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Resume Tips For Jobs
JerseyTom writes "SAGEWire reports that with the economy speeding
up, more and more people
are freshening up their
resumés. They've printed an article by Tom
Limoncelli, co-author of TPoSaNA, that offers specific advice for geeks writing resumes." 'Course, I'm not sure how much I believe the economy speeding up - but still good information.,
1: Try and sound interesting in your Hobbies / Interests section, you'll just come across as a twat. Be honest. And DON'T mention Stanley Kubrick. Everyone does that!
2: Go too far ahead in 'Career Objectives'. Think 2 or 3 years, not 10!
3: Forget to spell check the thing.
Last time I had to update my CV, it took about a week in order to get all my skills in an easy to read, yet eye-catching format.
:)
I never realised all I had to write was
404 Error; Page not found.
Right then, lets send this baby off
Don't write a 10 page essay about your previous jobs
I'm not sure about the economy speeding up, but I freshened up MY resume because I got laid off. I would hazard a guess that many people are doing the same. They've either been laid off, or are still worried about losing their jobs in the near future.
bytesmythe
Hypocrisy is the resin that holds the plywood of society together.
-- Scott Meyer
What economy are they referring to? Certainly not the American economy...
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
DO NOT put an "Objective" section at the top of your resume, they're all bullshit, never relevant and only limiting, and when you hand someone your resume, your objective is simple - TO GET A JOB FROM THEM.
You have 2-4 inches to catch someone's eye - if you've got a college degree put it there, and next, put your most relevant work experience.
customize your resume for the job you're applying for.
... hi bingo
you can always add "did volunteer work rating messages submitted to a public web site. Work involved reading posted comments, deciding quality and relevance of posting, and moderating accordingly. Also did oversight work rating moderators performance."
or
"managed a wide area information distribution network involving the exchange of compressed aural and adult entertainment products. Work involved maintenance of clandistine anti-detection systems and frequent network reconfigurations for various Internet service providers".
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
I'm getting laid off today...
Don't forget, you must lie and the employer must believe, right before the end of the interview you tell that you've lied in your resume and all over the interview.
The job will be yours. For sure.
-=-=-=-=
I know life isn't fair, but why can't it ever be un-fair in MY favor!?
I'm currently building my resume, and as a App Developer it is tempting to lists all the projects I worked on. In my case diversity was the thinking. To counter the overload of projects, I instead listed just the most complex projects, and also listed the other roles that I had played at the company. Uber g33k? Yeah but, I don't have to sound like one all the time.
http://whatexit.org/tal/mywritings/resumetips.html
First of all, it is no longer sufficient to simply mention that you are a programmer. It isn't even sufficient to mention that you know C++. I've seen requirements that specifically want 2+ years of experience using Visual Studio. This is the most idiotic thing I've ever seen, but that doesn't stop companies from putting that in the job description. And we all know how HR departments are. If you don't have exactly what they're looking for, you don't get called back.
Another thing is the certification hang-up. I've known people with certifications that don't know sh*t, but that won't stop them from getting a job before me, because I don't have any certifications. Hiring managers (particularly those who are non-technical) are fooled into believing that certifications somehow equate to a higher quality employee. It doesn't matter that this isn't true; it can easily keep you from getting a job.
Thirdly, the "Jack of All Trades" background is getting harder to place. Employers want someone with large (sometimes unreasonably so) amounts of experience in particular (sometimes obscure) areas. It used to be that having a generic background was a good thing. It meant you could easily adapt to new technologies, and had a wide range of experience to draw on for coming up with novel solutions to problems. Nowadays, employers don't want you to solve anything. They want to purchase a solution-in-a-box and hire a technician (not really a programmer) to implement it. Finally, employers are looking for more on your resume than "I wrote some software". They want to see how you drastically reduced the running time, or saved a bunch of money, or lead a team on to beat a tight deadline, save money, and make the manager look like a champion. Remember: they aren't hiring you to just get a job done. They are hiring you so that they can pad their own resumes with accomplishments that you pulled off. So, make sure that the things on your resume support what your potential manager would want on his resume.
After all this, I would like to mention that I am starting to feel burned out, and am looking towards getting back into academia. I'd rather do research than spend the rest of my life feeling like a corporate flunky.
bytesmythe
Hypocrisy is the resin that holds the plywood of society together.
-- Scott Meyer
I'm not asking for much. I just want a chance to live at least as well as I did with no income at college (meaning: don't starve, basic cable, internet, and shelter), not default on my loans, and most importantly to me gain experience toward building a better career. I'm looking for an opportunity, not compensation.
