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Feature:Geek Jobs
The following was written by Slashdot Reader Joseph Walsh
Getting a Geek JobA few days ago, I was enjoying the hum of the half dozen servers in my office when I decided to do a quick check of the online job search engines. I wanted to know whether there were any worthwhile jobs listed. So I went to one of the larger job search sites, and typed in Linux. No luck. Java? Nope, not without a whole lotta web site design skills. C? Not unless I was willing to master a half dozen semi-dead languages before applying. Sigh.
So I plugged in my current position's buzzwords -- Novell NetWare, WordPerfect, GroupWise, Windows 95, Paradox. Plink! A job description popped up that fit me pretty darned well. They were looking for someone to run a Novell NetWare LAN who also knew WordPerfect and Paradox. And they were willing to pay at least 20% more than my current employer!
After pressing the "submit resume" button, up popped an email. Ah, okay. They wanted an email. So I composed a nice cover letter (pointing out the strong correlation between my skills and the job requirements) and attached a copy of my resume. Of course, the attachment was in WordPerfect format, which made sense to me in light of the fact that WordPerfect was listed as a required skill. (Those of you who are more familiar with this process are no doubt groaning at my nievete'.) I didn't expect to hear anything back, but I thought I might as well give it a shot, right?
A couple of days passed, and I essentially forgot about the whole thing. But last night, what should arrive in my in box but a response to my submission! I opened it up, expecting the standard "thank you for your resume; we'll keep it on file blah blah blah" letter. After all, I have a degree in Human Resources Management, so I have some idea how this stuff works.
Which is why I was rather surprised to find that, instead of a standard acknowledgement letter, I got a one-liner which read in its entirety:
doc or rtf
The brevity of this missive puzzled me. What did this person mean? Is it some sort of garbled language, or a dialect with which I am not familiar? I made my living as a freelance writer for a while, so I pride myself on being able to figure out the written word. But this had me stumped.
Then I remembered my attachment. It was in WordPerfect format, and this person seemed to want it to be in either Microsoft Word or Rich Text Format. When I realized that the file format of my resume was the cause of this brief email, I admit I became a little angry. But when I understood the whole situation, I was furious.
The situation is this: I submitted my resume in WordPerfect format to what turns out to be a temporary and permanent employment agency (as opposed to the actual prospective employer). As anyone who has changed jobs in the last decade knows, these agencies are becoming the gatekeepers of all jobs. Soon, no one who changes jobs will be able to do so without going through an agency of one sort or another.
That's all fine and dandy, except that the people who are employed as gatekeepers rarely have the knowledge required to accurately judge people in highly skilled professions, such as the computer field. So, this "doc or rtf" person, who can't figure out how to import a WordPerfect file into Word, who can't even write a civil and intelligible email, is deciding whether a prospective employer will ever see my resume. That frightens me.
From conversations with colleagues, my experience is not at all uncommon. It's necessary to please these functionaries in order to get a job. And on top of that, there is often a Human Resources Information System at some point in the process (I should know; I implemented the one at my current place of employment). That HRIS will likely be used to automatically scan resumes, then only those which are buzzword compliant will be looked at by humans. The rest will be summarily thrown in the bit bucket. So if the HR person at the company to which you have applied is looking for someone who has "JDBC" on their resume, while you have "Java Database Connectivity" or even "Java Data Base Connectivity", you're out of luck. No human will ever see your resume.
And even if a human did see it, he or she probably won't be someone who is qualified to judge you or your accomplishments. It will almost certainly be a functionary who can barely operate a computer, who might have a list of buzzwords and terms given to them by some pointy haired boss. If those terms aren't on your resume, forget about getting a job at that particular company.
Once all of the above had gone through my head, I got a wee bit depressed. I started to question whether I wanted to continue in this industry. How else should a sane person feel when confronted with sheer insanity? Should he embrace it, or run away from it?
But, before I give up, I'd like to make a solid try at fixing this system. There just has to be a better, more reliable way for geeks to find jobs. Does one already exist? If not, can we invent and enforce one?
How do we get ourselves out of this idiotic morass?
I've been job hunting myself for almost 3 months. I'm a software developer and have plenty of marketable skills; my last 2 job hunts started and finished within a week. This time I decided to look for jobs exclusively online; monster, net-temps, etc, etc. I must have submitted my resume to 25 places via email and got 2-3 replies. Then I started faxing the resumes instead of emailing them. Enquiries! Interviews! Progress!
