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Joel Rants About Resumes
rbrandis writes "Mr. Spolsky's latest rant is about writing a resume that will be read "Please do not use cover letters that you copied out of a book. If you write 'I understand the position also requires a candidate who is team- and detail-oriented, works well under pressure, and is able to deal with people in departments throughout the firm' then at best people will think you're a bullshit artist and at worst they will think that you were not born with the part of the brain that allows you to form your own thoughts and ideas.""
Maybe the problem is that after sending out 6000 resumes and cover letters only to receive rejects letters from about 40% while being completely ignored by the rest has led me to believe that spending a great deal of time on each application/resume/cover letter I send out for Yet Another Job Opening would consume an amount of time equivelent to a full-time job? The amount of time I spend on a resume/cover letter package depends on how much I want the job. If it's a job I would use just to pay the bills, I e-mail it to you. If it's my dream job that I have no chance in hell at every getting, I send it out printed on cotten with a calogne-laced envelope.
But thanks for "keeping my resume on file" anyway...
...you find yourself even *thinking* of using the word "proactive" - just give up now.
make sure you don't write exactly the same letters. I, as the owner of a medium sized webhost often compare them to those of others in the same business and it is not considered good practice to simply copy it over and over again. At least adapt a few words.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Deal, no more generic bullshit answers. Now when to the bullshit questions and requirements stop? I've seen job requirements that required experience in products less than a week old (W2K3 Server), and bullshit questions like "what is your greatest weakness". Cut it all out, sounds great to me.
There was a guy that applied for a programming job. He wrote on his resume that he knew C++ and C since he heard about those classes in college. So naturally he figured that there must also be C+ language and wrote it into his resume. The HR looked at his resume and lo and behold .. he was hired.
Sometimes they do look for a conformist that will work hard and implement company policy without asking to many questions. In those cases a well written and not to bold resume/CV could help. Unfortunately you dont have much chance of knowing that until after the interview.
This is my sig, show me yours
A great cover letter won't even help you get the resume passed to the person who is doing the hiring.
Even if you're CEO of something as famous goatse.cx, it's not going to get you much love. Team experience counts for a lot these days.
Go somewhere random
Having been responsible for the interview process, I have to agree with 95% of Joel's comments. I also used e-mail as the principal method of communication, because it allowed me to drag and drop organize an otherwise unruly pile of paper.
While I never saw an application that said "hire me d00d" from Yahoo, as he seems to be quoting, I saw some pretty awful stuff. The fact of the matter is most jobs will generate far more interest in the position than it is possible to interview through, so a good resume is your only hope of getting to the phone interview in my book.
In my experience, 50% of all applications (or more) are either:
a) Unqualified: why are you wasting your time? If I ask for C++ experience, your VB skills are probably not going to help debug the memory leaks you create.
b) Illiterate: I'm a poor speller too, but I found "spell check" and a proofreader, why can't you?
c) Inflexable: my favorite category. "I work from home in California, and telecommute" isn't going to fill position in southern Arizona. I was shocked by the quantity of these in 1999, heyday of stupid applications.
I do however make some allowances for international applicants. Some of my best finds were people with 80% command of English, but 100% command of C++, architecture and design. I'm willing to work with a language barrier, so I thought he was a bit agressive in that area.
Sig under construction since 1998.
Even if you do everything Joel Spolsky says, you're still going to have a demoralizing, uphill battle getting a good job. (Been there, done that, got the lovely parting gifts.) So if you don't follow his advice, and you don't already know the manager (preferably in the Biblical sense), you really don't stand a chance.
Do not lie. Lies are eventually revealed, you waste your time and theirs.
Keep it to what's current and to the subject.
Make it readable and non-technical. It's going to be screened by HR people, they're typically really bad with technical details.
Keep a text copy, some people want to receive resumes through horrible web interfaces.
Nobody gives a crap about your hobbies, unless then involve lots of theft of past employers property, in which case they'll appreciate your candor.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
It is amazing how poor most resume submissions are. They follow the common pattern, but in doing so manage to not stand out at all.
For example, people applying for art positions (like 3D artist) will send a resume but not a portfolio. What's up with that? I could not care less where they went to school, I only care what they can do.
The cover letter is by far the most import thing in most instances. It needs to say what the applicant is capable of. What they have done that is similar. And why they want to work for the company in question (which they should show some clue about).
Don't use "Resume Writer 2.0", just sit down and write something intelligent. Put yourself in the frame of mind of the person who has to wade through the huge influx of job seekers. Think about you would want to see in a resume/cover letter.
David Whatley
It's not what you know, but who you know.
The truth shall set you free.
Sent from your iPad.
Joel's comments may be applicable when applying straight to a person within a dept. But unfortunately for many companies, the resumes are sent through HR first.
The HR people usually don't know the tecnical details about a job all that well, so they filter based on presense of Buzzwords (or so it seems a lot of the time). If you don't put the admittadly moronic "detail oriented, forward-thinking, team player" in your resume, it may not even get to the person who can actually understand what is written on the resume!
Of course this only applies to technical positions. If you are applying to a job that only asks for MS OFFICE skills, HR can probably figure it out.
So after several pages of bashing pretty much each and every applicant and resume they ever had, the little note at the bottom says (emphasis mine):
Are you a student looking for a great job next summer? Fog Creek Software, a small and friendly startup in New York City, offers summer internships in software development for Computer Science students.
Oh the irony...
Sig? What sig?
how many people have seen emails like this? they always crack me up:
of course, there was no peter mcdermott at our company, nor did our jobs@ email have any name linked to it. the jackass forgot to remove it when he cut and pasted from some other job posting response.in the words of strongbad...DELETED!
anyone else's gag reflex triggered whenever getting an email beginning with Dear Sir/Madam from @yahoo.com?
*sigh*
-fren
"Where are we going, and why am I in this handbasket?"
This is exactly why people correct other people's English mistakes. If you aren't using it correctly when you are in casual conversation (or casual correspondence, as the case may be), you might not use it correctly when it actually matters.
Sure, he understands what you mean if you write "i m interested in your job," but if you don't have the patience or care to make even that one sentence cover letter correct, why on earth would an employer want to take a chance on you?
I'm done apologizing for wanting people to speak and spell and use English correctly. For most of you, this is your native language! Why is it shameful to want to speak it correctly?
(I probably made some grammar errors in there. I'm SURE I did, and I'm sure someone will pounce on them. I proofread this, and I have spellcheck running, and I have a pretty decent working knowledge of grammar in English, so, you know, I'm trying.)
Also spell check and let an unemployed English major review it.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
Aside from things like too much information (3+ pages without any real reason to have such a long CV) and very poor layout, I've seen CVs in Norwegian written by expats where the Norwegian is well beyond abysmal. And of course in some section or other, the person in question claims to be fluent in Norwegian.
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
Same thing goes for Word's resume wizard. You can use it to get started, but if you stick completely with its format, your resume is going to look just like everyone else's. You and your work experience are different, your resume should reflect that.
Don't be afraid to take risks. One of the best resumes I've seen used color and graphics - it was definitely eye catching, and it worked, because when I called the young man back, he'd already accepted an internship somewhere else!
Blogging Weight Loss, Distance Education, and more at verlin.com
Buzzwords. Acronyms. Keywords.
In anything much bigger than a 2-person shop these days, resumes pretty much just go unread into a database. They are only seen by a human if they match a retrieval request. For that to happen, you have to have the keywords that the hiring manager typed.
The rest doesn't much matter. If a retrieval doesn't match your resume, it will never be retrieved, and will never be read by a human.
One thing still missing from the databases: They need information on how long a given acronym, uh, I mean product, has been out. This would cut down on managers looking for five years experience on something that was released less than a year ago.
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them."
It's hard enough to remember my opinions, never mind the reasons for them..
While I understand his frustrations, the reality is that there are a lot of people--*especially* a lot of techies--out there looking for work. And spending the time/energy to develop a complete narrative cover letter for each position you send your resume to is simply time prohibitive.
I'm willing to bet that 99% of people who are looking for work right now are taking a "shotgun" approach. This isn't the *best* way to get your resume out, but it is the quickest. And if you're looking to get your foot in the same door as several hundred others, speed counts. As does as much exposure as possible--hoping that somewhere, somehow, your resume will generate interest.
Ultimately, the best way to generate interest is to carefully research the company you're submitting to, the position, check for networking opportunities (very important!), etc. But this isn't always practical--and it's tough to tell how much extra attention that will generate. From the job seeker's standpoint, sometimes "shotgun" is the most practical, even if it doesn't generate as much interest each time it's sent out.
Gifts for Geeks - Stuff that really matters!
Comedy is best when semi-factual.
When was the last time this guy sent out resumes? Jeez...
How about "Even stupider". Stupider? No such word. The form "Even more stupidly" would be correct in the context he's using.
C'mon - for once the grammar trolls can have a field day with this and still be on-topic. From my point of view, the phrase "people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones" comes to mind.
Cheers,
Ian
If only the Democratic candidates had resumes better than:
* Demonstrated leadership capabilities
* Against special interests
* For the middle class
On the other hand, maybe those writing tech resumes could learn from the politicians and insert a few lines trashing the other applicants?
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
Gees. I gotta disagree, here.
First of all, what does my prospective employer have to do with what other positions I apply for?
And second, I think that shows a sign of determination and, in these times, you seem to need just that to get a job. Gone are the "one phone call to the recruiter" days of finding 50 job offers. In fact, my last recruiter called ME a few months ago looking for a position for herself...
Go ahead, apply for every job THAT YOU'RE QUALIFIED FOR, and sort through the results yourself. Get out, get noticed. If your prospective employer thinks you should sit around on your ass and pretend that you're qualified and live off of Ramen and potatos for months while you wait, then you probably don't want to work for him.
Any sufficiently well-organized Government is indistinguishable from bullshit.
I completely disagree. I get more responses when my cover letter is a song copied out of Lord of the Rings than I ever did when I included useless crap such as my qualifications.
Dear Mr. Jones,
I am very excited about this opportunity.
Clap! Snap! the black crack!
Grip, grab! Pinch, nab!
And down down to Goblin-town
You go, my lad!
Clash, crash! Crush, smash!
Hammer and tongs! Knocker and gongs!
Pound, pound, far underground!
Ho, ho, my lad!
Swish, smack! Whip crack!
Batter and beat! Yammer and bleat!
Work, work! Nor dare to shirk,
While Goblins quaff, and Goblins laugh,
Round and round far underground
Below, my lad!
Joel - in all fairness this *is* a summer internship you are receiving resumes for. These people haven't got a great deal of experience - the fact that they put time into writing a halfway decent cover letter should be a positive thing, not a reason to chuck their potentially good resume in the trash.
Or maybe teamwork and being detail oriented are both bad attributes for a software engineer?
I'm a 2000 man.
>whenever you have a comma, there is always exactly one space and it's always after the comma and never before it.
He should take his own advice and put two spaces after periods.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
I find resumes to be fairly stock and I think that's the way a lot of HR people see them. "This applicant seems to meet the criteria" and then they should pass them on to someone technical to find out how many of their listed skills are BS (not Bachelor of Science). A good HR person underlines keywords and will ask them to expound on their team-playing and weaknesses (read BS compatable strengths) in a preliminary interview. I think the point of this isn't to so much guage your usefulness as a member of a group, but to figure out how good you can blather about useless information. The ability to fluff a page of technical information into a painfully simple 4 pages of instruction manual is a useful skill (note the length of this post). To guage how well this person works in a group, you should check their references. Personally, my GPA out of college was quite craptacular, but anyone I worked for/with would speak very highly of my work ethic when you actually paid me to do stuff.
No, the biggest hiring problem in picking a developer isn't resumes, it's ties. The CS career fair at school was like an art teacher trying to explain why colors clash. Purple paisley with yellow dots, my God... two words of advice for all those job hunters out there: club stripes.
[I am certain their are incompetent, . . .]
If I were in charge of hiring you wouldn't have been hired.
Joel, as I'm sure you know, was one of the technical guys behind VBA in Excel, along with some other fairly big projects. He apparently made enough money from these gigs that he went off and started his own company, initially focusing on consulting (at the most unfortunate time to be in consulting...), and then moving into shrink wrap software. Apparently they're doing okay as they recently moved into a pretty impressive new office, still in swanky (and expensive) New York City.
Joel is a big advocate of treating developers well, and is respected for generally being pragmatic and insightful, with a humorous writing style that is informative while remaining entertaining. On the flip side, a couple of his recent posts have been blatant quid-pro-quos with some friends of his, and he's selling out a bit with the Programmer's Paradise gig.
> ...at best people will think you're a bullshit
> artist and at worst they will think that you were
> not born with the part of the brain that allows
> you to form your own thoughts and ideas.
And in either case many jobs will open up for you.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Hired for what?
Oh, I get it. Deceit and stupidity...must have been an HR position!
Any sufficiently well-organized Government is indistinguishable from bullshit.
who are with me, and thinking along with me, Who the FSCK is this idiot and why should i give a damn about what HE and his shitty firm think about resumes?
Joel:Attention, the entire population of India: whenever you have a comma, there is always exactly one space and it's always after the comma and never before it.
Entire Population of India: Uhh..?.. Fuck you?!
Rapid Nirvana
I see resumes all the time where you can tell that the writer either does not speak English very well, or suffered a serious head injury at some point. Every time I read one of these resumes, I'm reminded of Lewis Black's bit about the cop in Miami who asked him "How you money make?"
"Good Communication Skills" may be a cliche thing to put on a resume, but if you can't communicate well, in the native tounge of whatever company you want to work for, you are going to be at a major disadvantage. Especially, developers, who tend to think they can just sit in thier cube all day and not talk to anyone, need to wake up. Any job that does not require you to communicate with anyone else at your company can easily be outsourced to another country. Think about it.
Resumes (unlike slashdot posts) should be poured over again and again to make sure everything is perfect. If you don't know what "perfect" is, you need to find out. If you can't do that, why should anyone hire you?
Again and again, I see job positions for which the applicant is asked to submit a resume via a textbox in a web form. Usually, no mention is given of what format is allowed (Plain ASCII? HTML? PDF? Tex?), so one pretty much has to assume least-common denominator, and submit in ASCII. Then, one has to pray to the line-width gods that the end product (printed out? online?) will not look too horrible compared to what you just put in.
So, for those on the other side of the table, can you please implement a simple web-file-upload protocol, and tell us what format you like?
"...here's what I do with the resumes: I make three piles: Good, OK, and Bad. I give the same resumes to Michael and he does the same thing. There are always enough people that we both put in the Good pile that those are really the only people that stand a chance. In principle if we can't find enough people we like that we both rated as "good" we would consider some people who got Good/OK, but in practice this has never happened."
After my (1st) layoff, I attended a resume seminar paid for by the company. The speaker mentioned this one principle: That your resume was a tool to get the company to interview you. Not only were qualifications important, but your resume had to communicate that you were interesting or unique in some way - the point of the latter being that it would brand your resume into their minds and guarantee you an interview.
If X number of people all have basically the same qualifications and skills, and they all have decent looking resumes, the separating factor then becomes personality or uniqueness (something that would say "hey this guy would make a cool and interesting co-worker/subordinate).
Is the juice worth the sqeeze?
Its very difficult to be objective and to find a "one size fits all" sort of resume guide. Even one that is written by Joel Spolsky.
Joel has some criteria that he considers more important than others.. Fine. He's doing the hiring, it is his perogative (sp?). The thing is, not all hiring managers are ticked off by the same things that Joel rants about.
I have seen resumes with a few (minor) spelling errors that wouldn't have been caught by spellcheck make it into a short list. I've also seen letter perfect ones rejected. Obviously, some managers scan through and look for work experience and qualifications. They don't notice (or care) about "having a space only AFTER the comma" (direct quote from his rant).
I also don't completely agree with his idea that "if you don't have the right qualifications, don't apply for the job". I've applied for a job asking for 4 years experience, but I only had 2 (or a bit less). I still got the job. It is a nitpick, but if you think you're close enough, it's worth giving it a shot. Obviously, asking for a DBA and getting a COBOL programmer applying isn't ideal, but some employers are flexible about years of experience and specific technologies.
Last, but not least, I don't have a domain of my own. I use my Yahoo address and check mail on it regularly. What's wrong with using a free email service anyway ?
Sorry, Mr. Spolsky. You have good points, but I wonder if your rant deserves the publicity that it is going to get with a frontpage Slashdot story. Apologies for the rant of my own :)
Except that you are the product.
It's no use sending out resumes at random. You need to know who you are speaking to and what they need. Then, try to explain clearly why hiring you will save them money and/or provide other concrete benefits.
The hardest part is getting an interview but normally decent firms will interview several candidates. You can also call before you send your resume, find the person doing the selection, and ask them whether your CV was clear or not. This can help to get it to the top of the stack.
Last piece of advice: this is such a hard time to find tech jobs that you may be better starting your own business one way or another. Ironically, the dot-com boom was better for employees than for businessmen, and this period is the reverse.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
What you can do should be the only thing that matters, artist or not. Judging a person's achievement capacity on a bland resume is a faulty method of finding good workers, but a great way to hire good resume-writers. Iif the initial criteria restrict the applicant pool to the set of competent resume writers it may very well exclude a larger one of competent workers who lack that skill.
So, it's amazing this skill set is not available, because now they'll have to export the job offshore where apparently all the IT workers have this skill set.
Honestly, I'm surprised people look at cover letters at all, it's all fluff anyway.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
While I can emphatize with Mr. Spolsky's travails when filtering candidate resumes, he needs to consider the well-being of his company when ranting on his personal website. Spouting racists remarks about Indians and stating that he shreds resumes without any consderation are two perfectly good ways to get a not-so-nice visit from the Department of Labor. Especially when linked from slashdot -- allowing an even wider audience.
Bottom line, his resume advice is good, but his business acumen is quite lacking. CEOs and company owners do not make these kinds of remarks publically. End of discussion.
While I may not be the perfect responder as I have been looking for a career job for a while with no luck and have basically been working towards my masters in the mean time. I have hobbies listed and they are always being asked about by recruiters. Why? Because they do relate to me and my skills. The hobbies I list involve an anime convention which I am a head of staff on, and a university club I helped found on campus. Both of these reflect on organization, leadership, and management type skills which I have not had in a "professional job". And it gives the interviewer something of interest that I can use to make myself stick out more.
Sure, Mr. Spolsky is an intelligent person who is put off by that sort of resume, but he needs to remember that he is not the typical reader of resumes. The kind of boilerplate/cliche/abject nonsense business-speak that he dislikes is actually the preferred language of communication for most HR/Sales/Mgt types. That's why it exists! Think of it as a presidential campaign speech - it's INTENDED for morons.
Somebody spelt his company's name as Fag Creek.
The best planning can be done after the project completes.
"harnessed synergy to effectively utilize envoronment variables"
"able to balance time and work in a consumer-driven market"
"a team player with valuable people skills"
these are easy to make. add your own!
I agree with most of Joel's rants. I have been a rep at a local college(a highly reputable tech school) job fair numerous times.
I am truly amazed at how crappy some resumes are. Some students hand me resumes that are printed off-centered, bad photocopies, wrinkled from the folder they just stuffed it in, etc. If they can't take the time to print their resumes on quality paper and carry them in a resume binder, I tend to believe they are just as careless when they are working.
Spacing and formatting is also a huge problem. Highlight the most important aspects of your resume. When looking at hundreds of resumes in a few hours, you want to be able to easily spot education and skill set (especially when dealing with college students who have little experience).