Screw the job market. I'm going back to the college life, late nights, late mornings, parties, beautiful women everywhere, lots of beer, and no drug tests. In a few years, I'll have at least a Master's, but that's only if I completely fail to achieve a PhD. Screw the job market. Screw the job market. Stay in school. A teaching assistantship + college lifestyle if far superior and better for your future than developing an ulcer at 23 trying to get an entry level job.
"Slashdot Reader" is probably a bad thing to put on your CV as a "hobby". I'd imagine (...whistle... makes sure boss aint around...) that alot of people spend alot of time on slashdot.
"Slashdot Poster" is probably a v.bad thing to put on your CV... unless you've got alot of karma.
Indicating your Slashdot Karma level on your CV (Character Recordsheet) is probably a good thing... but this also implies Slashdot poster... which is a good thing... but it implies that you're a slashdot reader... so you're buggered.
I'll probably get modded down as flamebait for this. Have at ye fowl moderator.
DO NOT put an "Objective" section at the top of your resume, they're all bullshit, never relevant and only limiting, and when you hand someone your resume, your objective is simple - TO GET A JOB FROM THEM.
Put an Objective on there--but make it relevant to your career search. Do you want a long-term job that will last you to retirement? Do your plans only focus on the short-term now? Do you want a part-time job to support you while you go to school?
I'd recommend a general objective, instead of customization per company. Use the cover letter for that--to display your interest in and knowledge of the company. Your resume should be static, so it feels honest and trustworthy, and they don't think that they're lying.
(So call Apple or MS or Be or whomever "the greatest" in the cover letter, not the resume...)
Oh, and keeping it consice sounds good to. One page is a good limit for a physical resume; if there's extraneous stuff (education breakdown, career breakdown, hobbies) that are relevant but not essential, pt them on the back or leave them out.
Want to look good to the idiots in HR? LIE. And I mean LIE. I've seen H1Bs and absolute total slackers (high-school dropouts, even) do it for years, and they get some pretty cushy jobs.
Do you have more years experience in a language/program than it existed? Yes, you do have 9 years of Java experience and 550,000 lines of code written, 15 years of HTML, 4 years of Windows 2000 Professional, etc.
Did you never graduate, or even go to college? No problem -- just put on your resume that you graduated with a BS in CS from RIT, Georgia Tech, or whereever.
Lie liberally -- the companies hardly check anything unless you're going to be CTO or something, and if they do find out you're lying, it's not like you're going to get arrested; simply move on until you find a company that buys it.
What exactly is the difference between a Resume and a CV ?
CV == Curriculum Vitae; generally it includes more emphasis on academics and less on positions held.
But the two terms are used more or less interchangeably now, so (modulo the usual rules about customizing your resume to the job) you can generally just use the same sheet regardless of which they ask for.
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
...so that it sounds like an achievement.
e.g. Was a member of a team that selected a new problem management tool
becomes
Selected a new problem management tool
Do this on every line and use bullet points.
BYU
All things in moderation; including moderation
I can't tell you how many resume's we see that have *gross* spelling errors or serious grammar issues. Plus, we get a ton of resume's without cover letters. I know some companies don't require this, but when you read that a job description says "send resume and cover letter to..." then it's a good idea to include it.
People aren't handing jobs out anymore and there's alot of competition for them now, even for really qualified and experienced people, so that means you have to compete for the job, which also means you have to actually put effort in to getting it.
We just filled a sys admin job where we interviewed almost 30 candidates. We actually had guys showing up in shorts, torn jeans and t-shirts. I mean come on folks, even though many west coast jobs aren't "tie required" most employers like to see candidates who look presentable.
Just check your work. If you don't care about the job you're applying for, don't waste everyone's time.
-s
I don't mean that spitefully, but judging from your take on the work world, it seems obvious. You see, what you point out as reasons for critisism, many would point out as simple facts that exist in a professional environment. I personally (from my perspective specifically) do not find it the least bit odd that companies are placing more value on specific skill sets as they need them rather than a "jack of all trades". Of course the person that you will report to wants to hire someone who is going to make them look good. They are judged based on the quality of the staff that they hire. I also have a beef with certification whiners. My take on the topic is simple. I don't go out and get certifications for the sake of getting them. If someone that I am trying to get work from (as a consultant) is looking for a particular cert, then I spend the few hundred bucks, take the stupid tests and get the piece of paper. It's still nothing more than a piece of paper, but it is also a marketing edge. I have found that most of the people who whine about certs being "useless and trivial...no real indicator of skill" are usually afraid to go take the test becuase they are unsure they could pass it. I'm sorry, but if it's so trivial and meaningless and so easy that someone with know real knowledge can get the thing, then go get the cert if that's what the hiring managers want to see. It has nothing to do with being a corporate flunky, it has to do with marketing your self. Short of starting your own business, you will have to work for someone. That being the case, you submit your self to their rules. It's their field, their game, their ball, their money, their equipment, their risk. You may be a hell of a player, but like it or not, the company doesn't live or die at the hands of some whiney prima donna. So, all that being said, I again must agree with you that academia is a fabulous place for you.