I have had some stunning replies from Customer Service departments of major corporations that would have gotten someone fired if they'd sent it on hard copy. So many companies are still getting used to email as an internal communications tool and they don't realize that it should be a legitimate external communications tool also.
Hmmm. When I first entered the job market, this is exactly how it worked. Problem with it was, you were on the hook for 10% - 15% of your first year's salary the day you accepted the job. So the recruiters had no problem lying through their teeth about what the job entailed, working conditions, etc. If you found out after starting that things were not what you were led to expect, oh well.
Which is why my resume was in HTML when I was looking for a job. Strangely enough, I got a couple of replies back amazingly similar to the guy in question. The only question I can ask is: why? Why should I waste my time dealing with the clueless? If a company can't hire competent HR people, why should I assume that they have competent engineers or managers?
Of course all that resume shopping wasn't how I ended up getting a job in the end...
-E
Send mail here if you want to reach me.
This is a book I must recommend to anyone considering changing jobs. It's updated yearly, and my last one was '93, but it had a lot of good information I've used since.
For example:
1) Go directly to the person responsible for hiring
2) Ask said person for 5 minutes of their time. Give your 5 minute spiel, then say "I see my 5 minutes is up, thank you for your time". (I used this and it worked).
3) Networking networking networking (people that is). It's probably very hard at the 20-25 yr old age, but it works.
Plus there were chapters on why you want to change, finding the best job for you, negotating salary and benefits, etc.
Posted by Dahakbert:
... :)
This is great for college students, but if you're working, I highly suggest putting your resume up, but WITHOUT any phone numbers. Most recruiters I've dealt with have been annoying as hell, calling me at work, telling the front desk that they are "returning my call" even though I've never talked to them, so they will be passed through. But since I revised my resume, put only my home address and NO phone numbers, only an e-mail address for contact, it is much more managable. Here are a few tips I would suggest for people who want to put their resume's up and NOT be annoyed:
1) don't put any phone numbers on there. Only e-mail addresses. That way, you can easily return messages and have it take up less time
2) if they call you at work, and you never put up a work phone number, DO NOT TALK TO THEM. Here's what they did, they looked at your resume, got your current employment's number from directory service, and are xcontacting you a way you did not ask for. This should always be highly discouraged.
3) if the recruiter tells you they heard about you from someone who highly recommended you, 9.9 times out of 10, they are lying. Recruiters usually say things like this to make you believe that they are really interested in you... if you ask who refered you and they refuse to tell you, guess what...?
4) do NOT answer any questions about your current business, how many employees are working there, what they do, etc. Tell them if they are that interested in your company, you can refer them to a sales person, tell them you do not want to answer too many questions about your business which can get you introuble for non-disclosure. Trust me, they have no qualms about being unnecessarily nosy. Most likely, they are probing you for info so they can decide to target other employees at the company who you work with for recruitment as well.
5) if they want a resume submitted to them by fax or mail, that is ok... however, tell them you want to know who they are recruiting for if you give them that. If they refuse, they are wasting your time. The best recruiters I've dealt with told me whom they are recuiting for and what the job is within one or two e-mails to them.
6) Always have an enemy or a wate-of-time's e-mail address or contact information infront of you, so if you get a recruiter who just annoys the hell out of you, you can say, "I am not at all interested, but let me give you the contact information for someone who might be." In one case, I explained to someone I wasn't interested, and they proceeded to tell me how I really was and I just didn't know it, so I explained it to them a little more forcefully, and highly suggested they contact the career center at my previous university. I knew this would be a waste of time for them, so
All in all, from my experience I still think the best way to find your dream jobn is the old fashioned way --- either know someone, or send in a resume to a company directly using newspaper adds or with a job fair. Most of the time, recruiters are going to be a waste of your time and energy.
-- Dahakbert
I'm sorry but sending a WordPerfect file is really
like asking them to throw your resume in the
wastebasket.
I've had to sort through piles of incoming resumes
and this is how it goes on the receiving end:
1. Garbled attachments (delete)
2. BinHex'd attachments (damn Mac users - delete)
3. doc files (I don't have Word and I'm not
impressed by you doc formatting skills - delete)
4. WordPerfect attachments (are you kidding me? - delete)
5. doc files with macro virus (oh why thank you,
get a virus scanner you friggin' putz! DELETE)
The best ways to send a resume online:
1. Plain text in an email message
2. URL where the resume is posted online
The point is that the HR people have something you want, a job. They are likely to have to screen a few hundred resumes for every job they are hiring for, and they are probably hiring for several at the same time. So their top priority is finding ways of trimming the pile of resumes down, preferably without having to read the resume in detail. Don't give them an excuse to throw yours away. They will throw a resume away because it's not formatted right, because it's too long, too short, badly written, badly spelled, etc.