Many applicants came to the job fair dressed in non-formal attire. This is not good. At least, wear a shirt and tie. Don't roll out of bed and throw on some jeans, take the time to look presentable.
Like Solsky says, do these factors hurt an applicant if they have they meet the necessary requirements, sometimes. When applying for a job, you are selling yourself and must put your best effort in every little detail. From resume to dress, you will be scrutinized and judged. Look your best.
100% Insightful
i wish more companies would post things like this. the thing that really got to me while applying for jobs was - there is no ideal way to write a covering letter and resume. every single time, i had to guess what the reader of my application was going to value... admittedly, i just had several different cvs and boilerplate letters which i mixed and matched. however, if people told you what they were really looking for it would spare everyone a great deal of effort.
it's like when you finally see your own credit record and find that all the esoteric stuff people tell you about get a loan and pay it back immediately, have multiple bank accounts, get a false identity... it's all crap.
here's a big tip:
when trying to get a job, if the company in question is within driving distance, drop the resume and cover letter off in person, dressed for an interview.
be sure to follow up with a call, and a snail mail letter.
... hi bingo
Oh, great. So anyone who actually writes things like "detail-oriented", "team-player", "works well with others" will pass the keyword search by the HR department, then get dismissed by the department hiring manager "because its unoriginal". So again, the only ones who make it are the ones with the inside connections.
That, and considering the intelligence of most hiring managers, if its over their head, then it MUST have been copied from a book. Its unfortunate that not everyone realizes there are actually people out there who use big words. They're not just for textbooks.
[To intrusions]
I need to find out where I can report abuse on yahoo spades.......I was tormented last night and my rating held hostage..........Yahoo is turning into the "Getto" of gaming, and I hate that......I have been playing here for a long time, but yall need to set up some kind of abuse reporting system like they have on Pogo so that nice, hard working people like me don't have to have our internet enjoyment completely ruined by the scammers..! ! !
Linda R. Phipps
Dr 51r,
Pl5 F1nd my r3sum3 nclsed 4 th3 p0z1t10n 0f sl45hd0t 3d1t0r. Fr0m r34d1ng my r35um3, y0u w1ll 5ee th4t I 4m an 3l33t pr0gr4mm3r wh0 c4n wr1t3 r34lly c00l c0d3. I 4m curr3nt1y 1n 12th gr4de l00k1ng f0r a 5umm3r j0b.
Y0u c4n f1nd m3 0n IRC a5 #3l33tdude
I l00k f0rw4rd t0 h34r1ng fr0m u.
#3l33tdude
"Mr. Ameba, your resume says that you are a multi-celled life form. Thats exactly what we're looking for!"
0xfeedface
Joel might think it's c00l to rant and use international accents all over the place, but littering his HTML with 8 bit characters is asking for someone to rant right back. If he wants an accent in the word resume he should use & eacute; without the space that /. doesn't like rather than copying and pasting his blog text from Word.
Slashdot has sunk to a new low....
Keep a text copy, some people want to receive resumes through horrible web interfaces.
Does anyone know the proper way to deal with these? Just about every web interface I've seen will screw up your resume's formatting. I when I say formatting, I don't mean tabs and spaces, I mean fscking line breaks! Some of these companies have a "build your resume" interface that they prefer, but to be perfectly honest, the process takes longer than writing your original resume to begin with.
Oh, and in case anyone's wondering: here's the worst offender
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
These aren't your hobbies, they are your qualifications, list them as such. The reason they inquire is because they see them as such, too. If you have done volunteer work (an excellent contribution to building your profile) don't list it under some category of Social Activies, put it where it belongs. Eveything you do that is related to the position you desire should be list as your qualifications, not under 'Hobbies'
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Read the minds of the people who'll be reading your resume and write what they want.
Otherwise you'll have to rely on all the contradictory tips the "experts" give you.
D does really exist
This sig under construction. Please check back later.
I have tried that, but everyone that I tried it with could not smell the calogne when they opened the e-mail.
Fight Spammers!
In a sane world, I'd be able to show up dressed in a comfortable and casual manner, and not have to play suck up. I coming to your company to design circuits, not host a freaking game show. It's ridiculous. You always know the interviewees around here because they are all tarted up and turning purple because their tie is constricting the bloodflow to their head. They are the only ones wearing suits.
And no more of this "You have a fox, a mouse and a wombat, and you must get them across a river with only a straw, a nickel and a pair of women's panties..." I guarantee I can out design, out think and out engineer someone who feels the need to ask dipshit questions like that. Is this an engineering company or Romper Room?
Ahhhh! Feh.... the hell with all of ya... bunch plastic robots...
--- Ban humanity.
E-mail is cheap, worthless. At least say that you're willing to send your portfolio/resume by mail if requested.
The owls are not what they seem
Don't like the fluff and crap on resumes? Stop posting job descriptions written in the same hyperbole.
Must be fluent in C, C++, Perl, ASP, Java, Objective C, Ada, Lisp, csh, ksh, bash, Python Fortran, Cobol and HTML. Must have a working knowledge of the entire Microsoft sortware library as well as familiarity with process systems no one but us uses. MCSE, CISSP, A+, CCIE, CUSA, Red Hat, Solaris and security clearance required.
I think he was Asian-Indian, and I imagine this has something to do with the translation of his native language to English. No, he didn't get the job. I can just imagine the front page saying, "We wish you to buy our very very very good software."
- Do not lie. Lies are eventually revealed, you waste your time and theirs.
It does amaze me how many people lie on their resume. All it takes is asking a few questions to discover the lie. Just ask them to describe what they did, stop them a bit into it, ask for more detail on X, stop them a bit into that, ask for yet more detail some part of X. If they didn't do it, they won't be able to provide the detail. I'd say about 50% of the candidates I phone screened for interviews failed this test in the first 10 minutes.People continue to lie though, so I guess they must get away with it fairly often.
Nobody gives a crap about your hobbies
... one lady wrote such a long detailed list of her hobbies that we wondered how on earth she could ever find any time to do any work ... so we didn't interview her. So, that section of her CV was useful to us.
Not quite
Many of the employers expect you to write in a certain style and that you use the fashionable words.
The same goes for the interviews. They "think" you can't market yourself if you don't have a stereotyped attitude. If you present them your own personal attitude they step back on you.
Nobody gives a crap about your hobbies, unless then involve lots of theft of past employers property, in which case they'll appreciate your candor.
/. and talk on IRC with my friends".
Not always true. Once you're past the initial interview stage and left fighting for the same position with, let's say, 5-6 top candidates, the resumes are passed to the bosses you will be working with. For many people in management it's important to see the person behind the resume, and things like hobbies and free time activities can help to judge whether the person is well-balanced and has a life beyond work.
People who have hobbies are generally a bit more passionate about their work. It also shows the employer that a truly talented person is talented in many ways, so if your hobbies include good skills in some sports or crafts, some bosses can have a tendency to prefer you to other candidates who among hobbies listed "I troll on
I'd say they get what they are asking for. When you it on a job site or paper 85% of the text is about profiling the company and 25%(if you are lucky) are about the job. When you call them on a job you really find interesting, the people to contact are almost impossible to reach and most of the time they are unwilling to talk to you.
And it bugs me, because when I do find a job that looks interesting, I want to write something that they can use.
I have been reading af fair deal of job applications so I know when you have to read through 200 mails, you have to catch people's interest in the two first lines. Don't start with your life story, start with something that tells the reader that you can offer what they need and you are relevant for the job and they will read on. But it is hard to write something they can use when all you got are their marketing speech and you might focus on the wrong things in your application.
While I agree with much of Joel's rant, his comments about Yahoo Mail footers are totally insane. In case he doesn't realize it, anything sent from Yahoo Mail accounts gets an advertising footer appended. While it's unfortunate that one of these footers describes a product competitive to Fog Creek, he should be amused at the irony rather than angry at the messenger
What he really needs is an editor to catch his sentence fragments.
Ok let's get this straight here. He's behind that bucket of farts they call VBA and he's now some guru that the /. crowd looks up to? WTF is that about? Have you guys ever dealt with VBA?
For instance all the companies looking for 10 years of experience in the full gambit, for a basic desktop support position that could be filled by most high school nerds.
Anonymous Cowards - Oh God, How I hate you
I'm getting very tired of this kind of pedantic rants, like Joe's. Sure, perhaps he means well...
But let's face it: there is no such thing as the ideal resume. I have put extensive effort in trying to find out what an ideal resume should look like. Guess what, I've got the biggest list of conflicting requirements I have ever seen in my entire career as a developer.
The target audience out there simply does not agree on what it should look like. Some want only two pages, others hate it when they can't read the details.
I simply work with a very personal resume, personal in style and content - if they don't like it, I probably don't want to work there anyway. And trust me, there are people out there who hate it when you go creative.
Probably the first one shouldn't be there at all, and the second one is unneccesary in English. BTW curriculum vitae is plural: the singular is curriculum vita, but common usage beats correct grammar all the time.
>>In most of the English speaking world it is not >>considered polite to open letters to a Mr. Joel >>Spolsky by writing "Dear Spolsky." One might >>write "Dear Mr. Spolsky," or "Dear sir," or >>perhaps, "Hi Joel!" In this part of the English speaking world we would write "Dear Sir:".
My favorite resume contained the applicant's Meyers-Briggs score. He claimed that the score was quantitative evidence that he was a highly motivated, self-starting, ... team player. After a good laugh, the resume went into the trash.
I agree with the other person who said that these aren't "Hobbies". Word and classify them in a different category as if you are a professional with 10 years experience.
> And it gives the interviewer something of interest that I can use to make myself stick out more.
Note: this might be a bad thing due to people's bias etc. "Anime? This guy is into Sailor Moon?"
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
The trick with resumes is to get noticed, but not for the wrong reasons. A resume (at least in the tech world) has to walk a fine line: you want to get past the HR people who will be looking for keywords, but you also have to prove to the tech person who will end up reading it that you are not a total tool.
My last resume worked pretty well; I sent it to 5 employers and got 3 interviews (the other 2 were, frankly, out of my league but it never hurt anybody to aim high). The 3 interviews got me 2 offers, and I have a job from one of them.
From the resumes and cover letters I've been seing lately, I would offer this advice to job seekers:
Anyways, that's just me and YMMV. Selling is easy it just takes the will to close the guy.
All's true that is mistrusted
For example many years ago I was working in computational chemistry. In my spare time at home I tinkered with computer graphics. Now I have a career in digital visual effects.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
I interviewed 27 times before landing a job. And after a few years in that job, I reviewed resumes and sat in on interviews.
What I hated most (and what I was guilty of myself as an applicant) was how no one ever took the time to find out about our firm. They didn't even know what it was we did, even AFTER they got the interview. This is why the shotgun approach doesn't work unless you are a rare value in which case you won't be sending resumes out anyway because people will be pounding on your door.
How I got the job was I finally got a brain. I had myself videotaped during a mock interview and I watched myself and saw all the stupid and distracting and anxious things I did. I researched the places I was applying for, reading newspaper articles about them and the people who worked for them. I tailored my application to exactly what they did, highlighting work I had done that was relevant.
I was told during the interview that I'd get the job. After months of going city to city, what a high! I made shitloads of money, got great experience, and left on my own terms 3.5 years later to work for myself.
A thorough understanding of virtual post-morph open-source aggregate can unleash ROI, and empower mission-critical real-time marquee partners.
Colaboration of interfaces, while utilizing next-generation schemas will e-track butterfly hub initiatives. I find B2C benchmarks directly lend themselves to a path to profitability in an interactive way.
And I totally can use Exel, Internet, and Print Card Maker!!!
Nobody in the hiring process cares!
Please, please do not fax an 8x10 photo of yourself!
Three Squirrels
Somebody kick this guys ass. Freaking nerd.
You're a failure as a human.
I'm dying to meet the guys in charge of the resumes there : sure enough they'll be pretty cool.
Jokes apart, this guy really makes me the impression of a overly-frustrated guy that whips himself incousciously because he received some letter telling him that his resumes were plain shit.
Honestly, who is this fucking guy to be so ruthlessly mocking about people ?
Don't get me wrong : I never wrote a resume. But being so overzealously critical towards the Indian community for example... blaming people for making typing mistakes when he sincerely wishes to read human papers. Fuck.
I mean I can understand that this is a pretty boring part of his job, but at least he could be making fun of these people in a gentle way, instead of yelling virtually at everyone : "We didn't hire you because you are a fucking cocksucker". And if still he is not happy with it, he can still resign, huh ?
Seems like he doesn't want to understand that the situation has two faces : the applicant who is tired of writing highly-customized resumes, and the reader who is tired of examining 50% of resumes with spell mistakes etc.
I, very personnaly, think that this kind of guy makes the world worse than what it needs to be.
Go, and write us a good resume, man.
Regards,
jdif
Let's overcome our weakness.
Instead of bringing in candidates and quizzing them with stock questions to find out how bright they are, make the world's hardest instructions for applying and then just bring in the ones who follow them. I see a lot of people who are incapable of reading and following directions and I believe that they generally are not good employees, so it seems like a fair part of the selection process.
# In the olden days resumes were sent out in the mail and included a cover sheet on top which explained why the resume was being sent. Now that we use email, there is no reason whatsoever to send the cover letter as an attachment and then write a "cover cover" letter in the body of the email. It's just senseless.
# Even stupider is submitting two big Word documents with no body text in the email. This just gets you spam filtered. I don't even SEE these.
There so many, seemingly endless ways of doing things, that getting stuff like this shouldn't be an issue for people hiring. The first part above, I see no problem having text in the body of the email that is a cover letter, then attaching a PDF or something of the same cover letter. Why? Text if they can't read a PDF, and PDF if they want a nice printout of it. It's not senseless as Joel puts it.
The next quote above, about 2 attachments and no body. This is something you as the recruiter, HR, or drone in charge of the first round of hiring should have stated in your advertisement. Maybe not if it is a newspaper ad for lack of space, but online definately. Say that you don't accept word documents, or say that you must put your cover letter as plain text in the body of the email, etc. Give the applicants some rules to follow. If they cannot do that, it's a good first filter... not a reason for ranting.
My bigest pet peeve in my 9 months of unemployment before finally getting a job, is that the ads hardly ever stated what kind of documents they wanted. If they didn't say, I usually sent the stuff as plain text, hoping that it would be legible on their end. Other times based on the company, I would try to make a judgement as to whether they would know what to do with a PDF and would send the resume as that. Sometimes with cover letter attached as plain text with a brief note in the body of the email say why i'm sending this email. Sometimes with the cover letter as text in the body. If they said "WORD DOC ONLY" I would usually reconsider sending them anything.
Everyone should just say how they want it, and it would minimize these wastefull rants from Joel.
The worst part about resumes, is that you never get feedback from the company you sent it to. And by never I mean 1 out of 50 might send you back a canned, automated email response. Fog Creek does this if I remember correctly, I applied there last summer. Atleast it felt canned. Which was great though, because it was the first response I got back from anyone or anything over the course of many months. That after having my resume and and cover letters reviewed by english majors, parents, people in the software industry and former coworkers.
I hope Joel is using the comments about deleting and shredding resumes figuratively. There are laws that require employers to keep resumes and applications on file for some period of time after they are received.
YOUR MOM!
YOU NEED A BETTER MOM TO TYPE IN A POSTS... TYPE INTO THEM.
Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha Hahahahaha
... you wouldn't be a skinny unhealthy freak with a permanent cold and allergies to everything from housedust up.
I think the lesson of the story is to show interest in getting or learning about this specific position. Don't sound like you're desperately applying for every job; sound like you're deciding between a few that sound particularly interesting to you.
[*] - more to satisfy university affirmative action requirements than because they actually had a chance, but that's another story... University policies are well-intentioned but dumb sometimes.
According to dictionary.com, stupider is indeed a word. Perhaps Norwegian is your native language, and you think that Slashdot should use it for correspondance? I think this means that you are just the stupidest! LOL!
Flat feet.
Oh, professionally? Well, I work so efficiently that it demoralizes all my coworkers. That's why they had to let me go from my last 4 jobs.
> People continue to lie though, so I guess they must get away with it fairly often.
The problem is that you're a skilled interviewer. Unfortunately, employers only want those with gobs of experience. For those of us who seek entry-level positions, lying is the only way we can hope to get the decent jobs, because we can't buy experience or get it from a book or class.
I also got the impression that Joel, while good for sticking by high standards, might be setting the bar a tad too high.
The key to getting the interview is having a resume (and cover letter) stand out. You don't stand out if you send exactly the same thing as everyone else.
The cake is a pie
In this economy, forget the cover letter or the resume. It's who you know that gets you the job. When a former manager or peer goes to another company, that's when you have a chance of getting in there as well. HR is the biggest joke ever. The people that read your resume and interview you in HR usually don't know shit. Everybody knows it. Including HR.
there's no place like ~
... is in serious doubt.C'mon ,a couple of hundred resumes and you have a bandwidth problem ? Looks like Joel now believes he can write whtever he feels like writing about , however crappy it might be. Next time you want to rant about something, Mr.Spolsky give yourself 24-48 hrs before you put your pen to paper.
And then we'll send our resumes to IBM, SUN, DELL, GATEWAY and INTEL. To APPLE, AMD and MANDRAKE. And We'll take our remumes ALL THE WAY TO MICROSOFT!
AAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAA!
Unless, of course, vitae was the genitive (possessive) singular form of vita.
Although, to be fair, dictionary.com seems to want it both ways.
Wikipedia is more explicit. I think it's unfair that they call you ignorant, but maybe they know you better than I do.
And if you're going to go with the French spelling and use accents, you'd damn well better use both; accents affect the pronunciation of those vowels, you know!
It seems a waste to spend a lot of time on a cover
letter that noone reads anyway. A lot of times
when I'm interviewed it's clear they didn't
even read the resume part either...
-- Programming with boost is like building a house with lego. It's a cool but I wouldn't want to live in it
Different places like different things. Some resume reviewers like the bullshit fluff, some don't. Sometimes being different will make you stand out from the crowd, sometimes it will get your papers in the dumpster.
I had praises about my reseme at one place (although it was not enough to get me hired but not because of the resume), and a few weeks later a recruiter told me to completely redo it.
The people who read resumes and cover letters are as diverse as the people who write them. Anyone who claims there is One Right Way is a bigger bullshit artist than those who write fluffy cover letters.
Table-ized A.I.
A friend shared with me a box of resumes he collected while doing interviews at one of this employers. One in particular he pulled out and asked me to review. Very impressive set of skills and experience, only problem is the guy was like 22 and could no way have accumulated that much. Indeed, he put down everything he was exposed to in college and claimed expertise with. A couple questions revealed his lack of depth. It's gotta be embarrassing to be revealed as a liar in an interview.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
My hobbies involve teaching myself new programming/scripting languages, figuring out how databases work by setting up, running, and maintaining one, and writing free-as-in-beer-ware that reviews excellently. I am sure all of these hobbies are completely immaterial to my resumes... curse you, McDonalds, lower your standards!!!
I tailored my application to exactly what they did, highlighting work I had done that was relevant.
I was trying the generic approach, I had a very good resume, didn't get much attention.
Then I started targetted resumes and cover letters. My response rate went much much higher.
It isn't hard to do, just take half the Job ad and incorporate it into your resume and cover letter.
Not any different than an exam question.
"Writing a shareware app when you're a teenager is just as good a qualification to us as getting into MIT."
In my 15 years of hiring new college grads for entry level engineering positions, I've seen some total fucknuts come out of MIT. I mean complete mouth-breathers who couldn't solve a problem without their hands being held from start to finish.
