 Agile Certifications in 2018 - This post mentions CSM and ACP and doesn't even have PSM on the top-6 list.

After reading them all, I decided to go for the PSM first. I do put a lot of value on the ACP, but I saw lots of job postings asking for agile and scrum and thought that going for the PSM might be the best one to start with. 

I found the following links that I have been using to study for the test:

• Suggested Reading for Professional Scrum Master™ - This page suggests where to get the Scrum Guide, books, videos, courses and more for training. The Scrum guide is important to know and the Scrum Open Assessment can be taken many times.
• Scrum Training Series - These free video courses are great. There is a test of several questions at the end of each lesson which have references to reference material to let you know why the answer is the correct answer. This aids me in learning.  There are also links to documents and videos that I found helpful.

I'll come back here to update this as I progress in studying. 

If you have any thoughts on the certifications, the path, or any questions, please comment. I would like your input.

Free Job Search Advice Links (tips, hints and more)

 photo credit Frank Vex @frankvex on unsplash

There are many free resources for how to conduct the job search.  (note: you may find this new post about methods to search for work being helpful too)

I'm listing a bunch of them here in no particular order. I've found these helpful or they've been recommended to me. I can't recommend all of them. Check them out and see which ones you find helpful, then comment with your experiences and suggestions below. Your use is at your own risk.

Job and work search advice:

• This blog post on "31 Tips for your 2019 Job Search (from to pros)" has lots of good suggestions and links to many great coaches.
• Job-Hunt.org (free Resources)
• Liz Ryan - The human workplace (with a path assessment) and her Forbes articles
• Youtube: Work it Daily - They have live office hours for free
• Youtube: Deniz Sasal
• Youtube: Andrew LaCivita (he leads the "Milewalk academy") . Andrew has "Live Office Hours" each week on youtube.
• Audio/ Podcast: Win Sheffield, Career Coach for Get5 (see link to the GetFive blog elsewhere here in this post). He has audio "microcasts" (available on the website and also as podcasts) of about 5 to 6 minutes. Here is a good one that gives an overview of the processes and practices for the job search (which he calls a "Campaign"): "How can I get confidence to sell myself in the marketplace when I feel unfocused and unproductive? (TPOY054)"
• Youtube: Don Georgevich
• see his website at jobinterviewtools.com and jobinterviewtools.com/7days
• Youtube: Lisa Rangel
• Chameleon Resumes:  Free resources and podcasts
• DIY Do-it-yourself resources
•  Twitter: tips from Johnson and Johnson (you don't need a twitter account to view their tips):  https://twitter.com/jnjshine?lang=en
• Blog: GetFive coaching (Their coaching program is at cost, but the blog is free): https://getfive.com/blog/developing-new-momentum-campaign
• The Landing Expert (landingexpert.com) : Blog, Search for Networking Groups (lists include several states), videos, advice
• Nifty News - "News and advice for job seekers 50 and over"  Archives and subscribe to the email list (no cost, free) and receive a free copy of Your Ideal Next Job & Perfect Employer Workbook.

Resume Customizers
You can also get your resume scanned to find out how to get it to agree with job postings using these tools. The use of these tools is highly suggested if you are applying "cold" to a job posting. Of course, following up with connections inside and getting referrals is most important!

• jobscan.co - 5 free scans a month. There are paid plans too.
• Rezrunner.com  -  (this site includes resume, cover letter, and interview guides)
• Article there on How to Optimize your resume and How to use Resume keywords to get more interviews
• Skillsyncer - one free scan, then $9.99/month
• Jobgator - Compares resume to Job Description and gives recommendations (free to use)
• leap.ai - will give you suggesions on your resume - no cost

Recruiter Websites:

• searchfirm.com - find a recruiter 
• Forbes list of top recruiters: https://www.forbes.com/sites/vickyvalet/2018/04/09/americas-best-recruiting-firms-2018/#237386ad7d16
• ziprecruiter.com

Networking Meetings:

• The Landing Expert (landingexpert.com) - This site has a database of many networking groups. You can search by zipcode too!
• In New Jersey: New Start Career Network
• Meetup.com - find people who want to do similar things, or have the same hobby and network with them!
• Eventbrite.com - Some companies post hiring events here. Just search on the word "hiring"

Job Search Websites:

• Linkedin.com
• Indeeed.com
• glassdoor.com - also provides reviews of employers and salary information
• payscale.com - find pay scales

Websites where you can post a profile and recruiteres/employers will find you:

• https://hired.com
• https://www.vettery.com/candidate

 Salary research

• Indeed.com/salary
• Salary.com
• Payscale.com
• Bls.com
• Glassdoor.com
• Cbsalary.com
• Jobnob.com
• Onetonline.org
• Acinet.org
• Working Canada.gc.ca
• Service Canada.gc.ca

Find Recruiters:

• Searchfirm.com
• I-recruit.com

Find Contacts in Companies:

• This article from Zapier has lots of helpful tips: https://zapier.com/blog/find-email-address/
• hunter.io
• Rocketreach.co - find email address formats for people in companies

Do you have any suggestions?  Please post them as comments here!

Fun Party Game: Hunnert

A friend told us about this game recently and sent me these directions. We played it yesterday at the family reunion. We had children and adults playing it together. The youngest child kept asking to play again and again even though others won! Children can play as long as they know how to write their numbers up to 100.  The game is supposedly called "Hunnert" as a quick way of saying "hundred."


Place on the table one pencil and one die.

Give each player a blank piece of typing paper to place in front of them

The first player rolls the die toward the next player in a clockwise fashion

If the number rolled is a one, three, four or five - nothing happens and the next player rolls the die toward the person on their left

If the number rolled is a two, all players pass the paper in front of them to the person on their left

If the number rolled is a six, the player who rolled the die grabs the pencil from whoever currently has it and begins writing numbers from 1 - 100 on the piece of paper in front of them. They continue writing as rapidly as possible (and do not take any more turns rolling the die) until either someone else rolls and six and takes control of the pencil (and begins writing numbers on their own paper) or until they write numbers all the way to 100.

Whoever writes the number 100 on their paper is the winner.

Note: if someone has the pencil and a two is rolled, they will get the paper from the person on their right, so they will start writing numbers starting at whatever number comes next after whatever number was last written on that paper. 

Try it and comment here if you found it fun. Also, post here a comment with any fun games you like to play.

Save Yourself from a "Trip" to the Hospital

Save Yourself from taking a "Trip" to the Hospital!

I used to go to a barber in the next town. He retired, so I haven't seen him for a few years. He was a veteran. He told me many stories. One was about his wife. She fell down the stairs at his house once a few years back. She has suffered since then with injuries.
   Once we had a safety expert at work. He said that when something "almost" happens or when someone has a minor trip-up or accident, we need to heed that as a warning.
   I keep thinking about the barber's wife. I've made sure our railing is always tight.  Whenever I see how dark our stairs are at night, I think about articles I've read about people needing to be careful for safety in their homes and how we need to be careful about lighting. I've been thinking about using some electronics to make a light that senses movement and turns on.
Then I saw this at home Depot for about $13 for two (only one shown in photo).
We put them on our stairs. They work pretty good. There are other similar ones. I put one in the garage too. That one is mounted on the ceiling and lights up most of the garage.
So, here's a suggestion to save you from tripping on the stairs (or your garage or anyplace else) and taking a trip to the hospital. Think about getting something like this.
All the best to you!
I'd like to hear your thoughts on this suggestion. Please comment.

Things I've worked on in the past

Here's a list of things I've worked on in the past.

Note that these are generally in chronological order, so more recent items are toward the bottom.
I'll add to this as I remember them and have time to add to it.