I've been working for 15 years, some of it contract, some of it full time. I've changed jobs about 9 times in that 15 years. Believe me, I know how the game is played.
The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
You seem to be acting under the misaprehension that a incompetent person cares whether they hire inferior employees or not. They don't. And if you don't do what it takes to get past the HR firewall, you'll never get a chance to talk to the clued person who wants to hire you.
I've been on both sides, the job hunter and the employer, and believe me, when you see the unqualified bozos that HR sends your way, you wish that more supposedly smart people knew how to play the HR game.
The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
I went through this when I decided to become a contractor here in the UK. I didn't have a PC at the time (just my trusty old Amiga, sold on now), so I figured it would be OK to use the (as I considered it) de-facto standard multi-platform document standard: PDF. So I created my CV in PDF format and sent it out to the agencies.
,hacker Perl another Just)'
Hardly any (I can't recall 1) accepted it, and instead wanted "Word 95". Bah. So I complied. I complained, but I complied. I even wrote to a contractor magazine to say how ridiculous it was to apply for hi-tech jobs and have PDF be turned down. "Surely there are Unix sysadmins out there with no way to create a Word 95 document" I thought. But even the letter to the magazine got flamed by an old-timer for me to just "deal with it".
Well now I send out my CV in HTML, or point them to my web site. It's funny - Microsoft has actually done me a service there - with either Word or IE (or Netscape) they can always open my CV. Fine. But it's not the ultimate solution to the CV problem.
My CV is actually stored in XML. The resulting HTML is dynamically generated each time you view it (by a perl script called xmerge which does XSL-T template style operations). What I really want to be able to do is submit my CV in XML. This way both the client and the agent can extract much more detailed information that they want, or ignore that detail. Then we need some sort of search engine that can match CV's up to job postings - also created in XML. That's coming. It's the work of the XML-HR (now HRMML) group at http://www.structuredmethods.com/ to bring us that technology. Note that my CV XML DTD isn't the one used by HRMML, but one I invented myself, because it's simpler and more appropriate for contracting (IMHO). Ultimately I may merge my work with HRMML.
For more info, see my CV stuff on sergeant.org. Or mail me direct at matt@sergeant.org for more info, and details of how to post a web page providing your CV in XML and have the HTML output produced by my script off my server.
Matt.
perl -e 'print scalar reverse q(\)-:
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
I wouldn't go that far, but I will say I haven't had luck with them. I moved down here to Mississippi to marry a sweetheart who was finishing a PhD. I tried headhunters and mass mailing my resume. The companies that headhunters returned were quite a drive or what friends told me were sweatshops. Resumes just got headhunters refering me to out of state jobs that seemed to require frequent traveling.
I gave up on the suit and tie resume job hunting shit and went to the local state employment center here. After a few weeks of checking in with them, she finally picked up the phone to call someone, "I think I have the person you are looking for." They got me what seemed like a decent job at a local manufacturing plant. I interviewed with an engineer, took the employment test and heard back a month later they wanted me to start the next day. I kept getting reviews and rewards every few months until my 40 hrs/week salary matched those of my engineering degree holding buddies.
I enjoy the hell out of my job. My resume didn't get me here, but the usual approach that any normal worker tries. I would say showing up unemployed at the employment center got me a good job. The job I have gives me 100% vesting, all the paid overtime I want, paid vacations, insurance, and job security. Its a good feeling working with older, more mature people as they don't quit, but retire or die.
Didn't you read the article? The point isn't that some poor geek is forced to use Word to get a job (he wasn't--they accepted .rtf). The point is that there's something wrong with the whole architecture of the employment agency-driven job market: Namely that you have a clueful employer on one end, a clueful potential employee on the other, and a wall of cluelessness in the middle.
--
Fuck the system? Nah, you might catch something.
I support a small recruiting company. Yes, they use word. Yes, we have a constant problem with viruses which I cannot keep up with (niether can nai).