This is a shameless advertisment of my bosses free tips on how to get a job in general. If you're looking for a job in Germany, Austria or Switzerland, these tips might be of help to you. Of course you'll have to be able to read german.
Tipps & Tricks zur erfolgreichen Stellenbewerbung
I first wrote a real resume (i.e., not just a high school assignment) about 10 years ago. I spent a lot of time worrying about the format and language. Up until recently, every time I updated it, I assiduously read tips given by job-hunting and other professionals. I spoke with friends who were technical writers and document design specialists. Earlier this year I read a few books on it and asked all my professional friends and a few unprofessional friends and finally, and after much ado the conclusion I came to....
The advice is often useless.
Well, not totally useless. But very, very subjective. Some people will tell you to put in an objective. Others will tell you it's irrelevant. Some people will tell you hobbies are irrelevant; others will tell you it shows a holistic person who'll have more to give to a job. Some people will tell you being holistic is important; others will tell you that focus on skills relevant to the job is all that matters. Some people will tell you to use action buzzwords; others will tell you those will get you dismissed as a charlatan. You get the idea.
My guess is they're all correct. Resume design is an art, not a science. Every person looking at your resume is looking for different things from a slightly different perspective. I've come to the conclusion that there's no set of tips you can follow to get you a resume that will get you in the door. You just have to design and refine as professionally as possible, think a little bit about your audience, and hope the message you intended to send gets across.
And sometimes I think that your own judgement may be as important as someone else's. If you walk into an interview with a resume you are confident in, that's a good precursor to success.
This is the result of my thinking. Feel free to send/post critiques of the thing. Or job offers, for that matter.
Tweet, tweet.
At my company we run Exchange 5.5 and all resumes are sent to a public folder. We just went through a lay off. So just in case I needed some tips I copied the entire public folder into my personal folders in MS Outlook. You should be able to do the same thing in Lotus Notes or any other email system where resumes are sent to a central location.
My three advices
/. effect than make sure you put that down on your resume.
/. team: next time you may want to send a friendly reminder to the site that is about to be /. so that they can prepare.
Speaking of advices, here are mines:
1) Advice to IT people: if you can build me a website that can handle a
2) Advice to SAGEWire IT people: your website site needs some tune up.
3) Advice to Hemos and
Karma stuck at 50? Add 2-5 inches.. err.. 2-5x Karmas Count to your pen1es.. err.. Karma all naturally and private
You have 100 applicants for one position. You have limited time to sort through them all. So when you see a resume that has an error in it, or is three pages long, or doesn't speak specifically to the job you're hiring for, you can it immediately, with out even bothering to read it.
If a job applicant can't even take the time to tailor the resume to the job I'm offering them, then why should I bother reading it? If the applicant doesn't take the time to spellcheck something as critical as a job application, then they probably will miss other important details on the job. Sure, not everyone is a good speller. But everyone has the ability to correct their spelling.
If a resume has a generic objective statement, it's going in the circular file. Employers want to know that you've actually taken the time to show them in your resume how your goals and your skills match what the company is looking for. You don't have to lie or exaggerate, you just have to articulate your goals and skills in a way that they can understand, given their own organizational leanings.
One of the best things you can do is to have someone else read your resume. Have a friend who isn't afraid to be critical read it, checking for errors and overall flow. Writing is as much a skill as programming, and if you are a good writer, it's always helpful to have someone check your work.
Electronic methods are great for employers, because they allow for huge keyword-based searches. But the object here is to get your resume noticed, so that it gets read, so that you get called in for an interview. While the resume is a filtering tool for the hiring company, for you it's sole aim is to land you that critical first interview. From there, it's all about your opportunity to sell yourself, and the resume is practically meaningless.
So where possible, send a hard copy of your resume, along with a cover letter tailored exactly to the company you're attempting to get a job with. Research the company, show them that you're actually interested in what they're doing. This shows the hiring party that you don't just see this as another potential job out of 500 that you're applying for.
