FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

Well, you guys gave me a lot to thonk about. I'll reply back later when i have time...

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

well your father isn't foolish to think online could work.


if you really do love your job and what you do, if business is your biggest strain, taking it online is a pretty great idea. you basically open your doors to millions of potential clients. it's a bit of an overhaul for the structure of your business though.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

Okay, now i'm at home and can reply a bit. Italy is fucked, but where i live that is especially severe, moving to the north could be a bit of a solution.

I will start sending resumes and put up a nice looking portfolio (sadly, i haven't started yet since i was working full time at my studio), in the meanwhile i'll take whatever i can. My girlfriend lives in tuscany and has a stable job, if anything i could start looking for jobs in the area.

I was thinking about giving sites like 99designs.com a shot, cause occasionally there are well paid jobs which are ultimately won by mediocre designers due to a lack of participation. Does anyone have some first-hand experience with those?

mi40: my family cannot move. they cannot speak any foreign language (this is pretty common here) and they have their own ways to support themselves anyway. Besides, i don't want them to follow me and i don't want any support from them, they can't give me any even if they wanted to.

It's not foolish at all. The problem is he expects me to do that when i'm not a web designer, then asks for things that are incredibly complicated and expensive to do on a website and expect they can be easily done. Not only that, but start selling online means even more investment and it takes time to start off. I don't have that time anymore, because the situation is wearing me off and it's not possible to continue on these premises - i work an average of 10 hours per day and i'm making nothing out of it, the overall situation does not give any encouraging hints and then we (as a nation) have to witness everyday all sorts of waste from an incompetent ruling class.

Working with your parents, for the few of you who might have experienced it, can be nice for some aspects but also pretty crappy for some others. You're always their son, and being tied forever with my family like that is not what i want, after these 4 years i realize it. No boss can project their expectations on you like a parent can do, and if things don't go that well it becomes hard to bear with the constant pressure.

After a bit of talking, i know i can find another job right away (nothing exceptional, not even relevant to what i do) so i can make a little money to support myself when i'll not be here anymore. If that counts, i could count on my girlfriend when i'm looking for jobs near where she lives - keep in mind that not all workplaces can be found online and many won't consider applications over phone or mail here in Italy. Our culture is a little different - a bit more rural, i'd say.

Anyway, after this weekend i'll give my father an answer and that will be it. Let's see where this goes.

If not even moving to the north will do, i'll just have to leave the country. There are programs to work abroad and if you're not picky it's not overly difficult to find a living.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

All I seem to hear at my shop are stories of smaller shops closing up their doors, and its kinda depressing. Mine is one of the lucky few that are still in town, so I can't say I know what its like. But I wish you luck, man.

You mentioned graphic design and print. What are some examples of what you do? Posters, covers, boxes, etc.? Because if you can do the design part well, or the printing part well, maybe there is a large print shop around where you can apply? Or failing that, a newspaper, or government print shop? Our university even has its own graphic and print shop, maybe yours does too?

Also, if you decide to leave the country, just how far are you willing to go? Do you want to fax in a resume up here or something? I don't know what if anything I can do in particular, but maybe I can send you a copy of an application form for our shop?

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

My totally unexperienced opinion of business is that your dad clearly needs to get someone else to take the business online. Be it temporary so they can teach you (or even your dad) what you need to know, or someone permanent in the hopes that the business will take off once you reach a global market. (Dare I say that there are people on this site who would be more than capable of what he needs that might need work?)
Anyways, a few thousand or whatever it is, of paying someone to do that is probably nothing compared to the mountains of debt he's in right now, and seems the only way he can get his business running.

It seems clear that you know what you want to do though. You can't keep up with the demands of the business, that's that. If your dad doesn't want to find other help for the business, then it's obvious you need to leave.