I'm not putting MIT below any other school, I'm just surprised that it had an equal percentage of dead wood as the local state school.
However, I do find that the students who excel from MIT, generally do so to a much higher degree than the top performers from other schools.
I'd immediately pounce on an applicant who started and finished a big project, on their own time, during high-school. Hardware, software, organization: the simple fact that you have problem solving skill and care about something is a HUGE plus. Can't stress that enough.
GPA and SAT scores are the LAST things I look at.
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
See, I don't get this. I wear ties when expected by our dippy culture, but I never understood what the hell they are supposed to mean. As far as I can tell, it's some pointless relic from an bygone era. I'm not saying show up in torn jeans, but why can't people be comfortable in an interveiw instead of tarting themselves up with clothing they will never be wearing on the job? Why can't we have some sort of happy medium?
Some of the most brilliant engineers and scientists have are perpetually casual dressers. It's irrelevant. Drug dealers wear suits. Kenneth Lay wore suits. Saddam Hussein wore suits. It's meaningless.
We hired a guy last year who showed up in an expensive Italian suit (he came from a semi-rich family). He turned out to be one of the biggest screw ups we've ever had, and was fired six months later for accessing porn sites on his work PC.
--- Ban humanity.
> None of this will gurantee you'll always find honest, helpful recruiters, but at least you'll get their attention, if they're out there.
I have never gotten a position I kept more than a month with a recruiter. My experience is that most are slimy used car sales types. They try to undercut you too much, and send you to places you only have 5% of the skills you need, to do well.
The jobs I kept for more than 5 years (present one included), I got by getting a low paying job at a contractor, then when assigned to a contract, made myself indispensible to the company and refused to budge on salary requirements. More than one have broken their "no more than 15% above what you are making" rule about current salary + hire-on rate.
There is something that scares them about a 2 year developer leaving, and a stranger coming in. Especially when the 2 year writes code that works, shows up on time, and likes it there.
I have never looked for a job for more than a week before getting one. That was before the dot com bust though, so my tactics may no longer work.
The thing is that it isn't fair. They are the ones with the job. Your the one who wants the job. If you want them to give you something, you've got to lay their game.
Windows jobs often ask for experience for products just released because Microsoft sends so much of its crap out in beta release programs. Lots of people had a year of C# experience the day it was officially released.
The cake is a pie
From the other side of the fence,
1. Some web based resume submission processes
stink to high heaven. Plus they are all different.
2. Robert Half claims you have to send out over
100 resumes to get 1 interview. That seems about
right from my experience. If I only send out 3
to 6, how am I to get a job??
3. I found hand delivering my resume got me a job
and got me more attention then just emailing it.
i really like my "I" small, like so: "i". :)
saves me a keystroke
90% of the top jobs (you know, just feeling
important about yourself but not acctually
doing anything (like programming or
human resources)) get handed out because
the human-resources guy knows the other guy
or his dad or went to school with his mom,
etc...
in german we call this "vitamin B" for
"vitamin beziehung".
"beziehung" meaning relationship.
why doesn't ever a stastic like this show
up in newspapers:
"in 2003 55 billion us$ were waste in spending
time writing resumee/job apliance and being
rejected"
?
Of course you don't _copy_ verbatim another resume you found. But you _must_ use the langage expected by the person who is going to read it, and for HR folks, that almost invariably means groupthink speak that can easily be scanned into a database.
In several cases I've created different resumes for the HR department, interviewer, and hiring manager, all of them definitely discussing the same things, but each one with a different focus. HR was interested in database scanning for buzzwords, the interviewer was interested in understanding my social interactions with other people, and the hiring manager was interested in the social skills + raw technical capabilities.
After this, despite several experts saying I had the best resume/application materials they'd ever seen, along with a solid technical background, it took almost two years to find another technically oriented job.
Some of it might have to do with visible disabilities that make it difficult to share space with me until you're used to it. Some of it might be due to the fact that I'm not the _best_ in the world at what I do, and neither am I an A-type alpha-male personality that so many people tend to look for these days. Yet more if it has to do with the fact that probably 75% of the "jobs" out there are for companies without a shred of collective morality or benevolence to temper greed.
But in the end, it's a fact that there just aren't many jobs out there, and those that are available just aren't desirable, and no amount of research can help you accurately represent yourself if the company in question willfully lies to you about the hiring process, or uses a poorly informed HR department to scan for technical requirements it doesn't understand. Let these companies die the death they deserve.
Ugh, that's always bad for me - without the source code in front of me (or some other kind of triggering details), I usually remember only general things about my previous work, not the details. Of course, it could just be an excuse for having a bad memory...
Unfortunately, I think you've been lucky. There are certainly excellent recruiters out there, but my impression is that bottom-feeding sleazebags are more the rule than the exception.
Complete agreement on all your suggestions, BTW. Very well put.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Actually, most companies won't accept paper copies of resumes these days. They want you to e-mail it, because they just throw it in a big database anyway.
Oh and from the article, what's up with this line?
Men don't have periods.
If you are good looking, I am sure it would help your chances quite a bit to send an 8x10 publicity photo of yourself. This will be especially effective if you are white, clean cut, female. All three can be really effective. Just remember, there is no reason to care why you are hired. You should only care whether you can do the job once you are. The employment process is a war, and those who expect a fair fight will remain unemployed.
Not a good way to state on resume:
1999-2000: Krusty Burger, cashier, fry cook, janitorial duties.
2001-2003: Blockbuster sales associate
Hobbies: Developing free software, database design, stamps, coins, butterflies.
Better way to state:
1999-2000: Krusty Burger, cashier, fry cook, janitorial duties.
2001-2003: Blockbuster sales associate
1999-2004: Volunteer work on software development, contributions included report generation modules, interface to XML, stored procedure debugging and scripting. Languages and enviroments: Windows XP, Linux, C++, ksh, etc.
Volunteer work always looks better, because it indicates a desire to work and contribute. Hobbies? How serious is a hobby?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
You have to be willing to go where there's work, even if that means leaving your familiar surroundings or *gasp* not living in California. That's easier said than done of course, but you're all geeks so I know you don't have girlfriends to worry about.
I kiiiid, I kiiiid! No, seriously, the #1 thing I see people out-of-work doing wrong is ONLY looking for work where they live right now. My buddy just had to move from the midwest to Seattle for a 7-month contract. It sucks but it's work, and in 7 months he's hoping to get something back home.
I had to move out of the state I'd lived in for 28 years for a job, and drag my wife with me and SHE had to find a new job, but not only did we both find work, our income increased by about 40% and our COL only went up by about 8%.
It's a tough market out there, especially after we got used to being able to have no talent, education, or experience, and landing a 6-figure job on the west coast. It ain't like that any more. You might have to move out of Texas.
I've been in the job market for several years. I have a perfect resume, lots of experience that is suitable to a variety of positions, and a lifetime of experience searching for jobs. Since I usually get nibbles when I do find jobs to apply to, I would argue that the problem is the terrible job market and incompetent employers. This rant about bad resumes might be amusing to those of us used to belittling our fellow co-workers, but when I've been involved in the hiring process, most of the resumes I've seen have been pretty adequate.
The real problem here are incompetent, rude, and stupid employers. I've been through enough interview situations to know that the real incompetent factor in the job interview process is usually the employer. What burns me up these days are employers who can't even bother to contact you after you've gone in and interviewed with them. Think about it. You go out of your way to dress up for an interview, get your butt to the interview, spend an hour or two answering questions, and then the potential employers can't be bothered to contact you about the outcome of the interview.
Here is a short list of rude and stupid behavior that I have experienced from potential employers:
1) If you are contacting me to set up an interview, I assume that you have noticed the fact that I live halfway across the country from your office. Do you understand what a *phone interview* is?
2) It is rude behavior to leave an interviewee in a room so you can go get some cake at the department birthday party (Aspen Sytems in Washington, DC).
3) When you ask me stupid questions like "What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses?" I make a mental note that I will not work for your company.
4) I sent you a nice resumer, cover letter and thank you letter after the interview. The least you can do is send me a rejection letter when you have made your decision.
5) Please don't spring "tests" and "homework assigments" on me when I show up for an interview. Please have some respect for my experience, skills, and time. Just because you think that it is a cute idea to send me home with "homework," doesn't mean that you are finding out anything more than you could have learned from my resume and interview. Stop wasting my time!
6) If the interview is going to take more than an hour, please tell me ahead of time so I can adjust my plans accordingly. It really sucks to show up for an interview only to be handed an "itinerary" for three hours of interviews.
7) It says a lot about your organization when you interview me once, then interview me again three months later, and never bother following up with me with a phone call or letter (ACLU).
8) Don't assume that I will leave the job because I am "overqualified." If I bothered to show up for the interview, then I have solid reasons to want the job. Did it ever occur to you that I might want a part time job so I can have time for the family or other projects or jobs?
9) Where do I see myself in five years? Probably in your job, if this is the most intelligent question you can throw at me.
Yeah, people write bad resumes, but let's talk about stupid employer tricks!
It's depressing that you think that. But I'm not sure lying is necessary.
When I interview, enthusiastic, creative people straight out of college with no experience beat out people with piles of experience all the time. Sure, college hires sometimes have almost blank resumes (aside from some college projects), but passion and eagerness make up for that and more.
If you have no experience, here's what I'd suggest you do before an interview. Take one day of your weekend and devote it entirely to preparing for the interview. Read up on the company. Google the names of anyone you know will be on your interview loop and read their resumes if you can find them. Look at every product the group in which you are interviewing produces. Look at the competing products from other companies. Then spend at least an hour brainstorming on ideas. What changes could be made to the current products (perhaps stealing ideas from competitors, perhaps brand new ideas)? What cool new product ideas do you have?
If you do that, you'll look fantastic in the interview. I can't tell you how many people come in knowing nothing at all about the company. Not only does that make you look unenthusiastic, it makes you look lazy. Doing your homework puts you well ahead of the pack.
The advice may be good, but the fact is that we're still in a buyer's market when it comes to technical skills. The employers (the buyers) get to dictate what they require. And they don't always agree.
So, while Mr. Spolsky is looking for people "who are passionate about software", there are lots of other employers who have much different priorities ("DON'T bother applying if your experience isn't in our specialized industry.").
In the end, it doesn't really matter what you put on your resume or cover letter, because it's going to get lost amongst hundreds of others. So how does anyone get a job? Well, it's been repeated here many times: through personal contacts.
I read the rant. There are a couple of places where it looks as if Joel could use some help with English also. There is a lot of good information.
UNIX is truth, the Console is life. Use Evolution to send e-mail and not virii.
If there's a recruiter involved, you'll see a lot of this. Last time I was looking, I told every damn recruiter that I would not commute outside a certain area. This included San Jose, where a lot of jobs are. I can't count how many times recruiters tried to get me interviews to places there.
The other reason for inflexability is the old "I've got a job but want a better one" syndrome.
The cake is a pie
Now, I do exactly that. How should I know where the original email text is going to wind up? It seems harmless, at worst, to send the identical text as an attachment and in the email message body.
What's the standard practice on this?
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
"Stupider" is, in fact, a real word: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=stupider .
The phrase to which you refer - "Even stupider is submitting two big Word documents..." - is also correct.
Replacing "Even stupider" with "Even more stupidly" actually renders the sentence grammatically incorrect.
The whole sentence reads: "Even stupider is submitting two big Word documents with no body text in the email."
The subject of the sentence is "submitting two big Word documents." The subject must be a noun. Nouns call for adjectives. "Stupider" is an adjective. "Stupidly," on the other hand is an adverb and therefore neither appropriate nor correct in this instance.
"People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones." Indeed.
I've got karma to burn, so here goes.
Joel's article is 100% non-Scottish. Think your shiny resume and cover letter with perfect formatting and punctuation will get you a job? Think again. You're just one paper amongst the other hundreds; you're competing with Bernard Shifman and the guy who paid $3k to send his resume to 3,000 companies. You're not competing with people who know how the system works, and how to make it work for them. Those people already have the jobs while you're stuck filling out applications for HR.
Let us remember why a company is hiring: to use labor to make money, NOT to distribute jobs for charity. Tell me how, on god's green earth does a dead piece of paper prove that you're going to make that employer money?
It doesn't.
By submitting your past list of accomplishments, you're in effect saying, "Hey, Mrs. Employer, here is what I did in the past. Please figure out how this applies to the problems you're having right now, and then pay me to solve them."
So, one, you've added extra work to that hiring manager's plate (on top of her regular job), and two, you're asking her to do your job to figure out if you can make them money! No wonder most managers make the mistake of using HR do all their hiring---it is "easy(ier)"! Too bad it doesn't work very well. Would you have someone who knows nothing about the position you're trying to fill screen out potential candidates? Hmm?
Now then, let us look at how Safety gets a job:
No resume necessary (except as a security blanket for managers who don't know how to conduct an interview...but you'll never use it). Want to know more?
Yeah, right.
Yes, I've done some hirin' and some firin'.
Worst cover letter boner:
"I have good communicationing skills. As you seeing from cover letter, I can speaking and writing very well English"
Okaaaay... look, I don't need a James Joyce clone for an entry level engineering job so this kind of English is not a disqualifier by itself, but I try to avoid the delusional. Don't fib.
Worst resume boner:
Some guy got past the screeing process with a resume that looked quite good. Lot's of relevant experience items. So, naturally, I thought I'd pick one and let him expound, you know, give him a chance to show his stuff. First one fizzled. Second. Third. So, about the fifth try I decided to pick one a drill down to the bedrock, what did this guy really know? He listed experiece with SPICE. So I asked him some basic SPICE questions. Deer in headlights. It turns out, the "experiece" this guy had with spice, is that when he was a lab monitor some grad student had needed SPICE on a workstation, so he had tar'ed it off the tape. THAT WAS IT. He ran tar to pull SPICE off a tape. His entire resume was just as inflated as that item. His interview day ended shortly after.
Don't inflate, don't stretch. It will bite you in the ass, big time.
It depends on where you are applying. Applying to a fortune 500 company, yes, you need a monkey-suit. Applying to a small, young startup...you might actually be better off in dress casual.
The cake is a pie
I've written thousands of lines of embedded code that has been running perfectly in mission critical environments for years on end without ever crashing and the resumes I write suck. What does this tell you?
If you can write a great resume, it only means you can write a great resume. Nothing more, nothing less...It 100% does NOT mean you can program. They are not related in any way. I wish HR dildos like the one who wrote that rant would figure this out. No wonder software is so buggy. Look at who's doing the hiring.
Your trueley,
Currently employed Firmware, Software, and Hardware Engineer. Working professionaly in the industry for over 12 years.
Yeah, no matter how good your resume is, you are still subject to random whims of the hiring manager -- like Joel getting pissed at a Yahoo Sig. Or a Pro/Anti-MS shop taking issue with a Hotmail address. Or someone taking a like/dislike to the font you used.
Recently, my boss was throwing out all resumes that were longer than 1 page. Apparently he'd just remembered this "rule", and I had to remind him that our entire staff had resumes longer than 1 page.
(Although, I have to admit that I've tossed resumes for tech positions for having lamer email address like biff3861@aol.com, so I'm as guilty as the rest.)
" Do the requirements match EXACTLY? (Note that this has nothing to do with finding a candidate. They simply will throw out the resume and not have any candidates.)"
You really need to understand this.
If the requirements say "Linux 2.4, Visual Basic 5.0, Perl 4.0"
and your resume says:
"Linux 2.6, Visual Basic 6.0, Perl 5.0".
HR WILL THROW OUT YOUR RESUME AND IT WILL NEVER BE SEEN BY THE TECHNICAL/HIRING MANAGER.
Where I work that would be considered the ideal candidate.
Newsflash: People typically put more effort into a cover letter or resume than they do into a slashdot post. Do you run every post through a spell checker?
Bzzzzt. If you're applying for a technical job, such as developer, make your resume very technical. Languages, APIs, development tools, methodologies, the lot. I've hired quite a few developers and if I didn't see the acronyms I needed on there, forget it.
As a rule, HR will only do the first round of resume screening. This is where the cover letter helps, too.
Everyone knows that damage is done to the soul by bad motion pictures. -Pope Pius XI
I take every crap job that pays my bills.
So, I can spend much, MUCH time on my own open source projects.
And, if I really have something to add to the "world of software", someone will employ me.
Every other attempt will put me into the consulting niche.
...with tips on how Vietnam vets are more likely to get noticed then ones from Korean war. Because job search these days really came to begging.
I got hired with a resume that had only basic formating (boldface and 3 part titles using nroff), had quite a few grammer errors and only listed part time jobs I worked in high school of another country. Since then I interviewed and hired many candidates whose resumes contained every blunder possible.
The only change recently is that the last candidate is willing to work from India. Lower your salary range and all of a sudden you don't need perfect grammer or 10 years experience for a senior engineering job. Oh the irony from when INS was harassing us for taking jobs from US workers after coming here one-by-one and completing a college degree.
Resumes and inteviews are not supposed to be an experience in humiliation and arbitary bullying. Spacing around a comma says nothing about engineering skills. If it came to that, fresh college graduates should look into taking a second major. While people already in too deep like me can duke it out and hope for the best.
WTF are you talking about dumbass?
Not only that, it can be considered an inappropriate invasion of privacy. "...so, what's your greatest weakness..." "I have a vodka and squirrel fetish that I simply cannot shake!" Even then, both the question and answer is completely irrelevant to the job; as long as the guy doesn't show up drunk with squirrels in his pockets, you shouldn't care what his greatest weakness is (given he is a reliable and competent employee).So, you are saying that as an employer, I should not be concerned that my new hire *might* show up drunk with a bunch of squirrels in his / her pocket? I think this is a very valid concern when it takes a lot of company money and resources to bring someone onboard. Such a situation would be highly disruptive.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
This was one of my biggest pet peeves about my recent spate of unemployment. I lost a job as an IT administrator I'd held for a year and a half and was trying to get back in the swing of things, with recruiters, headhunters, jobs I'd found on the Internet or in the paper, and at a good 90% of them, I'd be asked to fill out an application when I got in the office. And all they would do with it was staple it to my resume. Why not just use the resume? I've never understood this.
Even worse was when I went to talk with someone at a major staffing firm and, after filling out the application, she asked me, "What percentage of the time did you use [a certain skill] at your last job?" I responded that I didn't know, and she asked, "Would you say 25% of the time? Or 10%?" This went on for probably about five minutes. As soon as the interview was over, I hightailed it out there and never called them back. That isn't information that helps me or information that helps them--it's just another damn hoop to jump through. If they had bothered to read my resume or the four-page application I'd filled out, they would have known my skills without needing a number assigned to it.
By the way, I eventually got another job: in another field by someone who came to me because they knew me and my work and wanted me with them. What a change. And nothing to fill out... until after I was hired. But I don't mind filling out W-2 forms and that type of thing once I have the job. But before? It's a waste of everyone's time.
--Matthew
"If the lights of Broadway blind me, I won't mind..."
Yes, there are many valid and (apparantly no so) common sense points listed there. I do have a problem with one of them though: "If you aren't qualified, don't apply."
Who's definition of "qualified" are we using here. Sure, if all you know is visual basic and you are applying for an embedded assembly/C position, then perhaps you could be called unqualified. However, who's to say that my 4 years of C++ experience don't meet what you are looking for when you say "8+ years of C++"? Sure, I don't know ada, but I bet that my 10 years of professional programming experience will allow me to pick up that language and become productive within a week.