If you can't send hardcopy, try to use an electronic cover letter (depending on which online resume service you're using, you may or may not be able to do this). The cover letter is helpful because it is seen *before* the resume. In essence, it is your opportunity to intercede and present yourself as a valuable hire, before they even see your qualifications.
Finally, getting a job through want-ads, either online or off, is the worst way to get hired. It's all about connections - if you know someone at the company, even distantly, attempt to use that connection to obtain an informational interview first. Make a personal connection with someone in the department you'd like to be hired for, and your odds of bypassing the "needle in a haystack" hiring process are much higher.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
Something a lot of people out there need to do is build up a solid network of friends and contacts, moreso than anything else. A solid recommendation from someone inside an organization will go farther than anything else; there is more than a grain of truth to the fact that the good jobs never make it to a forum like Monster. Especially so in today's economic climate.
/. crowd do not represent the demographic who sell themselves best :).
It's worthwhile to keep business cards. It's worthwhile to go out of your way to socialize with people in your industry. Go to trade meetings when you can. Hell, get involved in some open source projects where you can meet some people.
Learning to sell yourself is the biggest thing. A resume is part of that, but it's only a part. Unfortunately, the
..don't panic
Thirdly, the "Jack of All Trades" background is getting harder to place. Employers want someone with large (sometimes unreasonably so) amounts of experience in particular (sometimes obscure) areas. It used to be that having a generic background was a good thing.
I have heard the opposite from a training institute instructer and IT placement specialist (although they may be biased somehow).
They said that mostly small companies are hiring, not larger ones at this point in time. These small companies *do* want a jack-of-all-IT person because they don't have a big enough staff for specialists that we are used to (DBA, programmer, network specialist, help desk, etc.).
Thus, I am getting conflicting information.
I would also like to see a forum/story on making a *backup* career for oneself being that IT tends to be very recession-sensative.
Table-ized A.I.
I get a lot of conflicting information about tuning IT resumes for this tech depression.
:-)
Is there any statistical analysis of what works and what doesn't? (Probably not because too few people are being hired to produce good data
Heresay is nearly useless if it is all over the map. How about advice from people who have recently gotten hired, at least. Posting successful resumes (minus address, etc.) would be nice.
Table-ized A.I.
-AMEN-. My resume is three pages (shut up), but a significant portion of the second page is my currect position, and all the projects I've 1. managed, 2. did solo, 3. did in my down time and then released to the company.
I have some 30 lines -just- for my current job.
And never, EVER lie. You will be caught.
Amen to this one, too. You never know how many of your references will be called, and you also never know how thorough a background check your prospective employer may do, either. -Especially- if you're looking at a University job, or something with the feds.
One more thing: In addition to not lying, -don't- sell yourself as having skills that you don't really have. You want to get bitten? Get a job based on having Java skills, and then have to write a 10k line application in 3-6 months. Good Luck.
for my site
CV Wrting tips and more
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Ever hired anybody? Ever sifted through a pile of even 10 just resumes a day, especially while you're trying to code something on your own?
Yes, you have 1" to catch my eye. You don't catch my eye with education (the piles are already sorted by BS, MS, etc) You don't catch my eye with experience; I want to know what you want to do, not what you did (you are, after all, hiring for the future, not the past). If you sound interesting, I'll read what you've done.
You ESPECIALLY don't catch my eye with a multi-page resume if you've worked any less than 10 years. This means you're a babbling idiot who can't summarize properly. This means you'll write lousy memos, ramble on at meetings, and aimless documentation (all of which I've seen, amazingly enough all with multi-page incoherent resumes). The memo part is key. People won't listen to you if you can't write a good memo.
Yes I have 10 years experience. Yes my resume is 1 page with a clear objective. Yes when my dot bomb went under I was somehow only out of work for roughly a week (admittedly after taking a month of voluntary vacation), fending off offers from both coasts, where everybody else is suffering.
Coincidence?
- Matt
but seriously, in my field (industrial design) your resume is meaningless. its all about your portfolio of work. i know kids that didnt even graduste that got top jobs because they had a hot portfolio. whats my point, employers want to see what youve accomplished, not the paper slips youve accumulated.
I want 2D games back.
Avoid spelling mistakes and typos. Come on folks, this is a resume. If you misspell something, then your chances just got cut in half. Once we were interviewing for a documentation person, and she misspelled 3 words on her resume. She had no chance after that.
A good tip about experience with different things is to rate your experience. I know on mine, I broke up technical experience into three categories: experienced, some knowledge, familiar. That way when you say "familiar with dbase" you can expand on that in the interview to tell them exactly what "familiar" means.
