Sun Microsystems and the Job Hunt

Selkies

Dropped out of college for medical and personal reasons.
Now I'm getting a job, this is not a thread about dropping out.
I have experience in IT, Sun likes it, Sun interviews, Sun most likely send me job offer.

Anyone know anything about Sun?

I just got the email about the interview while I was in Germany, just came back and realise I know nothing about them.

I heard they don't tend to fire people and they don't have very competitive salaries?

Can anyone say something conclusively.

Selkies

Anyone know anything about Sun?
Really need to know quickly!

run_Forrest_run

Selkies wrote: »

Anyone know anything about Sun?
Really need to know quickly!

seriously, how lazy are you??

watna

My dad works for them (I think, he contracts so I'm not sure what's going on with him half the time). Sometimes he has to go in to the office for meetings on a Friday (he works from home) and they get beer and pizza. That's all I know!

Selkies

run_Forrest_run wrote: »

seriously, how lazy are you??

...

Yes they will surely give me an objective view on their own company.
Oh look, shock, surprise, according to their website they are fantastic, well that was easy.

Selkies

watna wrote: »

My dad works for them (I think, he contracts so I'm not sure what's going on with him half the time). Sometimes he has to go in to the office for meetings on a Friday (he works from home) and they get beer and pizza. That's all I know!

beer and pizza?
Thats actually really helpful, shows that they are very laid back. I had an idea that they were when I saw the work environment but that really confirms it
Thanks

Anyone else?

Saint_Mel

When they were making redundancies about 4 years ago their method was to
disable peoples id cards. Emails was cirsulated that anyone who's badge/card
didnt work in the front door to go to a meeting.

While they were in the "meeting" their desks were being cleared out for them
and their user accounts locked. They were told that they were the ones being
made redundant and their belongings were waiting for them in a box by their
desk.

Cheap canteen though!

Vokes

Google News them ?

Selkies

Saint_Mel wrote: »

When they were making redundancies about 4 years ago their method was to
disable peoples id cards. Emails was cirsulated that anyone who's badge/card
didnt work in the front door to go to a meeting.

While they were in the "meeting" their desks were being cleared out for them
and their user accounts locked. They were told that they were the ones being
made redundant and their belongings were waiting for them in a box by their
desk.

Cheap canteen though!

oh... right...
thats pretty horrific

Selkies

SofaKing wrote: »

Google News them ?

good idea... >>whoosh

laoisfan

When they were making redundancies about 4 years ago their method was to
disable peoples id cards. Emails was cirsulated that anyone who's badge/card
didnt work in the front door to go to a meeting.

While they were in the "meeting" their desks were being cleared out for them
and their user accounts locked. They were told that they were the ones being
made redundant and their belongings were waiting for them in a box by their
desk.

Cheap canteen though!

Are you talking about the US Office or the Irish Office in Eastpoint? I work for Sun and I can say I have never heard such crap!! No way would that happen in the Irish Office. The US maybe, as I used to work for Oracle and I heard this happen in the US Office. But not the Irish Office.

The canteen is ok, not brilliant but ok.

laoisfan

Selkies wrote: »

I heard they don't tend to fire people and they don't have very competitive salaries?

Where did you hear that?

As regards firing people, well I guess they are like most companies, they will only fire you if they have good reason to. in all my time in Sun I have never known anyone to be fired.

Salaries? Depends on your experience and what role they are hoping to fill. I work for them and I also used to work for Oracle. In my opinion Sun are a lot more competitive than Oracle as regards salaries (but that is my opinion only).

cronos

Considering you dont have your degree they would be a good choice as Im sure they will provide good training for cert's. Such as ... http://www.sun.com/training/certification/

Saint_Mel

laoisfan wrote: »

Are you talking about the US Office or the Irish Office in Eastpoint? I work for Sun and I can say I have never heard such crap!! No way would that happen in the Irish Office. The US maybe, as I used to work for Oracle and I heard this happen in the US Office. But not the Irish Office.

The canteen is ok, not brilliant but ok.

Office in Eastpoint. Was told that from someone who worked there at the time but wasnt made redundant.

laoisfan

Saint_Mel wrote: »

Office in Eastpoint. Was told that from someone who worked there at the time but wasnt made redundant.

I work in Sun and I can tell you for a fact that is simply not true. Perhaps your friend was referring to the US office? Things like that are common in the US but I cannot never recall this happening in the Irish office. I have worked for Oracle, Intel, EMC Ireland and have heard horrific stories from the US while working for those companies but never in Ireland.

As a company Sun are ok. They do pay above industry standard (IMO) but again the position and experience of the person will all determine what salary will be offered. They are ok for training, some groups are better than others for this.

damnyanks

Whenever large groups of people are made redundant you will hear horror stories like that. It's nothing new happens in every industry. Place I worked fired a group of people recently. They just disabled their security badges and brought them to a meeting. Everything else was packed up

laoisfan

damnyanks wrote: »

Whenever large groups of people are made redundant you will hear horror stories like that. It's nothing new happens in every industry. Place I worked fired a group of people recently. They just disabled their security badges and brought them to a meeting. Everything else was packed up

Within the last 12 months Sun made some people redundant. i forget the figure.

Did they disable their security bags, call them up to a meeting and at the same time pack away their desk etc? No.