I'm a little worried that your dad doesn't fully understand exactly how unqualified and how much time it would take you do what he wants though. You need to convey to him exactly what you can and can't do, what skills you don't have, and some sort of timeframe. I know I myself don't have any experience doing something like this, but both my husband and my brother write programs, and your situation, where the client is clueless as to how easy or hard it is to do something, and they keep changing their mind about what they want, etc, seems to be a very common and potentially very serious problem. My brother worked for one of the contractors who were digitizing the Canadian healthcare system a decade or so ago, that huge boondoggle were the government spent a ridiculous amount of money for essentially nothing. To hear my brother describe it, the problem was not that the company wasn't doing anything, but rather that there was a communication failure about what they said they wanted and what his company understood, or they changed their minds, multiple times, over years. Software development isn't just about knowing how to program, it's about making what your client wants, and often when the client doesn't know what they want. (In this case, your dad's the client.)
Anyways, what you were saying reminded me of this. Even if you don't stay working for your dad, (which seems like that's the choice you've made), I really think you need to sit down with him and do your best to convey just how much work and time is needed to make what he wants to the best of your abilities, because I fear he would be keep on trekking anyways, and keep spinning his wheels in regards to the technological framework he wants for this...even though it's outwardly something very simple like a web-based business.

I am, however, in agreement with Xiz, in that doing something you love, if you can live while doing it, is worth a lot. It seems to me though that you love this business.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

I've won a few contests on there, but it seems to have gotten a lot more competitive lately. It just sucks when you have an original idea that you know works better than the rest and they go for some clip-art tier shit :I I had that happen once... $500 design lost to by CLIPART!!!! But honestly it's not worth putting all your effort in, only if you have some spare time between waiting to hear back from job applications or something.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

I didn't read any other posts so idk if it's been said already.

put together a portfolio of your work and send it in to some big guys. Maybe you'll get sent somewhere by it. Think big.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

Could also give Threadless.com a try if you want to make designs for t-shirts.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

I'm sorry to hear the situation you're in :/

Based off what I read, here's what I would suggest.

For that job you said that you could find away, I'd go with that, especially if you can no longer handle the tension between you and your father. Use the time you're not at work to be working on your portfolio, sending out resumes, etc to try to get your name out there or to be working on some plan for yourself. Doing so will allow you to still show off your name on a global scale.

However, a lot of opportunities happen because of knowing the right people and those kind of things tend to happen on a more local scale (or at least they begin that way). So, another option is that you move out of Italy to places where there are more opportunity (whether that be NA or wherever.) That way you can physically meet people, go to an interview the next day of someone requests, etc.

I know I'm not being much help, mostly because the only person who understands your situation the best is yourself. In the end it's your decision. I do wish the best for you though, good luck in whatever choice you make.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

Ok so here's some updates on this

Yesterday was a really tough day and it's gonna be like this for a while. After one of the most emotionally distressing discussions of all my life, i told my father i no longer want to continue working here. As a result, i am prompted to gather all of my stuff and bring it away. I'll keep coming half day until september so the change isn't so drastic. Both my parents are shocked but in all honesty all they are doing is try to support me through this decision. Now i have to find means of making money. Even though the crisis in italy is pretty severe, through a friend from the italian ITG community i already found a spot in the north of Italy, inside a company which is currently anaffected by the crisis and going pretty strong. I'll send a curriculum by the end of the week and get in contact with the human resources manager really soon. Only issue i have is i'm broke as fuck, so from now on i'll save every little money i can, and will try to sell out some useless stuff i have lying around. In the meanwhile i have to help my mother who is in serious debts... It's gonna be tough but i'm gonna do it. Wish me luck.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

good luck brother, i'll take care of stepping stones for now - you focus on assembling your life together first ok?

thumbs up

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

oh my God, I had no idea about this. I wish you and your family the best of luck on making it through a really tough time.

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

yo mollo i know youre not religious at all but i looked up my church's meetinghouses throughout Italy that are all over your country here. every single church has a bishop, and what we call a Bishop's Storehouse which is essentially temporary free groceries for anybody going through a tough time to help them get back on their feet. it doesnt matter at all if youre from another church/muslim/jew/agnostic/atheist there will be people wanting to help others out.

all you would need to do is show up on a random sunday afternoon and talk to any stranger to help you find the bishop and the bishop will hook you up on the spot. no obligation to join the congregation whatsoever

also some of our chapels have Employment Resource Centers and will work with anyone to help find work relating to your skills

good luck bro

Re: FFR, i am at a crossroads in my life. Need some opinions.

I would suggest doing what adlp said seeing as you could use any bit of help you can get. They will most definitely help you with what they can, free from any sort of unwanted pressure about joining. They genuinely just want to help those in need. Good luck either way brotha.