Know what you say you know. We were hiring someone into our QA group, and we were testing on Unix servers. We had to have someone with Unix experience. One guy had the word "unix" in several places on his resume, but when we got him in the interview, he couldn't even answer my basic questions. (what is your favorite shell in Unix?) He asked me what I meant. He didn't know what shell scripting was, but he thought he could learn it. Then came the blunt questions "how well do you know Unix?" He said "pretty well". Guess what, for proclaiming to know Unix and not knowing a damn thing about it, he got to see the door.
Don't put the standard, tired, canned crap on your resume (Objective, hobbies, etc). Believe me, they all start to look the same. What you say in your objective really doesn't help at all, it can only really hurt you. If your objective isn't worded for the position you are interviewing for, then HR may not even pass your resume on. And if I want to know your hobbies, I'll ask you about them in the interview. And printing your picture on it is dumb. Being "clever" for the sake of being clever probably won't help.
Show that you know how to use your experience, put down some quick details about projects that you have worked on (# of people on the project, the type of project, etc) Don't go into too much detail, but don't just say "coded in C". Be specific, but not boring. If you read what you wrote, would some questions about it come to mind? (and not - what the hell does that mean?) Pretend to have been interested in past projects, even if you weren't. Nobody wants to hire someone who is just there to get a paycheck and doesn't care about what they are doing.
Be honest. Really, that is about it. Don't blow smoke up anyone's butt, don't interview as someone you are not. Be yourself, that is who they should be hiring. If you aren't right for the job, then it is because you aren't right for the job, not that you didn't put on the right game face.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
- Make it look nice. If it looks like crap, I think your code looks like crap. Marketing is critical here.
- Don't include every technology you've ever touched. If you do, I love calling people on their tech knowledge. You've used Intermedia, interesting. Tell me, what's the function of a stemmer and how does it work in Intermedia? Don't be too agressive. You cannot know everything.
- If you put multiple tools or editors down, make sure you know them. I used to ask people what they liked about a Visual Cafe over JBuilder, and, more importantly, why. If they used BEA and Websphere, great, tell me why I would use one or the other. If you can't do that, then you don't know the tools.
- IMHO Certifications quite frankly are crap. They show you can take tests, not that you understand the tools or languages. Mention them later, not at the top.
- A style note: use verbs!!!! Developed, Created, Architected, Designed, Coded, Documented etc. Do not use sentences. I was responsibile for is a banned phrase.
If you have any other questions or comments, just let me know. Hope it helps....tizzyd
With all the resume tips being posted, heres another.
Keep it under 4 pages. I dont care if you have 25 years of experience, keep it 3 or fewer pages. I personally watched my manager THROW AWAY a bunch of 5-6 page resumes he had. Too much information. No one cares what you did in 1983.
siri
The current job situation in the IT industry reminds me of the energy industry nearly two decades ago. At that time, I was graduating with a bachelor's degree in geology and was looking forward to employment in an oil or mineral exploration company.
Then the price of oil dropped to less than $20 a barrel.
The immediate fallout was that oil and mineral companies put a hiring freeze on new undergraduates. Several of them were holding on to their graduates and PhDs in the hope that oil prices would recover leaving them with a core exploration group to field when it was needed.
It wasn't long before energy companies started laying off the people with masters degrees and, soon, the PhDs. In short, there was blood in the streets. The old joke was renewed: "Why did the guy with a bachelors in geology fail to get a job at McDonalds? Because he didn't have his PhD."
I couldn't stand the idea of going back to school. I was tired of school (starvation) and wanted to start working again. I gathered up all of my networking contacts and pressed them hard for any job available. None of them were offering jobs in geology. So I started looking in other related industries.
I figured that if I could get inside of Exxon or Shell, then I could post for internal positions when they started arriving. My foray into the petrochemical industry started with a job in a small formaldehyde plant. I was the only operator with a degree. Heck, I was the only one in the plant with more than a high school education. That experience, however, gave me an in-road into another field - industrial hygiene. I went from plant to factory performing routine studies of industrial exposure to workplace hazards.
After a few short years, I had learned enough about the field that I considered certifying as an industrial hygienist.
But I found an ad in a local newspaper that was offering a job as a well-site geologist who had industrial safety training. Because I had taught industrial safety as a hygienist, I got the job. It was a lateral move with fewer benefits and was a contract position. But it was in geology, a field I had long given up hope of getting a job.
I was eventually hired on permanently and have been here for the last 10 years. I now have more work than I can perform myself. I will have to farm the excess out to people who have more education and work experience than myself.