Spoken Word Recognizer or Altair 8080

In college, my senior project was a spoken word recognizer. It was supposed to recognize spoken words for each of ten numbers: zero through 9. It didn't work. It was programmed on an Altair 8800
(another post about the Altair 8800 computer). The professor who taught the class was the only one who could pull the paper tape through the paper tape reader (it was pulled manually) without getting an error.

Univac in Fortran using Punchcards and later a Teletype

Used punchcards for a FORTRAN class and later as a help desk for students taking Computer Science classes including FORTRAN programming classes that most engineering students were required to take. Also, took several classes to learn languages: COBOL, and SNOBOL.

I then found out that if I asked a teaching assistant for a class, I could be able to work on a teletype
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletype_Model_33
When he had the class with me (a one-on-one) it malfunctioned and paper started shooting out the back!  Years later, when I was working in the "real world" I bought one from the local Morris County College when they were getting rid of them. I used it with CompuServe (an early online community before the internet and facebook). The whole house shook when I used it!  It had an acoustic coupler that was used over the phone line.

At home, I worked on hobby computers: Kim-1, RCA VIP

While in college, I bought an 8080 kit. I never had a chance to build it, because I quickly sold it to buy a Kim-1 computer that just had six 8-segment digital displays. I started a company to sell software for it http://oldcomputers.net/kim1.html
I traded it in for an RCA COSMAC VIP (based on 1802 processes)
http://oldcomputers.net/rca-cosmac-vip.html
And then later for an Atari 400 and then traded that for an Atari 800 (which I still have)

IBM-PC XT and AT

Later I bought an IBM PC compatible computer which cost in excess of $1500! That was a lot of money back then.

Military Avionics Software - Embedded software and Computer Engineering

At work, I was developing microprocessor-based solutions for a military subcontractor called Conrac (later Smith industries) for the F/A-18 fighter/attack jet and the AV8B Harrier Jump-Jet on a very large intel development system (one of the following, but I'm not certain which one:  MDS-80, or MDS-800) for the intel 8080 microprocessor. At the time I had either the RCA-VIP, or the Atari 400 or 800 and would tell folks at work that while I was taking months to develop programming code for these microprocessors at work, I had more powerful computers at home!

Atari VCS 2600 Video Games

At one point, while out at a local computer store looking at some add-on parts for my computer hobby, I saw an advertisement to work for a company doing video games. I interviewed and got the job to work on video games for the Atari VCS: http://oldcomputers.net/atari-vcs.html
(see my video games page for more info about the games I worked on)

While there, I worked on toys too, like games for the Etch-a-Sketch Animator 2000. Colleagues of mine worked on the Fisher-Price PXL2000 video camera for children and the video camera inside the Lionel Train - I think called "Railscope" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_OBo0JlYt8)

I worked on a multiyear research project for a Vettest Veterinarian Blood Chemistry Analyzer (which was still being used in 2017 and was a 3.2 Billion dollar product family) for which I was awarded 3 patents (see my patent page for more info about patents I have).


I left there to work for a company where we made even more video games: Imagineering which later became Absolute Entertainment (see my "video games" page for more about that). At that time we didn't have the internet and would send files over a bulletin board system and FTP.

UNIX, Oracle SQL, and Java.

 I worked at a mailing/printing/fullment company called DMS (later merged into Vestcom) on Cadol and a HP-UX system where I learned Oracle, PL-SQL, C, C++, shell scripting, and taught myself Java. It was the beginning of the internet and I told the president that I could make an online ordering system which I did. I also led a large CRM program for Wunderman Cato Johnson for its customer Clairol.

Y2K and several industries

I worked as a solutions consultant for several years for a very large telecommunications company on Y2K as a project/program manager. I moved mostly into Project Management at that point and got my PMP certification. Then, I worked on the first legally binding internet election for the Arizona Democrats with election.com, leading a project for a transportation solution for GOD,  , Shaw carpeting in Dalton Georgia, Lebar Friedman publishers, a pension system for the Associated Federation of Musicians and Employers Pension Fund (AFMEPF),  and led a solution for Hartford Insurance livestock insurance.