What they did do is inform them that they were being made redundant for whatever reason and was told they basically had a month. They were informed of what their entitlements were. Sun also told them that they were free to apply for any internally advertised vacancies in the company. These vacancies were based in Eastpoint but they were on the US payroll, not the Irish payroll (btw). Sun also informed that they would be given any additional help during the 1-month period i.e. extra training, help with their CVs from HR, time off to attend interviews etc etc. They were also informed that they would continue to have normal access during the month etc etc.

However that said not all companies are like Sun and I guess one would have to question their way of "informing" people that they have been made redundant.

OP: Sun are a good company to work for. Are they a brilliant company? No way. Anyway, no such thing as a brilliant company....unless you own it!!
If they offer you a position I would strongly suggest you take it. There is opportunities within the company for training (depends on the group though). They are flexible with time, they encourage working from home (I am working from home today...just not as I type this ). You would have opportunities for travel etc etc. A lot of their benefits are similiar to those offered by IBM, Oracle, Intel, EMC Ireland etc etc.

Good luck! I hope you get offered a position! What group/position btw?

--laois

Tweener

Actually, I have an "history" to tell you about my relationship with Sun, specificly the Irish office:
At the end of last summer I was offered a secure employment with them as an intern, for 6 months. Unfortunately for me, in a few days I would have had a phone interview for another internship, in a similar role, with another big IT company (let's just say that its name starts with G, and you probably access its website tens of time a day) in Switzerland...So, I had to choose between a secure offer in Dublin with Sun, and a possible offer in Zurich with [unnamed supersecret company]. At that time I was stupid enough to turn down the offer with Sun, because I preferred to go to Switzerland, and because the [unnamed company] provides slightly better benefits to its employees.
The truth is that the interview with the [unnamed company] went well, at least that's what they said; in fact, the two roles, between Sun and [unnamed company] where quite similar, so I was confident that, having passed the one with Sun, I would have been able to pass this other one, that's what I counted on, but....After 3 months of wait they told me that there wasn't place anymore for me; so, apparently, the interviews went good, but there was someone better than me...;-) After some moments of sadness and anger, I started to search again for an internship opportunity, but in the meantime the position at Sun had gone (of course, after 3 months!), and at the end I finished in a Swiss company, which doesn't work directly in IT (but of course they have an IT department), and that's noway comparable to Sun in terms of:
- Location and working environment: Their offices are almost in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by forests, and their notion of relax is a room with a coffee and tea machine, a few tables and chairs, and a few magazines...No pizza, no beer (except during farewell parties)...
- Company culture: I mean, Johnathan Schwartz has a blog, and has also agreed to show the prank some employees made him on the 1st of April...This kind of transparency, openess and cultural honesty is unthinkable where I am working now; I don't even know who the CEO of my company is, and frankly I don't care. In addition to this, there are a lot of other good things of the Sun culture, but listing them would take too long...Sun is one of the most honest companies in the world, and deserves a better recognition for this.
- Training: Basicly I have to train on myself, reading books.
- Professional growt opportunities: I mean, Sun invented some of the most innovative technologies of the last 25 years. Working at Sun you might have the opportunity to know the people who invented Java, or Solaris, or any other of the great technologies invented by Sun, and that have an impact on our everyday life.
- Commitment to open-source: They don't consider open-source as a priority, as a good model of development, they are too mentally enslaved by M$ to do it. Sun is unbeatable regarding this, it's the single biggest commercial contributor to the open-source "world". What Sun has done in the past few years, with the release of Solaris' source code, JDK source code, the acquisition of Innotek and MySQL AB, is incredible...
- Location: After having been in Switzerland for a few months I think that Ireland is better, despite the problems of your public transportation system, and of your healthcare system; you have a more dynamic economy (which doesn't rely on secret bank accounts of terrorists, criminals and tax evaders), you are not as arrogant to think that you are the best country in the world, you speak English, you are more relaxed and less perfectionist, you have RyanAir, Dublin has a young vibrant population, etc...
EVERY SINGLE DAY I regret the moment I said 'No, thank you' to Sun...Do you think that I could have any hope in the future (maybe after graduating) to be able to enter at Sun (in Ireland or in the UK)?
By the way, I learned the lesson, the hard way...

BostonB

You'll be on probation if you get it, so if you don't like it just leave. I mean if you read something on the web here, are you not going to take a job and not get paid for the few months you could be with Sun?

Tweener

BostonB wrote: »

You'll be on probation if you get it, so if you don't like it just leave. I mean if you read something on the web here, are you not going to take a job and not get paid for the few months you could be with Sun?

Yes, I know that I'd be on probation...My post was mainly to complain about the whole "adventure" I've had, and my current situation, and also to remark how much I've learned that Sun is one of the best companies (I don't know by salary, but I'm sure by work environment) to work for. I'm only worried that an opportunity like that won't never come back again, and I'll be stuck working for companies that I don't like, that don't endorse open-source, that don't let you work from home (the mental flexibility of Swiss companies is close to 0), etc...
I don't care if Dublin is a mess of a city (I don't believe what I read on the Internet - http://www.eirbiz.com/?p=213 - it can't be that bad!), I prefer to work in a bad city but with a job I like (Solaris/Linux sysadmin) than in a good city with I job I hate...

BostonB

My comment was aimed at the OP TBH.