The problem for us is not that we want them in doc format, but that everyone sends that to us. The format is utterly irrelevant to us, all the recruits formatting is wiped out anyway in most cases. Plain text would be better.
Because of file format problems, we must maintain a "doc" version and an ascii version of every resume we get. At 25,000 - 30,000 resumes, the docs take up a lot of space, about 30 times what the text files take up. What a waste.
support gun control: take guns from cops
In the long run applying for a job should be a process of filling out an online questionnaire, chock full of check boxes and radio buttons summarizing your experience. The HR department on the other end can then compare resumes in the same format without resorting to OCR.
Of course there will be brand new annoyances with this procedure. For instance messages like "Your application is not complete. Please press the back button on your browser and complete the following items: Current Salary"
A good use of this technique would sort through candidates efficiently and notify them automatically that their applications had been received. Hopefully there would also be a few areas to actually type something about yourself that a person might actually read, but the added convenience of technology makes everything convenient, including screwing things up.
You think it's going to get better all by itself? Don't you believe it. IT recruitment has been this way in the UK for at least the past ten years and if anything the dominance of the market by know-nothing IT recruitment agents is still increasing.
The only way this is going to improve is if the geeks take their business elsewhere. We need to set up our own CV databases and let them come looking for us.
How do I know this will work? First-hand experience.
There is already a web IT recruitment service in the UK at www.jobserve.co.uk. It works two ways: (a) they mail you a daily list of new jobs matching your chosem criteria; (2) you send in your CV and agencies, HR departments etc. who subscribe can search this big database of CV's. Don't forget to put in all those fashionable (buzz)keywords in acronym form and in full!
In the period of time for which I used the service I got more calls deriving from the CV I left on the database than I got from emailing my CV in response to particular jobserve ads.
Though if we some of us geeks were to set up something like this ourselves I strongly suggest that the home page says "NO AGENCIES" in large type.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
This situation bothered me a bit, as well, during a recent job search. Then I realized something: Organizations that rely on such "generic" HR resources to select new employees are going to get employees that match their efforts: people who throw around buzzwords in attempts to impress management types, not people who actually know what's going on. Eventually, these organizations will be at a competitive disadvantage as the highly skilled information workers end up other companies - their engineering efforts and products will suffer, and their more highly skilled competitors will move into dominant positions.
Yes, it's frustrating now - the environment is changing and the situation has not yet evolved to meet the new environment. This is an annoyance, yes, but a temporary one - the history of the world is driven by the resolution of such evolutionary tension.
BTW, clearly you are one of the moron crowd: "do not have a PostScript printer(probably regular HP instead)". Bwahahahahaha
Go ahead and laugh, monkey boy. HP printers default (ie, bottom end of each line) to being PCL only, which is just fine for Windows users. As a rule only the HP *M (for Macintosh) or built-in networking machines support PostScript, not the regular HPs.
-- Alastair
Ok, my team just lost one of its senior guys to a startup opportunity. Despite the fact that we expect him to return in 3 months :), we need a new body. Hey, JavaONE was last week, and we need a java programmer!
So the problem exists from both sides. Yes, we use recruiters, but we much prefer to hear from individuals. The few times we get good old fashioned cover letters, they get shown around the team - "Hey, look! A cover letter! Let's get this person in here!" We run ads in the local paper -- yes, it's the old fashioned way, but it still works strangely enough.
I'm torn over whether I should do this...oh, what the heck, I'll just use hotmail. If you're a fairly senior geek (5+ years experience in the biz preferably), and have some project experience with server-side Java, preferably with an e-commerce slant, and are in the Boston area and looking for a job (and don't mind working with people who speak in run on sentences :)), let me know. duane_morin@hotmail.com. A degree is not required, but it certainly helps. My boss actually prefers people who've got a degree in something other than CS (he likes em well rounded). We don't pay relocation (that I know of), so please don't write me from Florida if you don't plan on moving anyway. We do lots of Sybase here, so if you've got some of that, tell us. None of the above is written in stone (is it ever?) so if you're close, it can't hurt to write. But I'll tell ya, if you think you're good, but have got absolutely nothing to prove it, you can't really expect us to hire you.
Disclaimer: This ain't no startup, and I ain't even close to CTO, so I don't do the hiring. I just bring in the bodies.
d
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
I've had my resume online since I had web space (about 3-4 years). Only recently I had to take it offline because I was getting too damned many calls (about 2 a day). However, when a friend of mine exhausted her real-world resources, I put her resume on my page, and within 2 days Microsoft called her (she didn't go, of course :)).