The point? Don't stop working just because you've graduated and can't get entry-level work in your field. The IT field will eventually shake out the deadwood and under-qualified. If you continue to keep your skills up, the day will come when your skills are not only needed, they are hard to find. This translates into greater job security than if you were to have taken the first job you could find in your field only to be laid off 8 months later.
Don't give up.
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
There was a guy on IRC just yesterday, presented the channel his resume...
Interests and activities:
System level programming, networks, viruses, hacking, mail bombing, mail faking, Denial of service, password cracking, trojans, software reverse engineering.
I mean, dude!
The sad thing is, he was serious about it.
everybody hates job-hunting, so my advice is to make it like a role playing game. you "roll up" a resume and send it off to do battle with various hr creeps. if you "win" (get the job) you gain some experience and skills that you add to your character.
/dev/urandom
right now my resume looks like this:
name: frymaster
class: paladin (web)
level: 6
alignment:
str: 12
int: 16
wis: 15
dex: 17
char: 9
hp: 45
bonuses:
+9 vs. enterprise applications
+4 vs. venture capitalists
spells:
exercise stock options
exorcise stock options
dispell windows
summon libraries
banish end user
read documentation
evangelize
skills:
hide in office (+20)
comment code (+10 elvish)
languages:
java, php, elvish
2 1337 4 u!
The unemployement figures dont count people who stop looking for various reasons. The link suggest over three million may have stopped looked already in the current recession. A more accurate way is to look at Bureau of Labor total payroll figures which seems to be falling.
An engineering friend of mine is trying a different approach. Rather than learning to smile better, lie better, and shave better, he is using technology itself:
He is putting a timed spring on the back of his resume. (Actually, it is kind of a flipper, penguin-like even.) When they toss his resume in the trash, it pops back out onto the top of the desk at night. It has multiple reloads so that it can pop back out multiple times.
If it works, I am going to buy a set.
Table-ized A.I.
Besides, as I'm sure you know, my point wasn't that people who submit poor resumes are worthless. My point was that hiring managers have only a limited amount of time to go through a lot of resumes. Unfortunately, if you make errors on your resume, it is quite likely that your resume won't be seriously evaluated.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
First off, nobody should look for a job without reading Nick Corcodilos' excellent Ask The Headhunter.
Second, think like a hiring manager. Remember that the hiring manager has 50 resumes in a folder that HR has dumped in his lap, or worse, 50 emails that have been forwarded from HR.
Tell me, as a manager, exactly what you can do for me. This might mean some extra work on your part customizing a copy of your resume, and of course writing a job-specific cover letter. DO IT. Don't skimp here.
I want to know exactly what the applicant can do to help me out. Make a thumbnail sketch of what you are. The top of my resume looks like this:
Five lines sum up my background and experience, and highlight my key skills. Compare this with the standard meaningless "Objective" heading. Besides, "To obtain a position as a developer that will utilize my skills & experience" is just cargo-cult resume writing.Other little notes from my resume sins file:
Ask The Headhunter makes the key point that managers WANT to hire you. They want to find someone that they can hire so that we can all get back to doing real work. Make it easy for me to see that you are the person for the job.
>
> It depresses everybody it seems and they hunker down and don't spend. Plus, higher oil pricess.
In the short term, yes.
Which is why I say, once we've got our men and materiel in place, let's get the damn war started already.
Once the war's over with, and we've seized the oil fields (and/or turned them over to allied nations), oil drops to $20 (or less!), and we've got 40-year-low interest rates. Then the economy can recover.
I'd much rather see that - low oil prices - used to bail out the airlines rather than another $5B in taxpayer bucks.
I've reviewed a lot of resumes. A lot. One piece of advice; write a cover letter, very brief (a paragraph!) that is costomized _specifically_ for where you are applying. Furthermore, I suggest that you touch up your resume for every job.
The point of the cover letter: to get the interviewer to read the resume, and to positively bias them towards what they read there.
The point of the resume: to get the interviewer to want to interview you.
Don't oversell any one point. It's a waste of energy. The point of your resume is not to get the interviewer to want to hire you. The point of your resume is to get the interviewer to want to interview you.
For tech jobs, make sure you have a "buzzword" section. Little to no prose is acceptible in this section. We interviewers have short attention spans. It's common for us to use a yellow hiliter and simply hilite your technical skills. It's quite possible that we can make the decision to interview you on your cover letter alone. To wit:
"
Dear Sir or Madam,
I noticed that XYZ widget company is looking for a skilled senior XXX engineer. I've long had an interest in your company, and I'm enthused with the work that you've done, particularly in the area of ZZZ research. I have up-to-date skills in XXX-A, XXX-B, and XXX-C. Let's schedule an interview to see how it would be possible for me to contribute to your team.