As many have pointed out, HR often puts out bogus requirements (15 years of Java experience required). Since that pretty much automatically disqualifies everyone, in theory no one should apply. Guess what though...many people will still apply and someone is getting that job.
Don't limit yourself because you are missing the required experience and/or particular skill.
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
You realize that extremely useful features like VBA are part of the reason businesses spend the big bucks on Microsoft Office, rather than dealing with third-rate garbage like OpenOffice?
Sure, VBA is not anything you'd use for a major project, but it's downright indispensable when manipulating Office documents from one another.
As other people have mentioned, the HR departments are even more messed up than the applicants.
Perfect example:
I am an engineer (chemical) getting ready to finish my PhD. I was granted an interview with a large company. (Fortune 500 oil company) As is common, I expected to be interviewed by another technically competent person. (Engineer, chemist, etc..) Probably not a doctoral level, but at least could tell a drill pipe from a distillation column.
But no, I was interviewed by an ACCOUNTANT. I franky felt insulted at that. HR departments should realise that the person interviewing should be at least in a related field to the interviewee. An accountant cannot assess my skills anymore than I could assess an accountant's. Needless to say, I won't be working for that company anytime soon.
Really! Is he sure about that?
>> Make it readable and non-technical. It's going to be screened by HR people, they're typically really bad with technical details.
,can think for themselves. And even if they're not, make yourself stand out from the crowd.
Those HR people have been told they need to find a "Java/J2EE developer with good UML and OOA/OOD skills, capable of implementing XML over HTTP protocols"
If you don't have all/most of those keywords (ok, buzzwords) in your CV, HR will throw it out.
>> Nobody gives a crap about your hobbies
Several companies (typically the better ones to work for) want people who are different, sociable, will stand out
Consider "Hobbies: reading, cinema, dinner with friends" against "Hobbies: Field Archery (37th in National Championships), Cooking (Tex-Mex a speciality), RPGs with friends".
Which are you going to employ?
~Cederic
Translation:
I like getting free labor
Joel on Software painless software management
His strategy seems to be: rant like a lunatic and behave like a jerk. Then, only people with low self-esteem will apply and management will become really easy. Great idea.
Of course, lots of big organizations had figured that one out long ago, having a long tradition of degrading application and hiring procedures of their own.
Well its more likely that I wont hire you than that youll hire me anyway.
I spell bad In my native language aswell..
This is my sig, show me yours
One of the biggest misconceptions about job search is that a job opening is like a lottery and you are one lucky sonofabitch if a company deigns to consider you for a position with them.
A job advertisment is NOT a lottery, it is an invitation to enter into a BUSINESS NEGOTIATION with them in which you exchange something they need (your skills) for something you need (dollars). You should ALWAYS have the view that they are on trial by you just as much as you are by them and you will walk away from the table if they aren't the right fit for you. NEVER adopt the demeanor of the supplicant or job-beggar.
Another thing I have to take exception to is this statement: If you don't have the right qualifications, don't apply for the job. That depends on who wrote the qualifications and how reasonable they are. Often the list is written by some HR drone who doesn't know shit from shinola, much less what UNIX is or what a router looks like or that you can't possibly have 5 years experience deploying Windows 2003! Maybe you don't exactly meet their qualification list...so what? If you think you can do the job and offer them something of value, by all means apply! I've applied for (and landed) jobs that I wasn't fully qualified for. Who knows? The other guy they're considering might be a super-qualified asshole. I'd rather train somebody I can get along with than have to deal with an asshole any day! And if some HR dork gives you grief for "wasting their time" because "you don't meet their list", politely remind them that your time is valuable too.
You're using her as bait, Master!
I'm amazed at everyone here complaining about how unfair, mean, or Joel is being about the resumes he gets and what he does with them.
Frankly I think Joel is being nice. Most people's resumes I've seen suck- really suck. It boggles my mind what people think constitues a "good resume". Most have misspelled words (my spelling sucks, hence I use a spell checker for important documents), have horrible formatting, or look like a laundry list of acronymns/skills with no way for me to determine how well you know things or what experiance you have.
And don't get me started with those people who send a CV (long ass resume that I'll never read) when applying for a development or IT position. If you've got more then 1 page of resume for each 5-10 years of work experiance then your resume is too damned long!
Oh, and don't lie on your resume. It's amazing how easy it is to figure out when someone does and trust me, you've been black-balled for life by me if you do that. <sing>It's a small world</sing>
Basically a resume/cover letter is one thing: a paper representation of yourself which will cause the person to read it to want to get the real you.
A few recommendations:
1) Customize your resume/cover letter for the company/job requirements. This is more useful once you've got a lot of work experiance and you need to trip crap out so that it's not too long.
2) Your resume should show not just what you did, but what positive impact you had on the company. Did you save them lots of $$$? Keep difficult/high paying customers happy?
3) Show confidence, but not arrogance. It's a hard line to walk, but walk it you must.
4) Show that you've grown/improved and that you're interested in continuing to do so.
5) If you're in a technical field, don't worry about showing you're a "team player" in your resume, they'll figure it out in the interview. Good written communication skills however is what your resume/cover is all about. Be clear and to the point.
I've been doing alot of interviewing over the past several years and there's one thing that far too many people just don't get:
KNOW WHAT YOU PUT ON YOUR RESUME!
Seems like a pretty obvious thing, eh? No that I can prove. Not telling blatant lies on your resume is also important, but regardless of the truthfulness of what you've written, you need to remember it's on there.
Me: (seeing AIX experience on resume) What kind of experience have you had with AIX?
Applicant: Um, AIX?
Me: What platform does AIX run on?
Applicant: What's AIX?
If you put it on your resume at least know what the hell it is and remember it's on there. Even if that means you bring a copy of the resume with you and you look at it. I'm not even going to touch how I feel about the recruiter who brought this person in to waste the time of 4 different people who can't afford it because we're understaffed and trying to find someone to pick up the load. You know, the reason we're hiring in the first place? ARGH!
"Suppose you were an idiot..... And suppose you were a member of Congress... But I repeate myself."
I hear that's a requirement of all good PHBs.
First suggestion: don't indent anything in your plain-text resume, and don't use very long multi-line paragraphs. My resume contains 6 'paragraphs' averaging less than 4 lines each. If needed, it doesn't take long to replace a few newlines with spaces. Many times even that isn't needed; after all, when the company retreives the resume from their database, it may not be constrained to the same formatting with which it was entered on their web site.
Are you allowed to rant about using proper English when you use the word "stupider"?
Last time the goverment allowed us to hire or replace someone, we tried something new.
First, there were horrible resumes sent in and the only thing that stopped us from deleting them was if they sent a word document. We read most of them no matter what.
Second, we only cared what the persons experience was, an opensource project was a definite PLUS!
A resume was only crappy if they had nothing real
to show. We then selected about half for the interview process.
Third, we had two interview levels. The first was IRC, we would send an email telling the person to meet us on irc and then have a chat with them. This let us know if the person was for real or not. Whether they wrote a bad resume or not. It was great to do this, everyone on the team was involved in the interview and it was logged. Also, it was completly unbiased with relation to sex or race. Then after we had about 3 canidates we interviewed them in "real life". It was a quick and fun experience. And we hired someone that kicks ass!!
Can you see Iron City here?
Do not lie. Lies are eventually revealed, you waste your time and theirs.
Not true. I lied on my resume by stating that I was a highschool graduate and hinting that I was attending or had attended (though possibly not completed) college. The truth was that I'd never graduated highschool. In fact, I dropped out of highschool after the first month of my first year. And as for college - I've never even been on a college campus, much less in a college classroom.
I was hired and have worked for my current company for eight years, make $130,000/yr and telecommute from my downtown loft.
Make it readable and non-technical. It's going to be screened by HR people, they're typically really bad with technical details.
Sorry, but your resume needs to be VERY technical. Resumes are very often mechanically filtered so if you don't have particular keywords in your resume, a human won't even ever see it. That's why you see people pad their resumes with a lot of things they don't know much about but could learn in short notice if necessary. Or sometimes - just names/acronyms they've heard of but have not put actual research into.
You have to be full of shit just to get by the mechanical resume filters and get to a human's eyes.
You know, after reading through some of Joel's rants I'm not quite sure who in their right mind would want to work for Fog Creek.
Their software isn't all that great -- fairly useless if you have PHP skills at all.
He goes on and on about how he wants only the best and yet the only people he's getting are a bunch of masochists.
My two cents. Not a troll, just angry with corporate management. Hrmph.
Putting my hobbies on my resume created an opening for a friendly conversation with more than one interviewer. They also sometimes draw attention to you when you and the resume reviewer share common interests.
Of course it could backfire if you put for hobbies, say, "Sneaking into people's bedrooms at night wearing a mask." though this might be a plus if applying for a job with organized crime.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
The original poster makes a valid point about the shittiness involved with finding a job these days, and of course 10% of you, completely oblivious to each other of course, identify yourselves as professional comedians in attacking a couple of typos in his post. I suppose you folks are all completely content to have a job yourself, especially ones that allows you the free time to slashdot (not that there's anything wrong with that, of course). What you clowns need to realize that (especially nowadays) the requirements to get the job you want are more than simply qualifications or a dazzling personality. With the number of applications that each employer receives, there is a large element of luck involved as well. So go ahead and stroke your egos with pseudo-satire -perhaps one day your own inambition will land you waiting in line in front of the local soup kitchen as you contemplate the millions of other people who still don't give a shit about you.
There are several things that will cause me to put someone in the 'do not hire' pile - here's a short list:
- Generic resumes. You clearly don't care enough about my company to research us and make sure your resume fits the job.
- More than two spelling errors.
- More than one error spelling a technical term. If you know how to do it you should know how to spell it.
- Lying. Even a little one.
- Listing obsolete skills as filler. I don't care if you're proficient in Windows 3.1
;-)
Another thing I might add for people out there looking for a job - no one I know reads further than the first page when making the first cut on a pile of resumes. I personally don't read much more than the first half of the first page.Another thing that bugs me - applicants who stress the fact that they need a job. I know you need a job, folks - that's why you applied to the company in the first place. My only concern is what you can bring to the company - everything else is secondary. If you're not the best candidate for the position you have absolutely no business showing up for the interview.
The day after the interview, call or email me and thank me for the opportunity to interview. *Do not* use this courtesy call as an opportunity to ask me if I've made a decision.
Sorry for the rant, but I hire reasonably well-paid technical people all the time and you might be surprised how many people are completely unprepared to enter (or reenter) the job market.
we see things not as as they are, but as we are.
-- anais nin
i'll disagree - anybody who stops by and takes the initiative of dropping it off in person is going to stand out in the minds of the people you've given it to.
the object is to get around the annoying databases, and HR screeners. you are trying to get direct face time with the hiring manager, and avoid the filters.
just because someone says that they dont accept paper resumes doesnt mean that they wont.
think outside the box, and you're liable to actually land a job.
... hi bingo
Get off your high horses.
:)
I just got mine off. She enjoyed it. She's not really high though, just some 12 hands high
I've heard this advice before... I think it's crazy. How many IT companies don't have fenced campuses where you wouldn't even get in the front gate? Or for a smaller company, a little office without so much as a receptionist? For the overwhelming majority of companies around me (northern Virginia) you just can't do this. Is there actually somewhere you can?
I find that doing an intelligent full critique of one of their products, detailing weak points, what you'd have done to improve it, etc can really work. For those jobs where it doesn't work, well... I wouldn't want to work there, would I? I'd rather work where they value my input.
(I'm a game producer/designer, but this approach could work for a number of positions where you will have direct input and/or control on the development/creation of a product.)
It works in other fields as well.
It's not just the trite "it's not what you know, it's who you know" philosophy... it goes deeper than that.
What can distinguish you from the clamoring masses, all wanting the same job or position? Personal recommendation... all the way. This is partially how I got a residency slot I wanted, and my current medical job.
I was offered a residency slot based on my qualifications, but also because a department chairman at my medical school was personal friends with the department chairman at the residency site. A letter of recommendation and a phone call later, and the residency site chairman personally came to my interview, asked for me by name out of a room full of faceless medical students (talk about some envious glances... competition can be cutthroat in medicine), thanked me for applying, and told me to thanks his buddy for calling ahead (I knew about the letter, but that was the first I knew of the phone call).
My current job was offered to me long after I applied... my current director approached a mutual acquaintance from my residency program, and asked him about me. His response? "pure gold... you should hire him yesterday." (I don't know about that "pure gold" part... he may have oversold me a bit...).
The point remains... you can be qualified and never be hired if you get lost in the resume` shuffle... but that networking, word-of-mouth contact is money in the bank.
Also, the employer is understandably hedging his bets by not hiring someone sight-unseen, who may or may not play well with others, who may or may not be dishonest, etc, etc... personal confirmation of a person's claimed credentials/ability is key. And for those of you who think this is somehow wrong, we're talking about a good word from a friend, not someone's daddy getting him a job that he's totally unqualified to do. I despise nepotism as much as anyone.
Never, never underestimate the value of a friend...
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
If I'm asked that question in an interview, I make sure to ask the interviewer 'What's the worst thing about working for xyz corp' when they ask if I have any questions!
I'll have to remember that! Excellent.
you'd be surprised how well it works.
while you wont be able to get on lockheed's campus, you can certainly manage to get on most sites, at least in the reception area.
you would be surprised how well it works. i've done it in the philadelphia area a couple times, and it has definitely worked well.
... hi bingo
his advice is heavily flawed.
I know if you show that you have experience and gives hints you can do well on your own and can handle people, your application will be thrown out with most businesses. because unless it's a computer-centric job(I'm not even sure that counts)
in the us, namely retail, if you actually have any brains, you cant get the job, they want stupid, inexperienced, young workers who need their hands held on the job and need the manager's "brilliant guidance" to help them along, that way, none of them never will have the chance of getting promoted to a level near the manager, unless they're complete sheep.
all the jos my mom has worked, every time she'd get promoted, they'd find some reason to demote her. She has way more experience than anyone there, including management.
but I say, make it look like you're a dumbshit when it comes to jobs like that, get hired, then start kicking some ass.
and I know in the computer field, it can be tricky, because there are companies who want incredibly talented people, people who know what they're doing, because management is tired of people who have no idea what's going on running the company.. and of course, I'm talking about low-level computer job stuff, like network technicians for some random corporation, etc.. not stuff like working at IBM, or some random big company that is computer centric.
it's a lottery, sometimes you'll win, sometimes you'll lose.
btw, I know the experience discrimination thing all too well, tried getting a job at 5 different computer places, put in all of what I know, didnt get hired, but some people who didnt know shit got hired and they had to read off a list to know what the hell I was talking about when I visited to look for parts.
Compusa didnt hire me, and I know exactly why, their manager is a dumbshit.
I ask him for a vga box and he's like "whazz vga?"
so yeah, unless you're a geek-wannabe who thinks he's l33t because he can use windows, you're not getting a job with most of the places.
The whole resume HR system is built on contradiction. You will be chastised by those of Joel's ilk for attempting to conform, you will be chastised by traditionalists for attempting to stand out too much, and you may not get the job if your resume is merely average so long as there are other applicants with similar credentials.
Bullshitting and resume-fluffing are symptoms, the system itself is the cause. By limiting the set of potential hirees to the set of skilled resume writers big business is forcing a lot of people with skills in other areas to devote precious brainspace and time to mastering the otherwise useless art of resume construction - and excluding otherwise talented people who lack the skill.
Society would likely be 10% (or more) more efficient if there were no such thing as the CV or resume.
Sorry for being negative, but the guy just bugs me.
Some of the points that he brings up from time to time are reasonably interesting, but rarely inspiring or revolutionary.
An employee hands a thick file of resumes to his boss. "These are the people who would qualify for employment." The boss takes roughly half of the resumes and discards them to the trashcan "But, boss, they could qualify!".
"You see", says the boss, "We don't need employees who have bad luck".
Hey, is it racist to say that American Jews are better educated than the general population? No? Then how can it be racist to say that American blacks are less well-educated than the general population?
Both those statements are racist (and untrue) if interpreted literally (as a few people still do), which would imply that all American Jews are better educated and all American blacks are less educated than the general population. Versions of those statements which more pedantically express what you meant to say (e.g. "The average education level among American Jews is higher than among the general population" or "The average education level among American blacks is lower than among the general population") might not be racist, but they're similar enough to the racist versions that they still make many people uncomfortable.
If you don't have a job, searching for one is your full-time job. Yes, not surprisingly, in a down tech job market, you might actually have to *try* to get a job.
Perhaps the problem is that you're putting so little effort into each application that they all reject you because your cover letters and resumes suck. Likely, you're sending out a very general letter and resume, whereas the people who get interviews are those who tailor theirs to the specific job. Perhaps instead of trying less for more applications, you should try harder for fewer.
I do wish you luck.
I actually don't indent anything. For example:
Primary Languages (In order of importance)
1. Java - includes JSP/EJB/Swing/Servlets/JDBC
2. C/C++ - mostly CLI data processing and high speed graphics
3. VB/VBA - wide variety of GUI based programs
4. COBOL - data processing/Y2K on Unisys MCP
The problem is that (at least in the preview), it comes out like this:
Primary Languages (In order of importance) 1. Java - includes JSP/EJB/Swing/Servlets/JDBC 2. C/C++ - mostly CLI data processing and high speed graphics 3. VB/VBA - wide variety of GUI based programs 4. COBOL - data processing/Y2K on Unisys MCP
Not being able to use line breaks to format your resume for readability is highly frustrating. I'm not trying to wow them with my text skillz or anything, I just want the blasted thing to be readable. Sadly, it doesn't seem that's an option.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
I've had good and bad luck with my CV, I don't really know what I should or shouldn't include on it, or how I should write it, due to being unsure who's going to read it first. I've read a book or two on CV writing, and consulted a lot of techies and non-techies about my CV, but the more opinions the merrier, IMO :-)
Might it be an idea to have a section where people can upload their CVs (maybe with certain details purposefully snipped/edited for privacy reasons, or maybe not), and to get opinions on them, or even as a place where like-minded people looking for potential employees might look?
All those that are buying the "Greatest Cover letters" books and dumping that trash out there, keep it up. This can only make people, (like me), who do spend time on the Cover letter look better.
Not looking right now, but I swear that way this craptacular economy is being run, I'm sure it's not going to be far off.
(with SQL, that is)
Nobody gives a crap about your hobbies
I've had Firewalking listed in my 3-line Outside Interests section for some time now, and it invariably sparks conversation during the interviews. I'll grant that the HR folks don't generally notice it, but I have yet to see a hiring manager who didn't. That seems to be one of those resume tidbits that gets around the office before your first day, too, and in my mind anything that gets your name around the office without making you look like *too* much of an idiot is a good thing. =)
Dan
So the "inside contact" thing is true for the most part, but don't psych yourself out if you can express yourself well in writing.
=============
Together, we will drive the rats from the tundra.
...Hey,
Congrats on a VERY successful Karma-whore. +5 insightful, very well done. When I originally wrote it, it only got +4, informative.
Just in case anyone else cares, however, I posted this comment originally in response to "Have You Personally Used an Honest Head Hunter?" on September 30, under the subject line "Guess I've been lucky..."
All in all, this doesn't bother me too much, I figure you know you've "arrived" on /. when the whores start plagarizing your comments.
Rock on!