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
We get literally hundreds of resumes each week, by snail-mail, fax, and email. We probably ask for about 10-20 of those from potential candidates. The rest are unsolicited. Most are not for a specific position, just for "anything that fits my background". Most of the resumes are from unqualified people -- certainly over 80% of them are garbage.
Our Web site tells people exactly how to send resumes (plain text in the body of the email), yet we still get dozens of attachments in all formats -- Word, Word Perfect, PDF, HTML, even TIFFs of scanned resumes.
Given the following facts: (1) these resumes are unsolicted, (2) there's an 80% chance that they're trash, (3) the submitter can't follow directions, and (4) we have a couple hundred other resumes to process this week, we generally delete such resumes without even replying. We feel the chances are low that we're losing any good candidates this way.
On the other hand, the thread that says headhunters are morons has some truth, too. Their job is to do a buzzword-level screening of a large pool of candidates and bring a few to the client for in-depth interviews. They need to bring good candidates, but not necessarily the best ones. So if they can do that without the clerical overhead of doing a lot of document conversion, you can bet that's the route they'll take.
If you're applying for a job that's being filled through a search firm, here's what you need to do:
They don't care if you actually fit the description of the job being filled, even if they do know what it is. One recruiter interviewed me for a "development" position, and when I discussed my programming skills, I was told "this isn't a programming job, it's a development job." My dumfounded reaction probably lost me points, too.
Personally, I think the whole job recruitment market is entirely upside down. I'm a recent college graduate trying desperately to find a decent job (i.e. something more educational than "Unix Schmuck," which is what a lot of available sysadm jobs ought to be called), and having a hard time.
The way recruitment works now is that these middlemen approach companies who have openings and then wrench a placement commission from the company when they fill the position. Which makes no sense to me. With the way my search is going, I'd be entirely willing to PAY a recruiter MYSELF to find just the type of job I want. If it were really the right job, I'd give them a percentage of my paycheck for my whole term of employment and then some. Why jerk around with companies that won't even call you back after an interview and recruiters, quite a lot of whom are freelance only trying to make a buck for themselves with no interest in actually making the employee OR the employer happy -- when I'm willing to hire someone myself to find a great job that really fits me?
Regards,
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
I have been programming for 15 years. Perhaps that was my downfall. Had I been fresh out of school, I might have remembered the textbook definitions rather than what the terms *really* mean. The story has a happy ending though. I eventually landed an even better freelance consulting position. :-)
Thad
The Bolachek Journals
Uhg what a repulsive thought! Unions are great if you are in a low skill job where the employer can treat you like a replaceable cog in the corporate machine, but if you are in a high skill / high demand field. Do you really want a union dictating wage scale based on seniority? Or making it near impossible to can the code monkey who is dragging down your project?
Personally, I LIKE the fact that I can work as a free agent, define my own work conditions and pay scale, and basically make out like a bandit for doing something I love to do.
Here is a major clue alert. It is a seller's market right now for programmers. YOU are calling the shots. Don't be afraid to ask for what you want.
Thad
The Bolachek Journals
Ironic, isn't it, that the Internet is supposed to get rid of the middleman which provides marginal services (such as the RIAA), yet this particular group is thriving. And I can say that they provide little value, other than advertising, to the candidate or the company.
From the side of the company, no matter how many ways we tell them we want someone competent at the enterprise level, they throw all sorts of near-entry level resumes at us. Misfits, rejects. People who you might want to change tapes for you. Our own technical interviews are far more enlightening.
From the side of the prospective employee, the recruiters get in the way. I recently visited a large jobs site to find some interesting jobs, but I couldn't get even a SIMPLE description of the job or the details without handing over the resume -- which means getting forever hounded.
I could do a lot better job of selling myself than these headhunters could. And even with them, it is difficult to sell yourself as a "signal" in a sea of "noise". They just don't know how to evaluate people. All they are interested in is pushing bodies through to get a commision... and I doubt that they have my true best interests at heart.
As for the company, they need to step up to the plate and have their own HR departments be more active in advertising and evaluation. These recruiting firms only thrive because HR isn't doing their job, so lower level managers have to work around the system.