--[Signed, hotshot]"
Anyway, hope this helps.
C//
If you are over 30, you should have a two page resume. If you can only fill a one pager after 8 years in the real world, you will probably not get a sniff.
I work in Personnel and I hate little bitty ass fonts. It doesn't have to be special ed but I should be able to use it.
Find a unique font that looks cool.
It's the 21st century. Make it unique. Add a picture.
Aw screw it. You will be pasting into a memo field on a website anyway. Who cares what it looks like.
If you aren't part of the solution, there is good money to be made prolonging the problem
No some parts of IT tend to be recession-sensitive. The thing is to pick wisely. I can't speak for the coding side of the house having never been there. But I know that in the last few years of slow down. I as a datacomm, network infrastructure, security kind of guy have seen *no* slow down and in the past year have seen a lot of new interest. (Mostly having to do with the security side of things.) The reason so many folks in "IT" are having problems right now is because a large number of them got some kind of a cert during the bubble years and thought they were good to go. Had no love for the profession had no depth had no real understanding. And where in the I can run a windows/*nix server crowd. Well the herd go thinned. Get a good solid deep background then learn as much as possible about *every* aspect of IT and you too will be recession proof.
Cypherpunks: Civil Liberty Through Complex Mathematics. Those who live by the sword die by the arrow.
I agree that this is a huge story. I happen to think it's a big reason why the stock market's off - no imports from the Far East, no toys/clothes on the shelves for Xmas, consumer spending drops, and the last bit of the economy implodes.
So, how do I get to be a longshoreman? $100K/year for unloading big b0x3n off boats sounds like hard work, but fun, especially if this tech thing doesn't work out.
(Seriously - is it so hazardous that they have to offer that much per year to get anyone to take the job? Or is it really $50K/year, but 16-hour days with overtime results in the $100K/year figure? Or are they being grossly overpaid due to their union's militancy, and a $40K/year grunt with a Palm Pilot could do their job just as well?)
The media and my prejudices tell me it's the latter, but that convenient match-up is too convenient -- and I therefore think I'm missing something vitally important here. What piece of the puzzle am I missing?
What exactly is the difference between a Resume and a CV ?
Academics have CV's and are generally paid half what their non-academic counterparts with resumes are.
geezus fucking christ you right wing assholes are insane.
have you ever heard of the fucking "COMMERCE CLAUSE" in the FUCKING CONSTITUTION?!?!?!
you know the one that says "To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes; "
how the fuck can this be construed as to being outside of their constitutional duties, asswipe?
and in my next lesson - why supply side doesnt work.
fuck head.
... hi bingo
NO kidding dude.....I live in Denver and the market here is pretty bad for techies too. I started applying to jobs in Oregon thinking that maybe it wouldn't be as glutted....20 resumes later and not even a polite rejection letter, and I went back to school. Fuck the tech sector, I'm getting into something else.
This message brought to you by the Council of People Who Are Sick of Seeing More People.
Your practice of not customizing obviously hasn't worked for you these last five months, so why are you offering this bad suggestion to others? Tailoring your application to the position is absolutely *vital*.
I should have given a little bit more information. I spent more time tailoring from May through July. The most response I got from any organization was an automated "Thank you... we've received... we'll keep you on file" response. I spent DAYS researching some of these companies, looking up Forrester and Gartner Group reports, scouring their websites, even emailing some companies who used the product made by the company I was trying to get a job at. Lots of serious investment, no return.
Starting in August, I decided to "play the numbers" -- I sent out more resumes and cover letters, spent less time researching and customizing. I got actual responses from human beings and three interviews. That's what makes me think this tactic is more effective.
Now, the investment I made up front in spending lots of time writing and rewriting cover letters those first few months is a part of what makes me able to dash off a cover letter in under and hour. I've written the "how my skills and background can work for you" part of a letter so many times that I don't need to spend much time thinking about it anymore, unless the position I'm applying for is off the beaten path and unusually interesting.
Bottom line: the second approach has gotten me more interviews, the job of a resume and cover letter. The carefully tailored approach wasted time. I now do my careful research and preparation before the interview.
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
Know your audience. The type of job you are searching for should form your resume. It should also emphasize your strengths.
Sadly, when employers hire these days, they can truly pick among the best. Out of fourty people who applied for a temporary position I'm hiring for, seven are so talented and well fit that I'm almost down to tossing a die.
Anyhow, you should also make a good application. Write briefly about what skills in your resume you think will enable you to do a good job.
That's all I can tell you. The rest is probably position specific. Tailor yourself to the position as far as possible.
