Looking For A Job?

The company I work for, Data Connection, is looking to hire a group of recent graduates as software developers at their offices in Enfield, UK (where I work).

I can’t promise you would get to work on or with Free software, but you would get to work with smart people for a company who are very good to their employees, and have a great culture of technical excellence. You don’t have to be a graduate in a numerate discipline – we already have classicists, linguists and others.

If you are interested, you can find out more and perhaps apply online. Say that I sent you :-)

17 thoughts on “Looking For A Job?

  1. How many people does Data Connection need to hire? :) I know at least 2 people who graduated from cam.ac.uk in the summer going to work there, and that’s not from a very big sample…

  2. We’re currently looking for about another six in the short term, although we hire all year round.

    Who do you know? :-)

  3. The people I know are David Waller (he hasn’t started yet – he decided to walk around the German Alps for 6 weeks instead) and someone called Chris who, it transpires, I have never known the surname of.

  4. Just to clarify, I’m not interested in the positions (I have quite enough to keep me busy already), it just seems like Data Connection hire a lot of graduates (not that that’s a bad thing, just that I find it very surprising).

  5. Nah, you don’t want to work for DC. ;-) Come work for Ensoft instead. We’re having presentations in Cambridge on the 2nd, and Oxford on the 3rd of November.

    I know a graduate from cam who started at DC just over a year ago now, and I applied there myself, but turned it down in favour of the job here at Ensoft (started by a couple of guys who left DC ~7 years ago). One of the main reasons for applying there in the first place was that Gerv was working there, and I might get to meet actual Mozilla people! :-)

    Martin

  6. Do you have to be a computer sci major to apply?

    Does transportation engineering count?

    And what is Level-A?

  7. What is this obsession your company has with 2 As at A-Level? For the experienced hires it just comes across as petty.

  8. They’re not looking for experienced hires, they’re looking for recent graduates with the potential to becomes excellent, top-class software engineers (or at least working in that market – DC have some non-100%-technical staff too).

    They need some sort of metric for this, since they don’t force you to have relevant experience or degree. A-Levels are as good a metric as any for this ‘potential’ to become excellent.

    Martin

  9. I’m already part way through filling out the application form for Data Connection after seeing the company in a graduate job directory. If you have any tips for the application process I would be extremely grateful as, from the website at least, it appears to be just the company I�ve been looking for.

    Thanks

  10. jgraham: I thought the name David Waller sounded familiar; I Googled it and found out why :-) We do hire a lot of recent graduates; I believe the thinking is that what’s never been learned badly doesn’t have to be unlearned, or something like that. ;-)

    I’ve never worked for Ensoft, but if the founders took the Data Connection ethos with them, it’ll probably be a decent place to work too. :-) However, being larger, Data Connection has more places available, and can probably offer more variety of work.

    Do you have to be a computer sci major to apply? And what is Level-A?

    No – the vast majority of our employees are not Computer Science graduates. “A-Level” is a set of subject-specific exams taken at age 18 by young people in the UK. One can take anywhere between none and six (very rare); three is average. I, for example, took Maths, Physics and Chemistry.

    Andy: As Martin said, it’s just a convenient measure. We get thousands of applications per year, and it’s a reasonable way of pre-screening. However, note that the web page makes it clear that it’s not an absolute requirement if there are extenuating circumstances.

    Jon: best of luck. Let me know when your interview is and, if I’m around (which I’m not in November) I’ll come and say hello. :-)

  11. Just wondering, I’m a honours math student at the University of Waterloo, Canada. Since I’m in a Co-op program I’ll be looking for a job from January-March, but can I still apply for the job if I’m living in Canada? According to the website, they don’t have any offices in Canada.

  12. Sorry Alan, but we don’t have offices in Canada, and our US satellite offices are mostly staffed with experienced salesmen or UK expatriates. I don’t quite know what a Co-op program is, but if it’s where you work for a short period while still at University, we tend to do that with vacation students in the summer. And getting a visa would probably be pretty tough anyway. :-(

  13. I’m surprised you’ve never heard of Ensoft Gerv, there’s a little bit of rivalry between DC and us. ;-) I don’t know the details, but I don’t think my bosses left on the best of terms.

    However, they do have a very similar work ethic thing going on, and that was one of the main reasons I applied to them, and am now working here. DC were a very close second, but their application process was just much more complicated!

    So, to all those applying to DC, possibly think about applying to Ensoft too. After all, you can never make too many applications, and it’s a simple CV + cover letter jobbie anyway! We’re a smaller company, but otherwise similar to DC.

    Martin

    PS: Sorry Gerv! Didn’t really mean to hijack your job application post, but we recently got told to find some applicants too. And I’ve been reading your blog since the start now, so thought it was about time I posted *something* ;-)

  14. My co-op program is a setup where we have 4 months of school alternating with 4 months of work (related to our program). DC sounds like a nice place to work, but getting a visa is a lot of work.

  15. I’m surprised you’ve never heard of Ensoft Gerv, there’s a little bit of rivalry between DC and us. ;-)

    Read carefully :-) I said I’ve never worked at Ensoft. I did, in fact, apply there around the time I applied to DC, for the same reasons as you – it’s not much effort, and just applying to one company seemed arrogant.

    However, motivated by honesty, I did say in my interview that DC was my first choice because they’d been good to me in giving me gap year and vacation employment. That may have been a bit too much for John Cooper’s ego to cope with, as he didn’t offer me a job… ;-)

    Richard: just be honest, and be yourself – like any job application.

  16. That may have been a bit too much for John Cooper’s ego to cope with, as he didn’t offer me a job… ;-)

    :-)