"That naive cube! How long must I suffer this!" --Sheldon J. Plankton
As a prospective employee, I think I would have to ask myself how desperate am I to work in the industry if this is the kind of people I would have to work for. When I am in a position to be hiring for a technical (programmer, IT professional, whatever) position, I can hardly imagine caring less about most of the stuff in that article. I have not found it to be that difficult to receive resumes (notez l'absence des accents graves) and find out where the person worked and went to school; I find that a much more effective means for distinguishing candidates, and does not take much time, maybe 2 minutes per resume which does not lead to a followup. Where I grew up it was not expected (viz required) that skilled technical people were particularly punctilious about non [information technology] related stuff.
Larry
My best advice to add to the list is:
Don't come across as being a wanker.
When I have done interviews in the past, the most important factor was: "Could I sit next to this guy for 40 hours a week?". This was more important than anything else, including qualifications. At the end of the day, you could be God's gift to programming, but if you are an arragant SOB in the interview/cover letter, you aren't going to get the job.
I've hired about 20 people in the last year. Every single one of them I found by asking friends and contacts in the industry "Oh, hey, I'm looking to hire a [position] - they need to have [experience X / qualification Y] - do you know of anyone?". I don't even ask for a resume until I've pretty much made up my mind to hire someone.
Where does this leave an aspiring job seeker? Let everyone you know that you're looking for work. It doesn't matter if they even work in the industry you want to be employed in - they might know someone who does. And when one of these contacts mentions something, *follow it up* - once you're on my radar as a potential employee, nothing blows your chances like not returning calls or emails promptly.
Finally, go to conferences (or whatever your field's equivalent is) in your field. Talk to people who present. I got one of the best jobs I ever had because I went to a conference and argued with one of the presenters about a technical point (ok, not necessarily the best idea, but it apparently made an impression), then followed up with an email including a reference she'd asked for. In the ensuing exchange I happened to mention I was looking for work, & promptly got offered a job.
Anyway, hope these tidbits help someone.
If you look at any career book, most notably What Color is Your Parachute, they always tell you that mailing resumes is much, much more successful than sending them electronically, all tracking mechanisms aside. I would think that mailing a resume would show your potential employer that you're expending more effort as you have to get off your ass to go to the post office as well as spending your own money to buy stamps.
According to What Color is Your Parachute, online services (in a a targeted fashion) have a 4% success rate while mailing out resumes (in a random fashion) has a 7% success rate.
Every book I've read says that the best way to get a job is to be PERSISTENT. That means not necessarily following the directions. Joel wrote that from the perspective of the employer - he wants to make it easy to screen you out. You, as the job hunter, want to make it as difficult for them to screen you out. This means getting as much of their attention as humanly possible.
Make sure your software is using CRLF.
Someone writing a rant using poor grammar and non-existant words, about people butchering the English language.
IANAL... But I play one on
If my HR department is being so selective, why can it not select anything that remotely matches the technicial qualifications? You do not need to be a engineer to figure out that a "Mactinosh Technician" needs to have "Macintosh" experience somewhere in the resume.
The bull artists sure did have "detail-oriented" promenently displayed in their resumes, however...
==============
Together, we will drive the rats from the tundra.
Geeks lack social skills. The only way to build social skills is to get out there and approach. Approach early, and approach often. Hey, this advice won't only get you a JOB, it can get you LAID too!
(Maybe I should have posted A/C, but it's the truth, so it's going under my real UID.)
There's a whole group of hiring managers that love that kind of bullshit "I'm a team-oriented player who will never lose interest in your job and will live out my days there till old age doing your bidding 110%. Shall I bend over Now or later?"
My tech writing degree has helped, and writing resumes in college for $20/pop also helped.
First, you often need to pass the HR proofreader, who is usually a communications/philosophy major, or non-degree professional with medium (often quite good) english skills. (That might just result from reading a lot of romance novels and health magazines, BTW).
Get past the HR proof-reader by:
- Professional formatting - easy to read, lots of white space, and brief descriptions
- Proper grammar - though not always caught, why limit your chances that s/he'll catch your mistaak
- Itemize the technilogies at the top of the resume. They don't understand you technologies, projects, or anything else. They are usually text-searching on J2EE or XML, and occasionally Oracle
- Bold face the most important ones. For example, if the job is for a "J2EE developer with XML and Oracle experience" this will get the HR person's attention:
Recently, I have received a lot more replies pass HR screening since doing this.Languages: Java, C#, C++, SQL, UML
J2EE: JDBC, JSP, Servlets, EJB, XML, Web Services
Databases: Oracle, MS Access, MySQL
Finally, you need to make certain you know what you list, and not just how to spell it.
If you get the call from the IT guy, you won't have time to bone up on it and try to scam an interview, and any manager worth his salt will throw in a couple of filter questions to see if you really know the difference between an EJB and an entity bean before having you waste his time.
It's the Simon Crowell of resumes!
Really, if I wanted obvious criticism like "You need to capitalize the I" or "Spaces don't go before commas" I'd go back to grade school.
As most of the other comments have pointed out, it's a guy with a power trip. The most obvious example is the quote "The scanner is right next to the shredder in my office and the shredder is easier to use."
"at worst they will think that you were not born with the part of the brain that allows you to form your own thoughts and ideas"
I know many jobs where this trait is a requirement
A member of my church asked me for help on an assignment he had for his college business writing class. The assignment was to write a cover letter and resume. Initially, I was glad to help because I had exprience with reviewing resumes and interviewing from both sides of the table.
He brought over his resume. I think it was formatted from a Microsoft Office template. His cover letter was a close copy of the one from his text book. I tried to convince him to scrap this stuff and write a resume and a base cover letter that might help him get an internship during the summer. Instead, he just wanted to follow the text book and template to get a good grade. Well, if he wasn't going to spend time on it, either was I. I looked at them, corrected the spelling and grammar and sent him on his way.
Why did I lurk so long before registering for a Slashdot account? I could have had a Slashdot ID of less than 100000.
If you reuse code, you aren't thinking. Just go with as much bad code as possible.
WhatMeWorry
And I don't mean like a French Whore.
The concepts of Resumes and cover letters elude most people these days. It is as much an important fancy piece of paper as a degree from a college stating you can memorize books. I re-write resumes/cover letters for friends and wrote many a resume/cover letter myself. It's shocking what people consider a complete resume and effective cover letter aside from typical mistakes made by not using a word processor.
The first and most important thing as stated is break away from the mold. Using a template can be a great thing to structure your resume, but it is up to you to logical sort the information and present it in a manner that sells your skills and professionalism. Don't retain one generic resume to blast out to every place you apply to, custom tailor it by making small tweaks to best suit the position you are applying for. Try to keep the information useful and pertitent to the position, working at Subway does not interest somebody looking for a Perl programmer with ASP.NET experience. Portray the details of what you did at your job, would you be more interested in somebody that lists "System Administration" or "Managed user lists and group persmissions while maintaining system inegrity and performance to ensure maximum efficient availability on Linux Slackware servers." if you were looking for a System Admin? Present the information in a format that highlights your skills and achievments as close to the top as possible to hook quick glances for closer look. Think of how many of these are coming across a desk, so you want the skills and experience you have to catch that quick glimpse. Keep it as short as possible, remember a resume is submitted to get you an interview where you can really sell your personality along with your skills/experience. Pay attention not to cut out things again that relate to the job...but this is where trimming with customr tailoring to a position should create room for you.
Cover letters also should be a quick summary of yourself and your skills to show you do have communication skills and again, peak interest in your resume. It is a great chance to sell yourself and show you have some skills to be looked over on your well organized and thought out resume. Stated also, don't be afraid to show you have researched the company and have questions about it
Remember it's all a sales pitch for both parties to explore a match, so try to write something that sells!
-1 Overrated (Too many big words for me to comprehend)
I wear pants when expected by our dippy culture, but I never understood what the hell they are supposed to mean. As far as I can tell, it's some pointless relic from an bygone era.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
Deal, no more pasting cover letters out of books. However, if you want people to write resumes as if they were going to be read by a human being, you have to respond to them. Script a button on your e-mail client that automatically fires off a "Thank you for your application... While we don't feel this position is a good fit for your skill set we wish you luck in the future." letter when you send that resume to /usr/hr/archiveandignore. Most job seekers will send out dozens or hundreds of resumes before they are accepted for anything. That means most of their time is spent flushing text out to black holes, where their effort (you should spend about 4 hours updating your resume, writing a cover letter, proofreading, etc.) disappears into nothingness. One can only flush so much away without receiving any response at all without starting to "dial it in."
The ______ Agenda
A good resume comes from a person who agressively works so that their skill set becomes impressive. Go to school with that in mind, take jobs and certify with that in mind. Besides, if you do this then you will have to blow less smoke up peoples a@@es and that will better the whole IT world.
I'm pretty sure you're part of the minority.
Although I generally try to get a survey understanding of companies before an interview, I will try this approach the next time I get an interview.
The moon is covered with the results of astronomical odds.
...played out over an astronomical time scale!
Karma: Bored. (Thinking about resurrecting the "Anyone else is an imposter" joke.)
Mr. Spolsky uses incorrect grammar in his rant:
:)
Quote: "Even stupider is submitting two big Word documents with no body text in the email. This just gets you spam filtered. I don't even SEE these."
The last time I checked, the correct usage should be "Even more stuipd."
I just find it humorous that he would use a word that is not commonly accepted as proper usage to emphasize his point on folks using proper English grammar when applying for a job. Of course, this is just his blog and a rant so he can be excused.
I have had occasion to write a few resumes and cover letters only to have my impeccable grammar go completely unnoticed by the recruiter/hiring manager. I would like to be the Operations Manager at a software company as my skills lend themselves toward that "generalist" position. It is my experience that it matters little if your resume is perfect or not. The odds of having it actually reviewed by someone who has an ounce of creative thinking are about as good as winning the Powerball.
Someone should write a rant about people who write job descriptions. I cannot tell you how many interviewers I talk to that come up with, "Well, we really were looking for someone with [fill in the blank] experience." When that particular requirement is nowhere in the job description they posted. The big one here is J2EE. No one sees fit to included it in their postings, but it seems to rear its ugly head when I try to schedule an interview or a second interview.
-- Those of you who think you know it all are very annoying to those of us who do.
"I am certain their are incompetent..."
"their are," versus, "they are," or "they're" would move you're cover letter or resume out of the "good" pile. Not as bad as a resume I once received from a, "coledge gradeuate."
Internship = NO PAY
Slashdot Eds Link Anonymous Posts With Logged Posts
They Are Vermin Feeding On Each Other's Feces.
I Hate \.
Nobody gives a crap about your hobbies, unless then involve lots of theft of past employers property, in which case they'll appreciate your candor.
That's not true at all. If they don't care about the hobbies area, they'll just skip over it in the resume review. But it's better to have it on there. Never sell yourself short.
My hobbies area always lists the software I use at home, so I'd basically bombard the resume with long lists of the applications I am familiar with and use on a daily basis. I'm lucky in that my hobbies involved the things I do for work, and interviewers have always been impressed by my resume as a result. So, I list the applications relevant to the job in the skills section, then everything else in the hobbies.
Sure - a well formatted and grammatically correct resume catches attention. I, for once, am flooded with those everyday and have to then look for substance under that fluff... I mostly interview techies, and I dont care much about punctuation and English usage - as much as the projects and the tech skills that are on the resume. For me, the most important pointers: 1. DO NOT LIE. 2. DO NOT LIE. 3. MAKE IT SHORT AND READABLE (not interested in how long you spend troubleshooting that drvice driver problem).
Often some head hunter gets ahold of your resume and you can't control where it goes, so a cover letter is a good defense against bogus or time wasing interviews. When the HR person hands me a pile of 200 resumes I have to weed thru them: First to get marked 'No' have no cover letter. Second to get marked 'NO' are the ones which are impossible to read due to silly fonts - there is always some joker who prints a resume in runes or cursive fonts. Next to get marked 'NO' are the ones written entirely in slogans or buzzwords - corpo-speak. (The resumes going on the 'read twice' pile tend to have both a noun and a verb in every sentence on the cover letter.) The ones that make it to the 'OK, read' pile almost always say what they do and don't want on the cover letter. The cover letter determines which resumes get read - most do not. Saying what you don't want saves everyone wasted time and interview trips.
So say something like "I want to work within 20 miles of Bolton and type 'make' all day. Also say something like "I don't want to relocate or supervise or travel every week."
When a manager is going over the CV's for prospective employees, he'll only read the first page anyways.
* Have someone else write it. It is very hard to not be hard on one's self when writing a piece about you.
* Just __mention__ jobs you had years ago.
* Be very careful about what formal education you put on that one page. Certainly avoid any mention of any student organisations unless you are __certain__ it will help.
* The less you put on your CV, the more likely you'll get the interview. You can answer any questions not explained on your CV in that interview.
* Use snail mail. Don't use email or fax them. This will almost certainly eliminate you as a candidate for the job! You can put it on your own
homepage, but don't refer to that in a letter to a prospective employer.
* All references should be contacted in advance as a surprise call can produce unpredictable results. Remember its WHO you know, WHO You Know and WHO YOU KNOW that gets you the job. Mention a few key people you know in the CV, give out details in the interview.
Eventually the good jobs will come to you, contrary to what your parents may say. If the job looks interesting, certainly accept the interview. The salary advertised is not necessarily going to be what you get. They may try to snag you with low pay. Once that happens, it is hard to escape.
The above suggestions have worked well for me. A one page CV with lots of loose ends that you can clarify in the interview is key to getting the job. Once you are actually in the door, it is all about how you answer the questions in the interview that will get you the job. In my experience, a job offer or second interview will almost certainly result.
If you accept a job in the USA, never EVER agree to any drug tests. That is illegal here for a good reason. If a company tests, make that fact public and HURT them!
One final point: Dress for the role you are interviewing for. Know in advance what the companies 'dress code' is. Don't underdress and don't overdress for the part.
Yeah! Either in Nigerian "business" management or organ enlargement.
Are you crazy? Everybody lies on their CV, including the person giving you the interview. It's a generally accepted fact of the business.
No, I'm speaking from experience :( Most of the time you never get face time with the hiring manager, his secretary will just tell you he's not there right now (you don't know what he looks like anyway) and probably take your resume and put it in the circular file. Maybe, if you're lucky, it'll get put in his mailbox along with the resumes of about 10 other people. Besides, most places want time to check references, etc. Unless, of course, you don't have any, in which case you're probably not getting the job anyway.
Most job hunters spend more time on the cover letter/resume than they do one being referred to a potential employer. Big mistake. Here are two scenarios:
l337 d00d looking for job spends a week perfecting the resume. Sends out 100 resumes. Posts to monster. Gets replies that say: nice resume. Interview with HR next week. After interview HR says you need another interview. Three weeks pass Next interviewer says ok, you need to talk to vp. VP says well, I have a hiring freeze in effect until May. Damn, I feel really sorry for you all the time you spent on interviews with HR...
Joe Marketroid looks at job he wants. Asks who do I know that might know hiring manager. Calls person who is willing to contact hiring manager. referral made. Marketroid calls hiring manager and explains "I was not planning on changing jobs, but this opportunity seemed really super-great. My resume's not ready for prime time - but I do have some references you can call." Hiring manager: "send what you got. we'll talk at 4:00pm tomorow." Marketroid gets job after hour interview at local bar. Next day, Marketroid shows up at work. Moves into to corner office and is now your boss. Sucks don't it?
If HR is involved you probably WILL NOT GET THE JOB.
-- $G
See, I don't get this. I wear ties when expected by our dippy culture, but I never understood what the hell they are supposed to mean. As far as I can tell, it's some pointless relic from an bygone era. I'm not saying show up in torn jeans, but why can't people be comfortable in an interveiw instead of tarting themselves up with clothing they will never be wearing on the job? Why can't we have some sort of happy medium?
What makes you think they will never wear ties on the job? There are a lot of IT positions where ties will be required, at least some of the time.
Anyway, all clothing styles are either fashion-driven, situational, or both. You can wear what your drinking buddies think is "comfortable", or what the hiring authority thinks is "comfortable", but unless they are the same, I'd go with the hiring authority for the interview. Save the "pointless relics" of the current era for after hours :)!
Some of the most brilliant engineers and scientists have are perpetually casual dressers. It's irrelevant. Drug dealers wear suits. Kenneth Lay wore suits. Saddam Hussein wore suits. It's meaningless.
Not quite. The bad guys wear them because they don't want to feel like or appear as bad guys. I think you're getting that lesson backwards ...
As for the geniuses, they by definition get more leeway than us mortals. Just because it works for them doesn't mean that it will work for you.
I have received a number of funny and amusing resumes over the past year or two since I became management (*shudder*).
One of the most interesting was a gentleman applying for a Windows system administration position. It consisted of 7 pages of print, single space, 8 point type filled to the GILLS with every product he had every seen, touched, smelled or heard of. Everything from Microsoft Paint and Wordpad to a listing of at least 15 to 20 complier products. Yes, he even made the effort to let me know that he used DOS... and included every... single... version...
To top this little gem of a resume off (I had to read the whole thing, it was like watching a train-wreck), he included the following line at the end:
"This is a brief outline of my qualifications. If you would like a more detailed resume, please contact me".
PUUH.
I believe I sat dumbfounded in my chair for at least 5 minutes.
I think it's somewhat company-dependant whether this is a good idea or not. For example, in Joel's little rant that sparked this Slashdot story he specifically says he will more or less automatically shred resumes that don't come in through the channel he speficially told applicants to use (in his case, an e-mail address). But I could also imagine this working in some cases, I guess it's kind of a crapshoot whether this will help or hurt your chances.
Rock over London, Rock on Chicago. Wheaties: Breakfast of Champions.
Rich
Isn't really all that productive. Languages evolve over time and constructions that you use today were despised by the prescriptive grammararians of as recently of one or two centuries ago. The only real point of having a grammar is in order to have a normative standard so that people can communicate. If this person's grammar is seriously so different than yours that you can't understand what he/she is saying than yes, that is a problem. But that's pretty unusual for a 'native' speaker. Otherwise you may as well quit your bitching. People are going to use language in different ways than your prescriptive grammar allows, and chances are there is someone even higher up in the chain of grammatical knowledge than you who would look down in disgust.
Have a very white sounding name. If you even seem like a minority you can forget about finding a job besides McDonalds and just go on welfare. Another option if you are a woman, get a sex change. You'll get hired faster, and for higher wages. You may even get a chance to become president.
Think I'm kidding?
Proof: Proof1
Proof2
Exerpt:"Consider it a different kind of name dropping. These days human resource managers are legally required to put on color-blind glasses, to carefully pore over resumes looking for the "best" candidate. But still, discrimination can be as quick and capricious as looking at a person's name.
That's according to a new study of 5,000 resumes sent in response to want ads. Researchers found that people with black sounding names like Tamika or Tyrone were fifty percent more likely to get dropped from consideration and those with "white" sounding names were strongly favored."
Some keys to ending racism in the workplace.
1)Get rid of all names on resumes. Everyone should just be a number.
2) Get rid of job interviews. A computer should hire and fire on merit and productivity alone. Remove the human element from the process.
The results of these actions? The end of affirmative action. If we want to get rid of affirmative action I just showed you how.
Anyone who supports ending affirmtive action and racism at the same time, please respond and support this msg, mod it up if you cant respond with support.
People don't exist to serve systems, systems exist to serve people.
If you're applying for a job there, you should tell him that. He might be so ashamed that he will resign his position, and offer leadership of the company to you!
His poor grammar doesn't keep him from being a boss, but in his world your poor grammer keeps him from being your boss.