Stop the brainwash
Oh my, has Apple's Switch Campaign finally got to Steve Jobs himself? I heard that his pay was lousy, like 1USD/year, but recently he got a 40M USD bonus so that should have taken care of his itch to switch. So he's now top monkey at Microsoft, right? I heard they needed someone to keep Ballmer company.
"My name is Steve Jobs, and I run a fruit company..."
*grin* *duck* *run*
Resume Tips For Jobs
Here I was, thinking Steve had quit and needed help on his resume!
I had so many good suggestions, too!
Murphy was an optimist.
Security *is* one of the few areas that seems to be strong these days. It may be because of 9/11 fears, or just more viruses and hacking. (Maybe all the unemployeed IT people are hacking around.)
The coding side seems really down right now. About 1/2 of all coding is normally for medium-term stuff. When the economy is slow, medium-term projects often get canceled. That means that coder demand could drop to 1/2 of what it is usually at.
You don't really need coders to keep things "as is" in a company, except occasional bug fixes. Thus, a company may keep just one programmer on staff where before they had multiple.
Stalled business just don't need nor want coders. It is just not an immediate need for them beyond a skeleton staff.
Table-ized A.I.
I do it now...I support the anti-H1B visa program (Not completely, but the US has made the immigrant influx at an all time high)
Go to http://www.projectusa.org for information on this movement.
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
For those in the audience using anything more advanced than 7 bit ASCII, the correct spelling is résumé.
But are they interviews for jobs you really want and are particularly well suited to?
:)
One was nigh unto perfect for me. The other two were merely good fits. I generally don't apply for a job unless I know it's going to be somewhere where I'll contribute and enjoy putting skills to work.
My last job hunt lasted a month and I wound up with a job I love. I sent out exactly one resume after spending a day and a half on the cover letter. The cover letter detailed why this was the perfect job for me, and I the perfect candidate for the job
Would you mind posting the text? OK, emailing it?
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
My CL's, which have helped get me interviews (no job, yet) are a form of T-resume.
My 1st paragraph is short: "saw your ad in X for a Y at Z corp. Here is how I match your requirements:"
Then I have a list of skills or projects, each one directly matching a requirement listed in the ad. I choose 5 (or 6 if they are short) from a set of 30 different descriptions I have used over time. Because these are pre-written, I can put together a decent cover letter in 20-30 minutes. The last paragraph is a standard closing paragraph.
Within 10 seconds of starting to read the CL, the reader knows several things:
I don't add anything about how I'd be an asset or other general statements- those statements are too obvious and takes up room on the CL (and time in the reader's brain) Better to spend that time on capturing their attention.
Hint, they were not showing you around, they were trying to get something from you. What I don't know, but something.
I got the show around on my interview for one job, and it turned out that what they were looking for was someone to sit down and play with the system he would work with. (This was a QA job, so I got to use the product I was going to do QA on)
Remember, when they show you around the plant you need to keep your eyes open for opportunities to prove you will fit in.
Wow, all you have to do is know everything?
I'm surprised more people don't do this!
Democrats or Republicans. They are both taking us to the same place and they are not afraid of us anymore.
Only if you have a "Secret" clearance.
Democrats or Republicans. They are both taking us to the same place and they are not afraid of us anymore.
Things that "turn me off":
.
- a 10-year gap in your "activities". Either educational or in the work section. You'd better have a good explanation, and it better show on the resume: You won't get invited to tell me in person.
- Highly under-qualified work. College graduate person swapping tapes for example. Either you were very desparate for a job because everybody else was turning you down, or they figured out that that was all you were good for after a week or so, so that's what you ended up doing. It's certainly a hint when other people were declining someone a job....
- Not listing your mother tongue as a "language you master".
I'm currently interviewing people for a job: Technical, hardware/software, you have to work in Delft, The Netherlands. EE/CS college degree. Linux(unix) expertise very much a bonus. Company: Harddisk-recovery.com, send CVs to r.e.wolff@harddisk-recovery.com
Roger.
Have you read Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr?
It features, among other gadgets of a fully-automated USNA, what you are calling resumatics. In the history, it has the effect of keeping talented but disadjusted people out of the system. As in your case, in the story the disadjusted are the only sane people, but then, as the story takes the idea ad absurdum, they have no place in the economy at all. Thus they begin a Luddite revolution, together with people who do are accepted but feel unhappy about the whole thing. The revolution ultimately fails because the same people who started it end up using they creativity to fix the same machines they destroyed...
In real life, this could be part of the suicide mode big corporations tend to switch into once they start to keep insisting on missing the Cluetrain.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin