Eddie Bauer’s Search for Eric Jarvis

Background

Eric Jarvis’s story is a familiar one among FileMaker developers. Before FileMaker, Jarvis was a photographer. He needed to manage photographic assets for his business, and he identified FileMaker Pro as an ideal solution. He started teaching himself, and the more he developed his solution, the more he fell in love with the FileMaker platform. Eventually, he found himself with a homegrown vertical solution.

While at the FileMaker Developer Conference in 2018, Jarvis struck up a conversation with a career consultant from Kalos Consulting, Inc. He admitted that his passion for FileMaker had eclipsed that for his photography business, and he found himself wanting to dedicate all of his time to FileMaker development work.

Kalos got to know Jarvis, learned about his solution, and then educated him about the opportunities available to him—even without having had a long career at a FileMaker development company. Following the initial introduction at DevCon, the career consultant had a number of periodic check-ins with Jarvis as he endeavored to find a job that would be a fit for what he was looking for.
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Process

Some time went by, and Kalos was asked to begin a candidate search on behalf of Eddie Bauer, who had been on the hunt for a new FileMaker developer for ten months. The consultant who had been working with Jarvis recognized that Eddie Bauer’s FileMaker solution had a lot of similarities to Jarvis’s as both were essentially asset management.

Jarvis probably wasn’t the most qualified developer that Kalos submitted to Eddie Bauer based solely on past experience and development pedigree. He did not know as much SQL as some of the other candidates, but his experience using SQL with his own solution was very similar to what Eddie Bauer needed.
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Results‍

At the end of the day, specific skills ended up being more important than vast experience. Jarvis also had the soft skills and personality fit that every employer is looking for. He proved this during his first interaction with Eddie Bauer, and they quickly set up a second interview on-site. Instead of having his skills rigorously assessed, Jarvis said the on-site interview felt more like he was just getting to know his new colleagues.

Eddie Bauer had been looking for Eric Jarvis for ten months, and it took Kalos Consulting about 30 days from the time they took on the job to the time they closed it with Jarvis. After years of pursuing FileMaker development and honing his skills on his own, Jarvis connected with Kalos, and six months later, they landed him his dream job.