The middle mind speaks!
maybe your technique wasnt correct.
me, i'm a persistent, annoying SOB, and i almost always got to the hiring manager.
as for the references thing, i find that companies use references as a due-diligence excersize after they've interviewed, but before they hire you.
i stick by my opinion that it is more effective than shotgunning out 100's of email resumes, hoping to win the HR lotto, and have the computer select yours.
face-to-face you can change the odds, something that is incredibly hard to do over email.
... hi bingo
LOL! Point taken. I just thought I'd point out his use of improper grammar in a rant on the use of proper grammar.
I live nowhere near NYC, so I would not be a good candidate for his company anyway.
-- Those of you who think you know it all are very annoying to those of us who do.
This guy is obviously not a a techie, but some one with an English or some anal retention major that got into the tech industry during the .bomb time frame. Now its his time to show off how "smart" he is by ranting how the techies are stupid and can't spell. He are looking for people who can spell instead of looking for people who are smart in what they do, and thats what he will find... good spellers and not good techies, and he will find more anal assholes like himself.
When it comes to my turn to hire good people, and for his turn to look for a job, guess what... I wont be hiring any anal retentive assholes from FogCreek hell bent on writing "proper" English, generalizing all Indians as not being able to put a comma in the proper place, and disqualifying anyone that dosent fit your profile of having "good resume writing skills."
that's what his blog suggested ...
If the market is sad enough that grads are going to intern positions, why doesn't he expect people to apply to more than 4 companies?
I was out of work for 6 months, I tried being selective of where I posted for the first 4 months. But when there are 3000 people posting for one job you really have to apply for more than 4, sorry.
Plus the unemployment board requires it.
I proofread when I want something important, like a job. I don't bother when I don't want anything, like, say, when I post a comment to a website.
The cake is a pie
If you can't understand the different in complaining about ties and walking around nude, you have my sympathies.
--- Ban humanity.
Open Office's BASIC is far superior then VBA. OOo has a lot of great features. For instance, Microsft Office used some mutilated form of what I guess you could refer to as regular expressions in its Find utility. OOo uses a real reg exp parser and is great for altering documents. That in turn with its BASIC is just unbeatable. Then to just sink the ship on Microsoft's product, OOo has native support to save as Adobe PDF which is indespesable in my company. I never use Microsoft Office anymore, its just not powerful enough. Read up on OOo Basic and other features (there are thousands) and you'll see what I mean.
Regards,
Steve
Do not lie. Lies are eventually revealed, you waste your time and theirs.
Faced with serious bias against an increasing period of unemployment, a friend of mine [wink, wink] arranged to have a prior employer claim that he still worked for them. Recruiters stopped throwing him out of their offices, and within a couple of months he did find a position. In over 18 months, his past has never been put to question again.
When employers become vicious, lies are the reward.
If you don't want to see lies on a resume, then don't treat people like dirt or make absurd judgments about their situations. (Specifically: you're unemployed, so I'm not going to hire you.)
If you force people to make difficult decisions, don't act surprised when they perform survival actions.
[You have a stable society when some nut guns down a schoolyard and the law doesn't change.]
Yeah, that helps to eliminate some candidates right off the bat.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
What, do they want us to be honest about why we want the position?
The New Standard Resume Cover: I want this job because I need something to cater to my gaming addiction. Staring long hours in front of a computer screen is already 90% of my day now, and I hope to increase that percentage with this job.
It's the result of shallow mentalities. Sane, coherent minds should be able to overcome this prattle, but I know they don't, and hence I'm a 33rd degree misanthrope.
--- Ban humanity.
grammar teachers?
A lot of computer science departments realize that the language that is in style changes, so they teach a good amount of theory, rather than specific languages. What this means is that their students can basically pick up a new language by grabbing and book and be useful in a day or two
You won't be "useful in a day or two" in C or C++ if you have never dealt with pointers or manual memory management before. But even if you have, C and C++ have enough pitfalls and obscure corners that you really have to spend years learning them.
And the same is true about many other languages. And, in addition to the languages themselves, you have to know their APIs in order to be productive.
A CS degree gives you CS skills. CS skills are not the same as commercial programming skills, much as you may not want to believe that.
Really, by the time a position makes it to advertising in common places, it IS a lottery. Joel is lucky in that he's not HR full time for a large firm advertising in high visibility areas. A good rule of thumb in these scenarios is that they'll spend about 30 seconds looking at your application/resume/cover letter. Often applications for a position number in the thousands,so there's good reason for it. As you point out, the people screening these teaming masses may not understand speciific aspects of the job themselves. A resume and cover letters are tools to get an interview. You want to demonstrate that you can communicate quickly and be crystal clear.
The requirements thing is iffy. Some things you can get away with waving away, either because nobody has the specific skill set or because you show elsewhere that you have quickly picked up skills in the past and still can. Other requirements, like interviewing in NYC, aren't likely to be waived, and maybe even asking for them to be is ample justification for roundfiling. This is of course assuming the skillset wasn't tailored to the guy the hiring manager has in mind but has to jump through corporate hoops to hire. Often solicitation for applications is occuring while they begin interviewing candidates from within the company and from employee recommendations.
You're right though, in a way. Just because you've won the lottery doesn't mean you should be prepared to kowtow. If you've won the lottery, there's an expectation that you are in demand. One time in an interview I was asked if I had any other outstanding job offers or interviews. I wasn't sure whether to be offended, to tell the truth or lie. On one hand, telling them you have a job offer may serve as reinforcing their opinion, but on the other it may serve as an excuse to find someone else, who is less likely to jump to a competitor, having been introduced to the market and trained on their dime.
The real lesson here is networking. Toastmasters is a concept that has grown beyond its means, but there's plenty of other ways to find connected friends. Attend Linux User Groups if that's your bag. Keep in touch with college friends and remind them from time to time if you're looking for breadmoney. People on the inside of a job opening have a HUGE advantage; applying before the masses do with the endorsement of a current employee almost makes interviews formalities.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
I beleive some head hunters or huge corp. dont care about the formating. They use the text to crunch matching positions in automated search. If a 100% match is found (every thechnical keywords from the position is in a resume), they automaticly send you an e-mail or take the time to read thru.
My biggest complaint about them is that no one spells the word correctly anymore! Like any number of English-language words that require accents, this one is frequently spelt without, and as their removal in this case spells another word entirely (resume, as in, to continue), it is doubly important that they be used.
/. forums?! Neither in text nor HTML do they render. *grrrrr*
/.!). Under GNU/Linux, I use the character map included with KDE (GNOME has one as well), under Windows there are keyboard shortcuts using the Alt key and number pad (why can't I do this in Linux yet?!), and in HTML you simply name the letter and its accent; e.g. " & e acute ; " (without the spaces, as typing it correctly in /. makes it disappear!) will render e with an acute.
Incidentally, why the hell can't I use the accent marks in the bloody
It's not as though they're difficult (outside of
Bitch whine moan complain....
+++++++
"Look, dear, it's a crazy hairy scary man!"
And I'm not complaining as someone who has problems with interviews. I've had five serious interviews in my life, and four resulted in jobs. The fifth did not because the company didn't really have an opening but liked to bring in promising candidates anyway. I play the game fine. I just think it's bullshit, and as I get older, I find I suffer bullshit less and less rather than getting use to the stench like most people.
I'm reminded of auditions for a symphony orchesta. The candidate is behind a screen when they play, so nothing but the music can influence the judges. I don't think they even look at the person's name until after the initial audition. How you do this for enginerring I don't know, but there has to be a better way. The whole thing is just so fabricated and plastic as it is.
--- Ban humanity.
Having been on both sides of interview table for technical positions over many years, I understand how tough the resume selection and interview process is for both parties.
In many medium and large companies, resumes are converted to searchable databases. (Or they discard resumes and stick to Monster/Dice/Hot Jobs, etc.)
A technical manager may have THOUSANDS of people to choose from for a given position.
1. Missing the necessary buzz-words to exactly match a job-requirements search in a database? Then you won't even be selected as result of a query and so won't be considered at all.
2. Have too many buzz words NOT a part of the required job? Then the people who seem a "better" match on paper will get the interview. You may be the greatest programmer in the world, but the people whose resume makes it look like they spent 80% of their time in the last 5 years on the one computer language on the one flavor of O/S, building the kind of industry-specific applications required for a job, will get the interview over the people listing competence in twenty buzzwords. You may be that good. But the others will get the interviews. I do have a few mega-buzzword resumes out there. They generated my last two jobs when others searched and THEY FOUND ME. But I rarely send them in to specific posted positions.
Then what is needed? A database of dozens of resumes customized so you can fire off the most likely match for the position you want. So a site like monster.com limits you to 5 custom resumes? Then consider 100 ids, with each one forwarding to a single email address. Seems like too much work? O.K. Let someone else get the job.
If you know you are sending email to an individual (as opposed to an automated job bank or HR department looking for buzz-words), consider the traditional word resume attached to an email whose body is a colorful, well laid out, advertisement for YOU.
All of this assumes you have skills actually wanted by a bunch of employers. I once got a resume from a person who had spent the last twenty years maintaining the single program module that manages one type of payroll deduction for one of the country's largest companies. I can see you rolling your eyes now. "Oh, I'm so much more versatile than THAT." You may be. What message is communicated by your resume?
All this started with a discussion about whether or not to use a cover letter. I feel cover letters are appropriate if any one of several conditions are met. First, use one if the job posting hints you are disqualified from a position without one that contains a specific piece of information such as minimum required salary. (If I can get 200 quality resumes from people who follow my posted instructions, I don't have to look at any others.)
Second, if you are applying to a job where a phone call or email exchange resulted in your having to drive a competitive point home, it couldn't hurt.
For purely technical jobs, I bet the cover letter is likely to be a waste of time if not requested.
The bottom line:
Better to spend your precious minutes making sure the resume version sent matches the requirements of the job in question.
P.S. -
A note in quasi-defense of headhunters:
Of course they ignore your geographic and travel preferences. They're just trying to fill the few job orders they have. Forgive their optimism, and accept those interviews that make sense to you. Play nice with them and SOMEDAY they may play nice with you.
Consider that many companies no longer use headhunters at all as the various job boards are the primary employee-generating tool for many.
You need to spread your bets across headhunters, agencies, job boards, and direct applications.
Live Long and Prosper - Thanks Leonard. You are missed.
I am so tired of hearing the word, "alleged", that I may perform some alleged act on the next person to use it in my presence. That and the phrase "if you will." If I will what? geez...
The author made a rather stupid comment about punctuation skills of indians. How large a sample space one needs when ascribing a trait to all indians?
Well, after reading his point of view, I am convinced that only numbskulls are able to get a job at his company. Pffff, what a conformist.
"Probably my greatest weakness, if I were to get a job here, would be that svelte good-looking secretary just outside your office."
It's better to just fib and play the game.
I have to disagree with this. Stretch the truth nearly (but not quite) to the breaking point, based on your own estimation of your abilities. People read resumes looking for reassurance that they have a skilled person on their hands. Certainly, don't make up fake jobs or degrees, but your experience listing should reflect the skills you can bring to the job, rather than exactly your existing responsibilities.
For example, I got my first job (I was 16) by listing all the computer languages I knew the name of on my resume. The job was in FORTRAN, so I learned FORTRAN over the weekend between being offered the position and coming to work. No worries -- they were really happy with my work. No way would they have hired me if I listed the languages I felt proficient in rather than the ones that I felt I could be proficient in. (I was doing fusion research at a tokamak in San Diego).
I haven't been this impressed since I first laid eyes on a young bootlick named Wayland Smithers.
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
C++ really is a huge language, and it's very easy to think that you know C++ because you know both java and C and can sort of mix them together.
Common LISP is, from what I tell, in a similar situation - you may think you "know lisp" because you know scheme and think that that includes knowing CL, but... it doesn't.
For what it's worth, "Effective C++" is an excellent starting point for upgrading your C++.
In some countries, old-style HR droids expect all CVs to have a current photo attached. France is one of the worst offenders of this outdated practice, but I've seen it all over Europe and the far east.
I've worked in a few places where the HR people started by throwing out all the CVs which didn't have a photo and a block of personal information (age, marital status, children, hometown, primary school, hobbies). Then they sort the photos for good looking people. After they have a small pile of applicants who will look good in the hallways and the cafeteria, then they start looking at qualifications. I've sat in a droids office while she did this, and pointed out repeatedly to her and her boss that we really needed to find a specific engineering talent, and we couldn't care less what they looked like. I was overridden because the local HR policy forbid hiring a candidate if they couldn't make a visual pre-judgement. Someone later pointed out to me, it was obvious in hindsight, there wasn't one blonde person or short person in the company, since the two HR women preferred tall, dark haired men.
I've seen worse. At the European HQ of a large american company, I was asked for handwriting samples for a graphology report, my exact birthplace and time for a horoscope, and then the HR woman did a phrenology exam of my skull. I received a formal written apology from the head of HR in the states after I wrote up a fairly humourous rant about the process which made the rounds of some of their internal mailing lists. By the time the apology and job offer came in, I already had another job.
Years ago a makeup artist friend gave me a whole makeover, and then took my photo wearing a suit and tie. The good looking chap in the photo bears only a slight resemblance to me. I actually used it on a few CVs when I decided I wanted a career track again, which is what led to the interview with the big american company. Ever since, I've left my CV without a photo, and maintain a blacklist of companies who still require either a photo or a handwriting sample before being considered for a job.
These days, all my work comes from contacts, and I don't need to send out CVs any more. Networking is far more important to getting the first contact behind the HR filter than trying the usual way of adding your CV to the huge pile they already have. But having a spiff looking CV for the interviews is absolutely essential, because they will be reading it during the times you are not in their presence, and the CV has to be selling you when you can't be there personally to do it.
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
I have many years of experience on both sides of this fence, and guess what? There is NO advice and NO approach that will work in all situations.
As a prospective employee, I have sent out resumes about positions for which I was highly qualified. These resumes were literate (no errors in syntax or spelling), succinct (brief but information-dense), even well laid out and printed on good paper - and most of the hiring people didn't notice the difference. Yes, the people who have the communication skills to write books or articles will look for those qualities, but the fact is that most of the people actually doing the hiring could not meet those requirements themselves.
On the other hand, it is extremely frustrating, when looking for a new employee, to receive 200 resumes of which the vast majority appear to be the pathetic efforts of clueless losers. If Mr. Spolsky got 'lots' of good resumes from well-educated applicants, he should consider himself extremely lucky.
As other posters have noted, a little personal contact will accomplish what no resume possibly could.
The best way to learn is to read them. If you are at a company where it's possible for you to read the incoming resumes, do it. At a previous company we would have resume reading parties where a bunch of us techie types and our managers would go through the hundreds of resumes we would receive. When you have that much to go through, you learn to how skim. You can then use that knowledge to help your own resume- and cover letter-writing.
I live ze unknown. I love ze unknown. I am ze unknown.
Most people are hired by someone who is himself an employee. That person is not going to hire anything outside the formula because he'll be in trouble if he does. Joelesque rants are luxuries that only the sort of people who run their own companies can indulge in.
The moral? If your USP is that you are unusual, interesting, or otherwise don't fit the standard mould, go for the firms where the decision maker isn't worried about his job. Preferably where he owns the business.
And - to second just about everyone's post - remember that you only suffer 1 first interview for a job. The poor employer suffers dozens: every one of them spent hoping that you're asking the right questions to do the candidate justice. That's why we're desperate to discard as many applications as we possibly can. Misplaced semicolon = discard the application = 1/2 hour less of agony.
I think you need to rethink your never lie maxim. Maybe you can allow for embellishment or omission.
I've been on both sides of the fence, and for a job with a number of applicants, the hiring process has two distinct phases: the exclusionary phase and the inclusionary.
Looking through the resumes and the phone or first in-person interview. You are trying to cull the field down to 3 or 4 good candidates. Only then can you try to figure out who would be the better candidate.
You must treat the interview questions as being as broad as possible. If the job is looking for a linux application developer and you are asked if you have done any work with the kernel. Even if you have only recompiled the kernel, the answer is yes.
I interviewed once for Win32 application development position where I was asked about DirectX. They really had no use for the technology in their product, but it was being thrown out there as a meter. So, even though I'd never used it myself, I had compiled and ran one of the samples, and I knew a little about the history and that it was a COM based API. My answer was yes, and I talked about the development history and tied it in with Microsoft's shift to COM-based APIs. I didn't always treat questions like this as broadly.
About 8 years ago I was asked about databases in an internal position interview at what was then a leader in the online communications industry. This job was not for a database programmer, just someone who would need to use a database as a part of the job. I answered very truthfully, outlining what I had an had not done with databases to that point. The interview went great, but they ended up hiring someone with less qualifications based on that one question (I *do* know this was the reason). I left the company not too long after, having obtained a position programming database applications for reference and multimedia CDs. It was at once both a frustrating and eyeopening experience. I'm very glad it happened early in my work life.
If it is fundamental to the job, an outright lie about knowledge or experience will be found out and probably lead to your firing.
You must treat the early hiring process as a game. Figure out where you are in the process and act accordingly.
True, we're currently recruiting and the advert in the newspaper gives our email address and web site address and asks people to consult either of those for further information. Anybody that phones up, we try and get their name and put them on the "Unable to follow instructions list" (unless, of course, they've shown real cunning and ask for the MD's name or are just asking if the position is still open).
It may be different for other languages, but for C++ at least, you can't expect to be productive until you've been using it for six months.
The cake is a pie
Consider "Hobbies: reading, cinema, dinner with friends" against "Hobbies: Field Archery (37th in National Championships), Cooking (Tex-Mex a speciality), RPGs with friends"...Which are you going to employ?
Definately the first one.
As anyone who has worked with avid RPG players can attest. It's annoying having to wait for their pantomimed d20 throw every time you ask them a question.
Speaking of honesty, your friend took home a box of resumes filled with peoples personal information, given to his EMPLOYER, and then shared this information with you. And now your trying to talk to me from a position of integrity.
Anonymous Cowards - Oh God, How I hate you
To me it's exactly like if, in the days before e-mail, an employer discriminated against an applicant simply because their return address indicated their home was in the bad part of town. Yes, people could use something better for their username than "crazydood2004" or whatever. But dismissing them just because they're on AOL/Hotmail/Yahoo/etc. is indefensible. Not every university HAS a studentname@alumni.school.edu system like he says would be more impressive to him. And if the author had taken the time to do research, he would find that (to use his example) yahoo users don't have any choice about the "Do you Yahoo!?" ad.
What kind of answers do you typically get for that question?
Given that the point under scrutiny has been examined numerous times, it is prudent to avoid the eggregious mistake often made of providing a terse, trite answer. Let us instead consider the question in a more proactive light. The business critical evaluator will, of course, take the question in a retrospective based on core values, and produce a deliverable in a timely, mission centric fashion.
Naturally.
You can have it fast, accurate, or pretty. Pick any 2.
(N.B. I interviewed candidates for tech jobs at a startup. With companies with a large HR dept, the experience may be slightly different.)
Applications are great, from an employer's perspective.
If you've ever put up a job posting in any kind of public space/forum/job site, you would know that you will start getting flooded with absolute shit resumes that don't match and by desperate people cutting pasting and clicking send. (I've even seen candidates put up autoresponders to job posting sites.. no shit.)
An application, besides the marginal advantages that other respondents have already pointed out, tells me that 1) you've at least read the fucking post and what we're looking for 2) are not just some jerkoff spamming any job posting he sees and that you 3) will at spend ten minutes actually CONSIDERING and THINKING what you're about to apply for, since reading your resume and phone screening/interview will definitely take up (i.e. waste) a lot of my time (and conversely, if you can't be bothered to fill out a 10 minute app, you're not going to do very good work on the job.)
