I'm a recruiter for Comcast in the Southwest. I love helping veterans build a successful civilian career. What questions do you have for me?

David Kaczmarczyk — Wed, 24 May 2017 14:31:55 -0400

My family immigrated to the United States in the late 80's to escape the turmoil in the Soviet bloc. Raised in Chicago, I am a proud American and duty bound to serve my fellow citizens.

I am a recruiter for frontline installation technicians all the way through engineers in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah. I love my job because we are committed to hiring 10,000 veterans this year.

Response by MSG Brad Sand made May 24 at 2017 3:04 PM

MSG Brad Sand — Wed, 24 May 2017 15:04:48 -0400

What is the meaning of the answer 42 in the Douglas Adams books? Oh, you meant about COMCAST and recruiting...sorry my bad.

Response by MSgt Steven Holt, NRP, CCEMT-P made May 24 at 2017 5:26 PM

MSgt Steven Holt, NRP, CCEMT-P — Wed, 24 May 2017 17:26:36 -0400

Why does COMCAST buy up entire swaths of Rural America service area then refuse to provide service for that area? COMCAST has owned the rights to provide cable service for our area for over 20 years yet has not laid the first wire, switch, router, or transmission tower. Worse, they refuse to let any other provider provide the services COMCAST refuses to.

Or is that the type of question to be avoided at all costs?

Response by Capt Jeff S. made May 24 at 2017 5:53 PM

Capt Jeff S. — Wed, 24 May 2017 17:53:29 -0400

I am the grandson of Russian immigrants who fled the Bolshevik Revolution and settled in Chicago on the Southwest side near Midway Airport. The neighborhood I grew up in (Garfield Ridge) had Kennedy High School in it and consisted of Polish, Irish, and Italian families primarily. Your name appears to be Polish. Did you grow up on the South side?
\
Retired back in 2000 and worked for awhile at Nortel Networks in Research Triangle Park, NC as a Member of their Scientific Staff. I worked in Test Systems Development where we stress tested the phone switches and pumped VoIP signaling traffic into them to see what they could handle. And we coordinated with the software developers who were coding the software to drop packets reducing overall sound quality but maintaining a level acceptible of voice quality. The CEO's goal was to pass Lucent in sales and we did that. He took a $100,000,000 bonus and retired. When the Dot Com bubble burst shortly thereafter, hard times hit the IT sector. I trained the WiPro Indian contractors that took my department's functions over. Nortel's CFO was from India and was giving away contracts to Indian contractors. The company found out too late that you get what you pay for -- code that is buggy that requires more man hours to debug. Nortel ended up selling off its assets and laying off most of its employees -- the same ones that worked hard to achieve the CEO's goals. The bonus the CEO and other senior execs took would have saved many jobs... and with better management, the company might have been saved. It went under, about two-three years after I was laid off.

Cisco System was the only IT company in the Triangle area that had the foresight to plan ahead for the upcoming storm and they were able to weather it. Cisco's CEO was former Army Special Forces.

One of the problems I experienced making the transition from the military sector to the private sector is that the private sector - especially in IT - is mostly interested in what you put on a resume. They don't want to see you; instead, they just want to look at a piece of paper. And the HR folks that go over the job requirements don't have a clue what skills translate nor do they seem to understand that a person might not have years of experience working with a particular type of hardware or software but that they could quickly adapt what they know about comparable systems (such as RAID storage arrays) and be up and running in short order. Apparently, the HR folks don't want to get in trouble and lose their jobs recommending people to interview that don't meet all the checks in the block on the sheet. I was fortunate that the person hiring at Nortel was a former Marine who understood what a background in Avionics and Intelligence could offer. My boss was laid off before I was and when I eventually got laid off (in the tenth round), I was competing against all the other laid off IT workers with many more years experience in IT that were all competing for a smaller number of jobs in the Triangle area (Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill).

Long story short, I started doing construction and then retired again to South Carolina and did some construction project management and farming. Those are jobs you can't remote.

I still keep my skills up in IT. Dabble in Linux. Network, troubleshoot and fix people's computers. Have messed around with Android OS which is based on Linux. Am in the Myrtle Beach, SC area.

Response by SSG Trevor S. made May 25 at 2017 12:54 AM

SSG Trevor S. — Thu, 25 May 2017 00:54:22 -0400

I happen to be in your area of operations. I live in Sierra Vista, AZ. I would love to connect with you and explore opportunities for career growth.

Response by PO2 Skip Kirkwood made May 25 at 2017 2:41 PM

PO2 Skip Kirkwood — Thu, 25 May 2017 14:41:47 -0400

Nope. POTUS should adhere to AMERICAN customs, not bow to anyone!

Response by PO1 William "Chip" Nagel made Jun 8 at 2017 10:14 PM

PO1 William "Chip" Nagel — Thu, 08 Jun 2017 22:14:07 -0400

David Kaczmarczyk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE3KFcJ_hXE

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