Mortgage Industry, IOT, and IBM Watson

I then went to a Mortgage Company as an engagement manager. That company was purchased by IBM when they wanted to get into the mortgage business, but that was just before the 2008 collapse. At IBM, I was able to move to the Watson group as a Program manager. Since I was always keeping involved in technology, I was able to help lead a grassroots group of IBMers who shared information about Internet of Things (IOT). While working with IOT, I was able to speak at an IBM conference about a IOT product I created and also led a hands-on lab at the conference. Back at IBM, I participated in a hackathon where I used Watson. And, I built a TJBOT that used IBM Watson to listen to a users voice, figured out what they were asking, and respond in a spoken voice. I lead several major projects in Watson: one for Credit-Mutuel-CIC in France and another for a very large Telecommunications company.

More Artificial Intelligence

I then worked on a contract for a company doing AI for another very large telecommunications company. Then, I recently went to work for a Human Capital Management and Payroll company leading chatbot projects. I've been able to train AI and work with teams to tune the AI. I used IBM Watson.

I also worked with Large Language Models (LLM) for the detection of prompt injection.

Notes for Watson and AI Presentation to PMI NJ Chapter

These are some additional notes for the presentation I'm giving to Project Managers gathered at the PMI NJ Chapter meeting on November 14, 2017. See pminj.org for more information.

The Story: Medical Seive

https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/innovation_explanations/article/tanveer-syeda-mahmood-medical-imaging.html

Watson Starting points

Watson starting point: ibm.com/watson
All the Watson services: https://www.ibm.com/watson/products-services/

Explore more here: https://www.ibm.com/watson/aworldwithwatson/ 

https://console.bluemix.net/catalog/?category=watson

13 year old uses Watson
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/watson/2017/07/13-year-old-prodigy-taking-ibm-artificial-intelligence-by-storm/

Is Watson Artificial Intelligence? What is Cognitive Computing?

https://www.ibm.com/cognitive/businesscoach/about-watson/is-cognitive-computing-artificial-intelligence

"A beginner's guide to artificial intelligence, machine learning, and cognitive computing"
https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/cc-beginner-guide-machine-learning-ai-cognitive/index.html

IBM Research : Cognitive Computing and AI
http://research.ibm.com/cognitive-computing/

Watson Cognitive Computing: Areas of Application

Watson areas of application: Health, Education, Driving, Banking/Financial, Law, Hospitality, Retail, Customer Care, and more.

Music: https://www.ibm.com/watson/music/

Watson Beat (Music) https://www.ibm.com/it-infrastructure/us-en/remix-it-player/   

Watson Serves up Cognitive Highlights of US Open Tennis
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/client-voices/watson-serves-cognitive-highlights-us-open/

Listen to Kone Elevators “talk” with Watson : http://machineconversations.kone.com/

Customer Experience: https://www.ibm.com/blogs/watson/2017/02/staples-making-customer-service-easy-watson-conversation/ and https://www.ibm.com/watson/infographic/staples/

Employee Insights: Cognitive Knowledge https://www.ibm.com/watson/stories/woodside.html

 and https://www.ibm.com/blogs/cloud-computing/2017/04/woodside-energy-watson/

Banking: https://www-01.ibm.com/common/ssi/cgi-bin/ssialias?htmlfid=BKV12367USEN

Taxes: https://www.ibm.com/watson/stories/taxes.html

Customer Service:  https://www.ibm.com/watson/autodesk/ and https://www.ibm.com/blogs/watson/2017/10/how-autodesk-sped-up-customer-service-times-with-watson/

Health Care: http://www.medtronic.com/us-en/about/news/ibm-diabetes.html

Demos, Try It, Play with it!