BostonWorks let me put up 3 simple 'interview questions' beforehand -- loved that feature -- and I made them have easy 2 sentence max responses. It was amazing how many people submitted blank responses or how many I could screen just from reading their absolutely braindead replies. It was GREAT.
And finally, enough people will apply that frankly I only need to consider those who submit a thoughtful, properly formatted app.
I agree though that it wastes time on both ends, which sucks. But realize the root cause, which sucks more; the whole process stems from the fact that you need some way of putting up enough barriers to entry to keep obviously unqualified idiots from wasting your time.
-fren
"Where are we going, and why am I in this handbasket?"
1. Are you hot?
2. No, really, are you hot?
3. Do you have any interesting tattoos?
4. Do you dress hot?
Needless to say, I never heard from those companies.
"Thanks to the remote control I have the attention span of a gerbil."
Be wary of anyone who refers to themselves in the third person. This even applies to a Slashdot persona.
OT, but Ben Stein really is a heck of a nice guy.
He had found out that I went to UCSC, so after I won (some of) his money, we stood around the stage for 15 minutes or so swapping Santa Cruz stories...
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
An inability to lie convincingly in response to silly interview questions.
Quattuor res in hoc mundo sanctae sunt: libri, liberi, libertas et liberalitas.
>If you don't have the right qualifications, don't apply for the job.
Anyone who has ever gotten a job other than flipping burgers knows that the "requirements" are a wish list of things the company would like. DO NOT follow this advise while looking for a job. Apply to any that look like you could do it even if you have 6 months too little experience or 8 out of 10 required skills!
>Even stupider is submitting two big Word documents with no body text in the email. This just gets you spam filtered. I don't even SEE these
I hope you explicity say this, otherwise this is your problem.
>Please do not use cover letters that you copied out of a book
Your potential employees are not mind readers, they have no idea if they are going to be talking to a techie or a marketoid or a VP. Just because you like casual, matter-of-fact language doesn't mean Mr. Burns the VP of IT will like it. How are they supposed to know how to make the letter other than to make it as formal as possible? They are actually giving you the benefit of the doubt(misplaced?) that you will be smart enough to look past that.
>And while I'm on it, anonymous email accounts and AOL accounts just don't send a good message.
This could be the dumbest part of the whole article, although there are so many dumb parts, it's hard to decide. Anonymous emails are how 98% of the world communicates via email. Sorry Joel, I'm not going to go through getting an email from my school of 5 years ago, and check my mail with pine when I can get a prefectly good web email account from yahoo or hotmail, which is accessable from any computer, any OS, anywhere in the world.
>They won't exactly disqualify you since so many people use them, but crazydood2004 at hotmail.com does not really impress me as much as name at alumni.something.edu.
So every college is supposed to have an email for it's alumni b/c you are elitist?
>Do you really need to know if I Yahoo!?
Do I really give a crap about what you think of my email account? If you are this petty who would want to work for you anyway?
Grow up and realize that to the person applying for the job you are one out of 100+ jobs they are applying for. They don't have time to stroke you ego for a half-hour, as they are probably taking classes, working another job, or just sending out TONS of resumes trying to get a job as their bills keep piling up. If you cared about your company you would do yourself a favor and go back thru this article and think about what you are saying about yourself and your company.
-Comedian
>a small and friendly startup in New York City
ummm, yeah...right...
I've seen many of the examples you give, I can't think of any more to add. But what the hell, I'll bitch about back headhunters.
Tip 1: Vary your "this employer is great" pitch. After the third time of being told that "So-and-So is a real pistol!" for three different companies, I start to think that "is a real pistol" means "is someone I've never met". (Come to think of it, is "is a real pistol" really a good thing? Is the VP liable to go off at any moment? Does he require careful care to avoid accidents? Is he regulated?)
Tip 2: Keep track of your contacts. Getting a message introducing yourself after finding my resume on the internet is fine, but it's a little off-putting if we've exchanged email and phone calls not a year earlier.
Tip 3: Don't say you found my resume on the internet, then ask me to submit my resume to your web form. Feel free to submit it yourself. (Especially since I suspect you're lying, don't really have a job opportunity, but just want to flesh out your database of possible applicants).
Tip 4: Make your web site not look like ass. Clean, simple designs are easy; use one. If you can afford someone to write a stupid Java based hover effect (better implemented with JavaScript or CSS), you can afford a professional looking web site.
Search 2010 Gen Con events
Hobbies. I've listed one of my hobbies on all my resumes, and more than one employer has told me later that was a main reason for hiring me. That doesn't mean you should list any hobby, but if you love to do something that requires lots of skill, intelligence and dedication, do mention it. It tells a lot about who you are.
Lies. I don't lie on my resumes, but I have the feeling I probably should. The norm in the US seems to be that you embellish by about 50%. Employers know this and adjust for it. And that means that 67% of my skills are compared with 100% of other peoples.
Here's a perspective that I haven't seen in this discussion:
I was once a hiring manager in a company with a very conservative senior executive team. My team's office was in the same suite as the company's president and vice-presidents, and the rule was that we didn't even leave our cube without a jacket. (Please don't tell me how stupid this was; I'm just describing the environment.)
I can't tell you how many times, when looking at two or more equally-qualified applicants, my final selection was based on the answer to this question: "Which applicant will make my job easier?"
The fact that an applicant wore a suit to the interview told me one important thing: He didn't object to wearing a suit. And in that environment, when a programmer attended a meeting with the client, he wore a suit. When I hired the guy who wore the suit, I knew that I wouldn't have to listen to the same tired argument about how "wearing a tie doesn't make you a better programmer" every time I scheduled a client meeting. The same is true of the appearance of the resume. When I looked at a nicely formatted resume on cotton bond, I knew that I was less likely to have to fight with that applicant to get a client-quality document once he was hired.
What would you rather do: spend an hour bickering with someone about why they have to use the corporate template for a technical specification, or spend that same hour doing your job so that you could finish your work for the day and go home to your wife? I picked the applicant who would let me do the latter, and I had the pleasure of working with some damned fine programmers (even if they were wearing ties).
Remember, this was my tie-breaker (no pun intended) to select among several otherwise equally-qualified applicants. I'd never pick an unqualified applicant just because he was dressed up nice and had a fancy resume.
Of course, there are programmers who sit in their cubes and write code, who don't interact with clients or management, who avoid working with consultants and business analysts, and whose work is never seen by the client. Unfortunately, these are the kind of programmers whose jobs are likely to be shipped to Brazil or India.
That doesn't answer how one gets to the interview. It's difficult to convey enthusiasm and creativity on a resume, much less to compete with hundreds of other resumes that actually meet the criteria. In this market, the interview is not the problem, rather it is getting to the interview itself.
If you take some time to learn a skill and practice with it, even if it is for the sole purpose of learning said skill, then it is entirely appropriate to put "some experience with X" on your resume. If in the interview your interviewer decides to question your experience with skill X, then be utterly honest.
Tell me about your experience with skill X...
Several weeks/months ago I decided that skill X is an emerging technology and I have been spent many hours at home both learning and practicing skill X. While I have not had the opportunity to put my knowledge of skill X to use at work, I certainly believe that I am capable of using skill X in the workplace.
Thus you have clarified the ambigious expression "some experience with" and your employer can decide if your creativity and enthusiasm make up for your lack of professional experience with skill X.
The important difference, of course, is that MS did it all a decade ago and sold technical service. Sure that doesn't mean that they did it well, but they do have one hell of a head start.
"Sanity is not statistical", George Orwell, "1984"
That is incredibly unethical. If I ever get your resume, remind me not to hire you. :)
Thanks,
--
Matt
"Al, does this dress make me look fat?"
"No Peg, it's the fat that makes you look fat."
Well, whatever. It's fitting though, since the whole resume/cover letter/interview process has a bunch of bullshit.
---------
George W. Bush in 2004!
Hey Ian,
Are you back in Ireland?
Steve
Okay, so now that the domain has been abandoned I guess it's ok to talk about.
A few years ago I got a resume from someone who listed their email address as fly@flyonshit.com. Sure enough, it was a webdev position, and the website www.flyonshit.com was listed as part of the portfolio.
I don't care how extreme things got back then (dogs at work, hair-color-of-the-week contests, corporate-sponsored PlayStations, etc) there is just no way I would ever interview someone known (self-proclaimed or otherwise) as fly@flyonshit.com.
But seriously, my 80% success rate seems to be based on the fact that I asked the interviewer a lot of questions, thus demonstrating I was ready to hit the ground running, that I knew what I was doing, and was looking how I could integrate myself into their processes should I be hired.
I wore a nice suit, but that part of it felt so artificial and pointless. I felt like an idiot being shown around the officies and labs and being the only one in a tie. Carrying through with the product idea, the suit was like the bikini babes in beer ads. What the flying bleep do they have to do with taste and hops and fermentation?
I actually don't disagree with all the responses I have gotten here. My complaint is that there must be a better way, because I have seen the current standard interview process fail so many times in both the positive and negative direction. What they better way is, well, I really have no idea.
I'm also just so tired of all the vapid nonsense in this world, and have always considered the typical "professional" interview process to capture in a nutshell a lot of what's wrong with human interaction in this world.
I'm very happy in my current position, but I sometimes threaten to go on interviews just for the practice, and try out different things. For example, wear a very casual getup- nice jacket, polo shirt and slacks and NO TIE. Project an image of style but comfort.
There's probably a thesis lurking here for some psych major out there.
--- Ban humanity.
For some truly excellent articles on this topic, check out Ask the Headhunter, where you can find such gems as Keep Your Salary Under Wraps and Everything You Know About Job Hunting Is Wrong.
Anyone who is looking for a job or in danger of being laid off (that's everyone these days!) should take a few hours and read the Ask the Headhunter site from top to bottom. It really is an incredibly valuable source of knowledge.
What's with this "Funny" moderation then -- it was all absolutely true!!!!!
This is very slightly OT, but:
.doc golem, to three floppies (in case any one should prove incapable of containing such forces) and printed a copy to show to my roommate, who immediately asked if he could pay me $20 to fix his computer, which had, he said, been making a lot of fan noise of late. After I reformatted approximately half his drive and lost one of his motherboard's DIMMs, he paid me $30, and recommended me to everyone he knew, including his uncle, who works in HR at a large software company which shall remain nameless.
I have the best cover letter in the world.
See, I'm an arts major. I love comp sci, but, at core, I'm better at slinging words than code. And yet --- and yet! --- time and time I land juicy IT/comp sci jobs.
How did I do it, you ask? How -- in this era of downsizing, offshoring, outsourcing, and outcasting, can a man with only two thirds of a BA to his name whisk jobs out from under the noses of a standing army of hungry engineers?
It began some time ago. Late one May night, in the spring of my first year of university, I sat up, smoking, staring at my screen. I had no prospects that summer, and my bank account, over the preceding months, had boiled dry in the orgiastic worship of those two deities, Pizza and Alcohol, that stand watch over freshmen. I had no regrets, but for the gnawing of my gut; but this latter had long ceased to be a matter of purely speculative interest. Of late, it had begun to impel my thoughts towards dark fantasies and barbarous acts; I had even, in my nadir, begun contemplating call centre jobs. So I sat there, hour after hour, smoking, until, heavy with nicotine and caffeine and exhaustion's due, I reached for the 'Shut Down' item in the Special menu. But as despair condemns, so does it raise up. As I grasped the mouse, I saw a vision of all the terrible months, the agonies, that await the un- and under-employed, and, in terror, I blurted into my word processor a single phrase: 'To Whom It May Concern'.
'To Whom It May Concern'. Bold, but not brazen. Formal, but not stiff.
Just as, upon kindling a fire, one red-tongued flame implies the next, or, in ramen, one noodle dangles upon its predessor, so too with words. In my desperation I spoke, as they say, from the heart; I emptied the 'ramen noodle bowl' of my heart up, out, into the computer, and the word processor awaiting within.
A god must have possessed me, for I wrote without memory, and fell asleep on the keyboard. When I awoke, I discovered that I had created such a harmony of plain-hearted, well-spoken servile lies that I could not believe my eyes. I saved the created _thing_, my
And that is how I survive: By using the dark side of the market forces to manipulate feeble-minded middle management into hiring and retaining me. Maybe I don't have the certs, and maybe I don't have the street cred; But I *do* have the world's best cover letter. It is +4/+5 with mountainwalking, forestwalking, swampwalking and moonwalking. It comes on premium bond acid-free paper, lightly watermarked with one of those pretentious marbly patterns.
It also comes in an attractive matching envelope.
So far, according to my completely unscientific measurements, it's landed me, and my friends, over twenty jobs. It can be modified to target any position, any requirements, with only a single sentence change -- and yet it sounds perfectly natural and unaffected. In short, no job is safe, no position impregnable. The only reason I have not yet taken over the world is that the U.S. presidency does not accept resumes. But, in the event that I do somehow manage to take control (or, as I shall say on TV, 'stewardship') of the planet, you should not worry: I take very good care of the mindless suits that become my mindless slaves, and I see no reason to change a broadly successful HR policy simply because I'll have a few extra billion chattel to boss about. Although I admit that my reign will probably involve some gigantic poster-waving, I will see to it that eith
- undoware.ca
A personal recommendation helps, but you don't have the "right stuff"(TM), you need to be shown the door.
What if everybody gave out recommendations saying "Hey, this guy is awesome"?
What you are talking about is a form of grade inflation, and it occasionally crops up in medicine as well... I've seen it happen in a document that virtually every residency program requires: the Dean's letter. I've heard of medical schools sending out uniformly outstanding Dean's letters for every student... the only perceptible difference being that some are just a bit more outstanding than others. Some medical schools fear litigation if they pan anyone (even if they deserve it), and some are trying to defend their school's reputation as one of producing quality students.
For example, I know of one school that took almost 8 years to graduate a student (normal course of study is four years), and only allowed that student to graduate because both parents were attorneys and threatened to sue. Luckily, no residency program offered that student a slot, so that student will never touch a patient... at least somebody finally did the right thing.
In medicine, numbers usually get you as far as the interview (a personal recommendation seals the deal)... but that's it. After that, it's all on you. Med schools receive hundreds, sometimes thousands of applications, and MCAT scores/GPA are immediately used to cull out the non-hackers, with personal interviews for the rest. Residencies do a similar winnowing with USMLE scores. My former program black-balled some very well-qualified (at least numbers-wise) candidates because they came across as arrogant, or abrasive... I know, because I was present at those meetings. Being a clinician requires a human side, so geniuses who are also abrasive jerks are a liability. When arrogant guys like that go into clinical medicine, they piss off patients, reinforce the "God complex" reputation of doctors in general, and feed the malpractice attorneys. IMHO, those people belong in research... not as clinicians.
Word of mouth is so important... it's so critical not to burn your bridges, or to gratuitously act like an ass. I could tell you story after story of that kind of slash-and-burn philosophy coming back to haunt people...
Network... but be qualified, and be a reasonable guy... that's all most employers want.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
I can appreciate where Joel is coming from. I've been there. I've probably hired over 100 employees over the years which means I've sifted through thousands of resumes. That being said, I also get a bit of a reaction when I see these rants. Sure, it's frustrating but ranting about it isn't likely to help.
The other side is that employers are no better. Go do some random searches on Monster or HotJobs and see how many job descriptions contain misspellings or poor grammar. How about job postings that stress that resumes without a salary history will not be considered yet the company refuses to even list a salary range for the position. Perhaps we've all seen the job descriptions that either list every skill in the book or those that say something along the lines of "PERL Guru" with no real explanation of what qualifies as "Guru" or any other description of the actual duties of the position (Craig's List is especially guilty of these types of postings).
I could go on and on (like Joel does) but my point isn't to rant but to illustrate that for every well defined job there are 100 that aren't. For every job like Joel's which has specific requirements there are 100 jobs listed as requiring 10 - 15 years of Java programming experience (or worse, they confuse Java with JavaScript and have no clue what the difference is). Hell, I've applied for two almost identical job listings and been told by one that I was over-qualified and by the other that I didn't have the necessary skills for the position. I even went on one interview for a technical IT project manager position (that was the exact name of the position) and the interviewer kept asking me about whether or not I could use PhotoShop.
I think that instead of ranting about job applicants, Joel should use his platform to rant about the universe of companies who make searching for a job such an insane experience. Unfortunately, in this job market it's a numbers game. It costs almost nothing to submit a resume so there's a positive expected value if people submit resumes for anything they might even be remotely qualified for in the hope that they can get an interview. You can't get an interview for a job you don't apply for seems to be the motto and when companies continue to post such poor job definitions it only reinforces the behavior. Obviously nobody has 15 years of Java programming experience so why not apply if you only have 2? The job post says that they're looking for someone with an MBA but the salary range is $26,000 - $32,000 so why shouldn't someone apply with only a high school diploma? Chances are they're not going to be seeing many MBA resumes from people willing to work at that rate anyway.
In the end, Joel is no different than the guy or gal who goes out and writes a personal cover letter for 100 different jobs that s/he is specifically qualified for and doesn't even receive a courtesy follow-up phone call from a single one.
Brought to you by Fark.com! BOOBIES!
Probably depends on what you mean by "major project" :-) I've seen Excel VBA used as the indispensable core component of an industry-leading spacecraft design center. JPL's Project Design Center used to run on an Excel/VBA platform (although I believe that they may have migrated to something else recently).
Dear Liar,
I'm one of the few remaining dipshits who believe that there is such a thing as a career offered by lying, cheat fucks in middle management.
So, I'm including a copy of my resume in the tragic and somewhat pathetic expectation of adding to my world-record collection of "fuck you" letters.
I have written the resume to the contemporary "I don't give a shit(tm)" standard. I made sure to underemphasize my education, even though I invested five years and $75,000 to earn it. I made sure to include my "experience" even though I know for a fact that those details will make it even easier to disqualify my experience on the basis of a different build version.
I have also included an enormous list of accomplishments, which I am fully aware will also disqualify me because you fuckers don't want anyone to know there are people who actually produce something at work.
I have also included my salary history at your request, so you will have just one more reason to chuckle and toss this resume into the trash can so fast it leaves a dent.
So, in closing, I'd like to be considered for the "Entry-level shit-shoveler B" position, even though I have ten years of senior-level experience on two dozen software platforms.
I'd also like to say "Thanks a lot asshole. Take your job and park it," in advance, just so I can save you the time which I'm sure you consider better invested in a meeting or signing up for this week's donut list.
Another fucked-over job candidate
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
Joel talks about shredding paper resumes. Is this legal? I'm not sure where I got this notion, but I was under the impression that businesses are required by law to keep your resume on hand for a few years if you send it to them, even if it was sent unsolicited.
And here people actually thought it was our qualifications that were at issue. Some of us knew better. Some of us have known better for years. Here are the reasons people are disqualified, as written:
... which we go through to find good candidates. If you think for some reason that your resume will get more attention if you print it out and send it through the mail,
...but only just "look like it."
...at two companies where the shredder is easier to use.
1) Spacing before and after punctuation. (the #3 reason to disqualify job applicants).
2) How the cover letter is attached to the e-mail.
3) The cover letter is written too well. (One would presume that using 100% perfect puncutation would also spam-filter the cover letter)
4) Capitalization of pronouns.
5) The e-mail address domain.
6) Which company advertises in the e-mails, and whether they compete with the company advertising for employees.
7) The structure of the salutation.
Note that there is not a single mention of qualifications, education or experience. Not one. In fact, none of the three words EVEN APPEARS IN THE ARTICLE.
Proofread everything a hundred times and have one other person proofread it. Someone who got really good grades in English.
Just don't let them edit it or modify any grammar or sentence structure or it will go into the "fake cover letter" spam folder.
Write a personal cover letter that is customized for the job you are applying for. Try to sound like a human in the cover letter. You want people to think of you as a human being.
In other words, dramatically reduce your chances of finding a good job by only giving yourself enough time to send out perhaps 10 resumes for every 10 hours of work.
Study the directions that are given for how to apply. They are there for a reason
In other words, to show more effort and dedication...
Paper resumes can't get into the email folder we're using to keep track of applicants unless we scan them in, and, you know what? The scanner is right next to the shredder in my office and the shredder is easier to use.
No comment.
Don't apply for too many jobs. I don't think there's ever a reason to apply for more than three or four jobs at a time.
That's because you have a job.
Resumespam, or any sign that you're applying for 100 jobs, just makes you look desperate which makes you look unqualified.
In other words, if you are starving, make sure to wear a tuxedo and order the lite salad.
You want to look like you are good enough to be in heavy demand.
You're going to decide where you want to work, because you're smart enough to have a choice in the matter, so you only need to apply for one or two jobs.
A personalized cover letter that shows that you understand what the company does goes a long way to proving that you care enough to deserve a chance.
So does taking the time to send an actual letter.
Some of this stuff may sound pretty superficial.
It is superficial.
Indeed, what we're really looking for when we look at resumes is someone who is passionate and successful at whatever they try to do.
Wow, we're 80% in and the word "experience" hasn't appeared once.
Writing a shareware app when you're a teenager is just as good a qualification to us as getting into MIT.
This statement is beyond all reality.
Much as I'd love to be able to consider everyone on their merits instead of on superficial resume stuff, it's just not realistic, and there's just no reason a college graduate can't get this right.
Irrefutable proof that experience, education and competence are ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT in the contemporary workplace. Period. The argument is over.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
Because, of course, employers know that no one ever lied on a resume, and that if you say that you are a C++ ubergeek, you therefore must be one.
The cake is a pie
After returning from an 8 month contract in Germany years ago (pre-internet), I submitted my resume on European paper to a job in the USA. The paper isn't exactly 8.5" x 11". Can't remember if it's wider or longer. But the head of the development group I applied to said it wouldn't fit in the pile of resumes they received, and they couldn't help but notice it. I ended up getting a job there.
When I was in graduate school in Minnesota, I applied for an engineering position in town. When I got called into the interview, the first question out of the interviewers mouth was (in a fine Scottish accent) "So, it says on your resume that you play rugby." We had a nice chat about my playing rugby for the last 6 years, then moved on to talking about the work they did and how I could fit in with their plans. I am confident that my resume got picked out of the pile to get interviewed because my hobbies made me sound interesting and like a real person instead of a faceless skills list. Having something non-work related to talk about at the beginning of the interview also helped to "break the ice" and made for a far more comfortable interview where I wasn't as nervous as I might have been if we had launched right into the technical talk.
but in his world your poor grammer keeps him from being your boss.
In my world his bullshit job requirements keep my company from being his client.
My buddy just had to move from the midwest to Seattle for a 7-month contract. It sucks but it's work,
Out of food? Had to eat your own foot? It sucks but it's food.
Nice troll.
the guy makes some good points... I know this happens with many employers.
:/
When you get a few hundred applications for the same job you tend to be ruthless about what gets let through.
Now I just need to figure out how to right the best cover letter + CV so I can get a job... going on 3 months without work now
---- Put Sig here:
If you are reading the content of cover letters to make assumptions of the candidate, you might as well watch the info-mmercial on the shredder to really know how well it will work in your own home.
In the dot-com revolution, I hired 50 people and I learned that the cover letter was the least important part. If a company is judging you by your cover letter, you don't want to work for them- plain and simple. If you are judging someone by their cover letter, you shouldn't be in the position you are.
You read the content of the resume, regardless of its composition. Then you interview someone. Yes, you may see some things in the resume that turn you off to the candidate, but work mostly by their qualifications- not their writing skills, unless of course you are hiring someone to write your own damned resume.
Its funny how many experts there are on writing resumes and how few there are on interpretting them.
I kid you not. "States I Have Been In." This was a section of the guy's resume, covering most of an entire page. We almost brought the guy in just to see what he looked like, but wiser heads prevailed.
Best hiring story: Had a guy show up for a hardware engineering position, to design microprocessor motherboards (Z80's, 64180's, 8051's). The guy was from Raytheon or some other dumbfuck DOD-funded outfit. His experience? He was part of a 20-man (!) team that built a Z80 motherboard. His responsibility, over the 18 months of the project (!) was to -- get this -- design the DRAM circuit. Whoo hoo. When we told him we expected a soup-to-nuts, zero-fault board to show up in 60-90 days (average), and we expected him to design the whole thing himself, he got up and left!
"...at worst they will think that you were not born with the part of the brain that allows you to form your own thoughts and ideas."
Unless the applicant was an MBA, then it would just be a given.
"It's better to be a pirate then join the Navy"
Then again, I'm a graduate student and the only hires I get to make are work-study students. So far, I've done pretty well. While this is obviously a rather low-level kind of hiring experience, I've tried to make it work well for the students and for myself. I mean, if I'm going to hire a peon, I want him/her to be the best darn peon available.
My greatest weakness? Making snide remarks about stupid questions.
I am about to graduate with a CS degree, and I have been job searching for a little while. This might be a troll, but after reading the comments here, I can honestly say I have little motivation to even attempt securing a tech job.
I know I'm talented. I know I have a good work ethic. As cheesy as it sounds all of these conflicting methods and opinions make finding a job sound like shooting fish in a barrel. One guy, girl, or company likes this, another guy gets a bug up his ass when he sees the same thing. C'mon.
I am not crazy about the whole networking thing either. If everything was done in this way an incompetent person could know someone at company X and get hired. Some objectivity is necessary in the hiring process. If the world worked liked this it would be more fucked up than it is. Besides that, I am not a phony. I don't suck dick to code.
Despite what you may think of my attitude at this point, I have strong social skills and I feel that I can communicate effectively with others. You will have to forgive me, because I am little disenchanted with this job-finding process right now. I spent four years doing honest work, recieiving high marks for it, and really enjoying it. The fact that this mess is all the world gives me to show for it is quite depressing. I don't think anything is owed to me, but for some reason this whole thing seems more than slightly degrading.
Unfortunately holding down a job at a 7-11 and programming open source projects in my spare time doesn't pay the student loans, because that is what I feel like doing at this point.
I thought it was "it's your ass that makes you look fat", but I've been known to be wrong before.
jred
I'm not a mechanic but I play one in my garage...
Dear Spolsky:
Real humans do not spell "resume" with bullshit accents.
If you're interviewing somewhere, and you -know- they're interviewing a lot of other people, do something excentric or different that you know will draw attention to you.
:) That made a note in the mind of the interviewers. She got the job.
:)
I had a prof tell a story of a woman that was amongst a group of several hundred applicants who were interviewing. On her way into the inverview room in front of the interviewers, she skipped - like a school girl, not like a broken record.
So do something off-base. Wear a fun tie. Have a quirky laugh, and/or do something that will draw attention without disqualifying yourself, to let them know that you're interested in the job enough to think creatively about what might get you hired. A good employer will notice this and consider you more highly.
Now just don't let me see any of you sons-of-bitches in line with me, waiting for an interview.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
if more people than he need are already jumping over it? Why should he lower the bar only to present and even larger crowd to weed through? Yes there might be some good people stuck down there but there are in all probably also some good people in the list of people who didn't make classic blunders.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
that he was just writing in a language the intended audience could understand. :-)
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
"I work hard, but I'm a perfectionist. Also, I steal."
- Cat and Girl
I had no problem getting offers from many companies with many different cultures when I graduated. Screening methods varied from heavy HR screening to email directly to the branch manager. The companies may well have had problems, but I had no difficulty working around them... *NO* difficulty. If you do have difficulty, then you are also a problem. I find it probable that despite your belief to the contrary, you suck.
From the article:
If you don't have the right qualifications, don't apply for the job.
Whenever I see a posting for a position where I know nobody could possibly have such qualifications, I will typically apply for the position. Assuming that my qualifications are fairly close I will go for it. When the list of qualification are temporally impossible or they list such a wide list of in depth qualifications that only a bullshit artist will claim to have them I know the hiring manager will have to settle for what is physically possible.
Gotta agree about the don't lie part. My interviews are split into 3 parts: Making the candidate comfortable, finding out what they know, and getting feedback. A big part of part 1 is looking for something I've done and just shooting the shit over it. Now, if you say you're an expert in MIL-SPEC 1553, which I spent 4 years on, and I ask you what an RT is and you have no clue.... Guess what Charlie, you just blew it.
I'm amazed at the number of people I weed out just in the "relax the candidate" phase of the interview.
So who am I supposed to believe? My BS detector tells me to leave that stuff off, but then I'm faced with "experts" telling me to put it in.
smart and get things done
it was frustrating because I clearly knew what I wanted to be doing but it wasn't available to me at the time. It was always: if you want to do computers you need to go to MIT then you go work at a corporation as an engineer and follow "the path." But I dropped out of college, and started my own company. My brother followed a more conventional path. He got a degree and became a stock broker and that's what my mother expected that you're supposed to do. And he's doing OK for himself, but there's nothing like a few Ferarris to rub your parents face in." John Carmack
for those not treading a worn path, what matters (in software anyway) is the quality of the code, delivered on time meeting the design critera. JOS has consistantly made the point (the right one) that he's looking for the top 5%.
cynical mebut guess what ... this isn't a rant about hiring. This is a gorilla marketing campaign .... We're goin' up to slashdot to put the word to the net .
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
See, the guy who wanted candidates to wear ties wants a candidate who wants to wear a tie.
You don't want a tie, and you should look for an employer who doesn't want you to wear a tie, or employees who don't want to wear ties.
Everybody will get along better.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I'm not hireing Science fiction writers
Diplomacy is the art of saying "Nice doggie" until you can find a rock. Will Rogers
Shouldn't this be modded as "informative" instead?
what the hell?! all slashdoters should all get fired!! are you guys from a fundamentalist islamic nation?
Recently I was asked to review 5 proposals for a 200,000 dollar software development contract for a company XXX. One of the five proposals ends with the phrase "We really look forward to dealing with you at YYY. They had obviously taken a letter to this other company "YYY" and just thrown in the letter without reading it. If this is the care they take over proposal preparation, it makes you wonder what their test procedures are like...?
The only thing all interviewers have noticed in my resume is my hobbies.
Playing piano at a proficient level, opera, chess, latin american literature, Japanese cinema and Linux (way back when it was a rarity) got people to remember who I was.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Both sets of hobbies look equally enjoyable and show a balance between work and life out of work.
All would boil down to skills IMHO.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I have found out about people liying on their CV (it only takes 5 minutes, my record is 30 seconds: two questions and it was all clear all was made up).
In a former company HR would not accept future applications that were known liars and the job agaency would received heavy criticism, in case they would send several offenders any commercial relationship could cease (it happened to one agancy that was clearly not doing the most basic screening at all).
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
The person I work with on hiring hates resumes more than a page long. I temper that with reason though. We did get one resume that listed 'Hand-eye coordination' as a skill, which went in the trash (that was one of the highlights of it).
I would rather use a Hotmail throw-down account to send out resumes than a current work address (which would be wrong anyways) or using my personal domain's address (I don't need them checking out my personal site as part of the hiring process unless I have some sort of portfolio material there). The author's problem that someone may use a Hotmail or Yahoo account is asinine. Maybe it holds some weight because he claims they are a competitor, but I have never heard of him or his company and it is arrogant to suggest that someone register an email with him just to apply.
Why should they send a portfolio if they are being asked specifically for a CV???
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Perhaps because I know better and my personal email address has been in yahoo.com for the last 7 years?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
i m interested in your summer job.
here is my resume
So I suppose this means he wouldn't consider hiring e.e. cummings?
It always helps to have thousands of unemployed overqualified IT specialists desperate for any job somewhat related to computers. It also helps to have a sexy office and a popular blog.
:) And it's also extremely nice leaving a life completely devoid of worries about unemployment, when the only reason for being unemployed is that you currently have other plans.
But in other times and in other places his rants are irrelevant. A small management consultancy company I just left is desperate for new employees. The pay is nice, the working environment is nice. But there are simply not enough qualified people on the market. So every resume gets read, almost every candidate gets interviewed by phone and even people who don't speak English get a chance, even though proficiency in English is one of the prerequisites.
When you are a person (i.e. always) it's nice to have seller's market with labour.
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
I just started my 4th job in 20 years. I haven't modified my resume since 1987. I haven't shown it to anyone since around then, and I certainly didn't use it to get the last 3 jobs. It's not who you know, or how good your resume' or cover letter is. It's what you do with your life. It's the Open Source projects you contribute to, along with the value of those contributions. It's the geeks you have lunch with every week. It's the friends you maintain. These are the things that will get you the jobs. 3 months ago when I decided it was time to do something new, I started asking my friends who was hiring. I went on an interview, and 2 weeks later I was offered the job but didn't want it. Mentioned it to a friend who I hadn't spoken to in 6 months, but who called me out of the blue. He said "If I'd known you were looking, I'd have hired you." Within a week I was hired, and a month after that, I'm working there. (time needed to finish what I was doing at the old place). Then be the envy of all your new co-workers. Come equipped with your own Aeron Chair, your own bookshelf, your own toy-shelf, and bring your own MP3 spool.
And if you're looking for a tech job, they are scanning for key words, i.e. JAVA, C/C++, UNIX, etc.
So forget the long verbose explainations, and the long explainations of your objectives and goals in life.
Putting a picture on a technical resume is almost a sure ticket to the bottom of the wastepaper basket. If you were an actor, of course you'd include a headshot. As a techie, however, you are expected to be hired on your merits, and it's a big turn-off to many employers for you to plant your mug on your resume.
I've been on both sides of the fence, and the nearly-universal opinion of hiring managers regarding resumes with a picture is that they are a really, really bad idea when applying for a technical position.
Matthew P. Barnson
I learn what I think when I read what I write
We keep those resumes and make fun of them for weeks. Believe me, nobody wants to see what you look like.
"Fog Creek Software is an equal opportunity employer and supports workforce Diversity."
:)
I don't fall for that anymore
"Has it occurred to you to be honest?"
What if my greatest weakness is that I have a hard time getting up in the morning and I might be late once a week?
Now that may or may not be a problem.
But its sure to lose me the job.
Honesty is not always the best policy, but sometimes, honesty is the worst policy ("Does my butt look fat in this dress?" "Do you like me as a person?" "If I die, would you remarry?").
Think of it from a practical standpoint. You're not a councellor, you're trying to judge if someone's good enough for a job. Why would a person place themselves at a disadvantage? That may mark them as being too stupid to work there...
Seriously, think it through.
.
.
.
An open letter to every job recruiter on the planet...
BITE ME.
Times are tough, millions of people are looking for too few jobs.Maybe your comments on good resume etiquite is "The Truth" and the "Way it really happens" and all that. But it is also true that a lot of very good people, with terrific skills are out of work and desperately need to find jobs so they can feed their families, pay their bills, pay their taxes, and be good productive American citizens.
Not all of those terrific people with excellent skills GIVE A HOOT about writing a perfect resume or have time to "custom tailor a resume and cover letter for each and every application". You care because you have to read them every day. They don't because they have to design electronics boards, build houses, stuff boards, juggle numbers, call customers, answer the phone, locate the best price-- and all of the other zillion jobs that DO NOT require any special written skills.
So deal with it.
Applying for lots of jobs might make job seekers look "desperate" TO YOU. But here's another "truth", you moron, in this era of corporations OUTSOURCING everything that isn't nailed down-- they probably _are_ desperate.
GETTING HIRED TODAY IS A NUMBERS GAME, plain and simple.
I'll conceed that the tips you provided are useful, and firther, I would even recommend them to anyone attempting to find a job... But for you to look down your nose at out-of-work people because they can't write a perfect resume or cover letter--
SCREW YOU WHERE IT HURTS MOST BUDDY.
Here are some REAL tips for job seekers--
1. Change your resumes OFTEN. Change the tag lines (resume titles) daily if you can.
2. Send out as MANY resumes as you possibly can. Post your resume on as many job boards as is humanly possible. Here's a brief list to get you started:
www.monster.com
www.hotjobs.com
www.prgjobs.co m
www.computerjobs.com
www.dice.com
www.careerb uilder.com
This really is the key tip-- its a numbers game, sad to say. You will talk to lots and lots of recruiters and most of them will end in hang-ups. THIS IS ACTUALLY A GOOD THING. Every conversation gets you one step closer to the one that is going to HIRE YOU. So be nice, be friendly, be professional, but don't take it personally-- 99% of recruiters are matching buzzwords. Apparently that's all they really know how to to (besides nitpicking gramatical errors on resumes and cover letters). You will get about 100:1 response (resumes to responses) on average. In a especially good week you might get as many as 50:1.
3. Recruiters generally have the intelligence of a rock. I've met some good ones-- but only a few (and they want to bash US over OUR english skills...) SO MAKE SURE YOUR RESUME VERY CLEARLY ANSWERS THIS ONE QUESTION: "How can you solve the problem I have RIGHT NOW"? They probably won't think to TELL you what their problem is (or in fairness, they may not actually know), so you should ASK THEM WHAT THEY NEED.
Despite my obvious aggravation with recruiters-- don't be afraid to talk to them-- they are people too with difficult jobs. They want to do good for the people they work for by hiring the very best people they can find. Its not really their fault that they don't know sh*t from shinola about the jobs they are recruiting for. Be patient, answer their questions-- pay particular attention to buzzword use here-- if you can think of buzzwords you can use in your answer, by all means do so. You will be helping them to check off their list.
This may sound obvious, but I think too many people sit back and let the recruiter drive the conversation. Recruiters are there for YOU TO USE to get a job. YOUR GOAL IS TO GET PAST THE RECRUITER. THEY ARE STANDING IN YOUR WAY of achieving your objective. I'm not advising you to be rude, impolite, or unfriendly-- just bear in mind that you need to get PAST the recruiter to get the job.
4. Be aware of the "B
Hell no, I wouldn't hire e. e. cummings. I hate his poetry and the pretentiousness of his "i believe only the word God should be capitalized" riff annoys me.
This is true for me as well. One time the company nearly tripled my salary to get me into a position in another department. Their usual policy was a few percent raise over current rate.
I agree-- buzzwords are all they know. They have a secret list if you match them all up, you get the interview. I have met a few good ones who knew what they were doing, but not many.
Not to mention that posting your resume on the internet is tantamount to an open invitation to spammers. I always use a throw-away account for receiving material from, so when I'm done with it, I can chuck it overboard without regrets.
But if people never bitched about things, we'd still be huddling in caves, capisca?
--- Ban humanity.
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Hah! Or I could correct my own mistakes and correctly spell STUPID!
-- Those of you who think you know it all are very annoying to those of us who do.
it invariably sparks conversation
:)
You are bang on with this one. I've had to go through stacks of resumes, and there are usually lots of candidates for interview - but given the choice between two, if one is boring, and the other has interests that are interesting (like firewalking), the interesting one gets the interview.
I've had interviewers circle parts of my resume that they found really interesting, whether or not they were related to the job I was applying for. It's great having worked in the Cayman Islands
Resume only has one accented e