Listen to Kone Elevators “talk” with Watson : http://machineconversations.kone.com/ 

https://conversation-demo.mybluemix.net


https://text-to-speech-demo.mybluemix.net/

https://speech-to-text-demo.mybluemix.net/ 

https://discovery-news-demo.mybluemix.net/ 

https://natural-language-understanding-demo.mybluemix.net/ 

https://visual-recognition-demo.ng.bluemix.net/

https://personality-insights-livedemo.mybluemix.net/ 

https://tone-analyzer-demo.mybluemix.net/ 

 Try using your mobile device with WatsonIOT
http://discover-iot.eu-gb.mybluemix.net/#/play
Others links to try that are not in the presentation
 

Chef Watson https://www.ibmchefwatson.com/

Analyze your Twitter feed http://findyourwatsontalent.mybluemix.net/ 

Compare two twitter feeds: http://friendme.mybluemix.net/

Play a beat with "RemixIT"
https://www.ibm.com/it-infrastructure/us-en/remix-it-player/

TJBot

https://ibmtjbot.github.io/

http://research.ibm.com/tjbot/

http://henrywill4.blogspot.com/2017/06/tjbot-talks-4.html

More information on Watson

Watson Health:

Study by New York Genome Center and IBM Demonstrates Potential for AI and Whole Genome Sequencing to Scale Access to Precision Medicine
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52770.wss

Watson Drug discovery
https://www.ibm.com/watson/health/life-sciences/drug-discovery/
Parkinson's
https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/passion-projects/parkinsons-watson-drug-discovery/

Cancer: Breast, Lung, Colon, Rectal and Prostrate soon.  MSK Memorial Sloan Kettering
cut time for clinical trial matching
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52502.wss

Curb Substance Abuse Relapse
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52371.wss

IBM Research and UC San Diego Collaborate to Advance the Use of Artificial Intelligence for Healthy Living
For aging populations
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/53185.wss

Watson for Oncology https://www.ibm.com/watson/health/oncology-and-genomics/oncology/ 

Drug discovery https://www.ibm.com/watson/health/life-sciences/drug-discovery/

Health imaging https://www.ibm.com/watson/health/imaging/ 

Watson Data

 Watson Data Platform:
https://www.ibm.com/analytics/us/en/watson-data-platform/

Watson Fashion and Art

https://www.ibm.com/blogs/think/2016/04/watson-and-marchesa/ 
Cognitive Marchesa dress lights up the night
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/internet-of-things/cognitive-marchesa-dress/This dress was lit up with colors by Tweets about the dress using Tone Analyzer.

Watson Music
https://www.ibm.com/watson/music/
 Watson Beat looks at song composition
"Training Watson To Be Your Musical Muse"  https://www.ibm.com/blogs/think/2016/06/training-watson-to-be-your-musical-muse/

IBM and Andrés Cepeda introduce First ‘Cognitive Music’ Project in Latin America
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52330.wss
Tone Analyzer to Match sentiment of fans


New Exhibit, “Art with Watson: Hidden Portraits” Spotlights How Cognitive Computing Inspires Creativity
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52140.wss

Other Watson Applications

Olli: Artificial Intelligence for the real world, in record time
Self-Driving / Autonomous vehicle
https://www.ibm.com/blogs/internet-of-things/olli-ai/

Crédit Mutuel and IBM Watson Put Technology at the Service of People
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52108.wss

AI ETF Fund that uses Watson:
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4124004-new-ai-based-etf-uses-ibms-watson-technology

IBM and Ubisoft® Partner to Bring Voice Command with Watson to Virtual Reality in Star Trek™: Bridge Crew
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52347.wss

Watson IoT

In South Africa (where 70% of the remaining world's Rhino population is found, using IoT sensors on other animals (such as Zebras) to thwart the threats of poaching of Rhinos for their prized horns.
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/53162.wss

Watson Education:

IBM Watson and Sesame Workshop Introduce Intelligent Play and Learning Platform on IBM Cloud
https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/52532.wss

Free IBM Watson Teacher Advisor http://teacheradvisor.org

Watson Videos: 

https://www.ibm.com/watson-analytics

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Xcmh1LQB9I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPXCF5e1_HI

https://www.youtube.com/user/IBMWatsonSolutions

AI:

Google AI:
https://www.theverge.com/tldr/2017/7/10/15946542/deepmind-parkour-agent-reinforcement-learning

What's Your opinion on Artificial Intelligence? Space 10 & IKEA ask in an interesting presentation & survey http://doyouspeakhuman.com

Other options besides Watson:

OpenAI: openai.com

Theano: http://deeplearning.net/software/theano/

Tensor Flow: http://tensorflow.org

Microsoft Azure: 

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/cognitive-services/

Deepmind: https://deepmind.com/

What's the difference between Cognitive Computing and AI?
https://www.rtinsights.com/whats-the-difference-between-cognitive-computing-and-ai/

TJBot New Recipe (post #5 about TJBot)

TJBot has learned some new tricks!
 
I loaded a new recipe to show to the Children at the Vacation Bible School (VBS) at Church a few weeks ago! The Children and parents liked meeting TJBot!

 This is all mostly technical stuff for people who ask me questions about how I did it, so if you're not technically minded, you can skip this blog post.

 First, here are the links to previous posts on TJBot:  #1 order parts,  #2 test the hardware, #3 assemble the cardboard , #4 TJBot Talks


One thing I missed in the assembly instructions:
Use a screw to connect the TJBot Arm to the servo, otherwise it will keep falling off! (not mentioned in any of the instructions anywhere)





So, here are a bunch of my notes I took. They are sporadic because I stumbled on them over the course of trying to get this to work. 

I loaded a new recipe:
Recipe for TJdashboard - https://github.com/victordibia/tjdashboard
  
After done loading it, you can retrain Conversation to add more intents. I did this and added a bunch of intents and dialog entries to correspond to the Bible topics of the VBS week.
May need to get a new trial account since there is a limit to the number of services.
 
Booting up TJBot without a monitor and keyboard
I couldn't get auto boot up to work (see links below), so needed to ssh from laptop to get TJBot started, so used these instructions
https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/use-your-desktop-or-laptop-screen-and-keyboard-with-your-pi/
those instructions are very complicated, so basically I just did the following:
Connect up a cable
arp -a
ssh pi@raspberrypi.local
Then, once connected, modify the wpa_supplicant.conf file for adding new wireless SSIDs and pwds
https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/configuration/wireless/wireless-cli.md
http://weworkweplay.com/play/automatically-connect-a-raspberry-pi-to-a-wifi-network/
do ifconfig to get IP address (see below), then Then to start TJbot Dashboard:
cd /home/pi/tjdashboard 
and 
sudo node dasshboard.js

Control-C will stop the dashboard program from running on tjbot.  You should do sudo shutdown to gracefully shut down the pi

To select the correct microphone
arecord -l
sudo config.js
modify it for the correct device ID
(can also flip the camera there too)

you may also need to Blacklist audio
https://github.com/ibmtjbot/tjbot/tree/master/recipes/speech_to_text#troubleshoot

to get to the "dashboard" from a browser...
ifconfig to get ip
http://192.168.1.2:8078/
 
Dashboard buttons: 
"See" will take a photo and tell what it sees
Text will take a photo and look for text in the picture that tells a color 
Dance: will dance and wave arm
Wave: will wave arm
LED: to change LED color


Turn "Listening" on and off then it will not respond

Faces: uses local Face detect and will load your picture in dashboard
Sentiment: only if you connect sentiment 

Note that Everything you say is sent to Watson Conversation Service (WCS), but only acted on if an intent is found

Here are some posts I used to try to boot into the dashboard at startup, but I can't get it to work
http://www.instructables.com/id/Nodejs-App-As-a-RPI-Service-boot-at-Startup/
https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/44957/running-node-js-with-forever
http://www.linuxcircle.com/2013/12/30/run-nodejs-server-on-boot-with-forever-on-raspberry-pi/
Tried the comment at the beginingof /etc/rc.local:
node /home/pi/tjdashboard/dashboard.js < /dev/null &
It started up, but can't reach the dashboard URL without getting errors