The funny thing is that the headhunter/recruiting firms actually work AGAINST the companies that they find employees for. They recruit individuals away from their existing jobs. And once you are in the system, they'll be giving you a call back a year or two later, trying to move you somewhere else. And while they bring a new employee into the shop, they're talking to your other IT guys!
The value of headhunters, in most cases, isn't marginal. It is negative. They thrive on churn. They cost money. They provide poor service. The tight labor market and a poor HR department are the only two things that keep them afloat.
I have been contracting for about 7 years (in the UK) and have used agencies for the entire time.
They are a pain but - much like estate agents - a requirement if your going to 'play the game'.
In my opinion it is much better to find an agency, go and see them, get to know them and keep in touch with them. That is the tactic I use and so far it has not let me down.
I know people will have different horror stories about agencies - I have heard many of them. I can only think that if we didn't have a way of finding all of the jobs that are available (even if it is just an agency) we would invent one.
Flame away.........
Linux - the ultimate Windows NT service pack
get involved with a Linux User Group (LUG), sometimes employers send scouts to them...
also IMHO we need to talk to people in the industry, and help them understand us, etc. LUG's seem to be were to do this.
nmarshall
#include "standard_disclaimer.h"
R.U. SIRIUS: THE ONLY POSSIBLE RESPONSE
nmarshall
The law is that which it boldly asserted and plausibly maintained..
--Colonel Burr 1783
You CAN take the "I'm going to do it my way" attitude, and get jobs, BUT it's a lot harder. I was doing obscure programming for a while, and didn't want to learn the "Hot" languages. I'd see maybe 2 jobs a month I was qualified for. I had cut myself off from 99% of the market. Eventually, the market became HOT, and I was instantly in demand.
I'll give good odds that this happens with Linux, BUT, it is a gamble - high risk, higher potential reward, as you'll be the only person with with that skill set when things get hot.
Just remember though, you can get really hungry when your waiting around
-- 73 de KG2V For the Children - RKBA! "You are what you do when it counts" - the Masso
Taking a course in programming seems to be a pretty standard requirement for getting a degree in Mechanical/Electrical engineering. Ironically, that's how I wound up as a CS major, I took a course in C while working on my MechE degree, and realized I'd forgotten how much I liked coding. But most of the older people in the field didn't graduate under those requirements. Some of my engineering profs are still struggling with Excel. But I find the derogatory attitude of programmers to engineers and vice-versa really annoying. They are both trained to be specialists. He has as much reason to understand network architecture as you do to design circut boards.
Geek-grrl in training
To truly understand recursion, you must first truly understand recursion.
It strikes me that we basically have a solution to this sitting in front of us. After all, if these idiot agencies can manage a website _with_ middlemen, certainly Slashdot could provide something _without_ them. What I'm thinking of here is a service to allow companies to post searchable job listings which Slashdot users could then apply to, emailing a resume to a contact person at that company. Naturally, people advertising jobs on Slashdot will be of the highest quality (better monkeys) and be capable of understanding the resumes of technical people.
Not to say this must be done, mind you, only that it would be nice. We have to look out for ourselves because the job sites are too busy filling asst. manager positions at insurance agencies (and are, as has been stated, staffed with people too deeply ignorant of what it is that we do) to bother to give the technical community the kind of service it needs.
+--------+
The sage does nothing, and nothing is left undone.
+--------+
DoktorMel
-- The Sage does nothing, and nothing is left undone. --Lao Tzu
You have the programming skills, but you haven't yet learned how to deal with all the other aspects of working. Devote yourself to developing some skills hacking the work-sphere, and you will find your professional life much easier.
:-)
I have been working as a contract employee for a great many years now. I started in a permanent job right out of school, which was nice and comfortable, but eventually I got burned out and followed my friends into the contracting world. The first couple of contracts I thought were nice, they paid better and I had some freedom at the end of the contracts to take a long vacation and spend the money.
But after a while I realised the best contracts were eluding me, the contracts that started at $75/hour and went way higher (last job was $2500/day). So I got to be friends with a recruiter and used her as a mentor to learn what other recruiters were looking for.
Recruiters only put up a candidate for key jobs after they personally know that person and have a successfully placed them at least once. The good recruiters have a reputation to keep up, especially with the high-paying clients, so they will never take a risk on those jobs. One bad placement and the phone never rings again, so its better not to place someone if you don't have them.
There are recruiters who don't care about the client or you, and I have been burned by a couple of those. Getting to know the recruiter will help you avoid bad situations. It takes an investment of your time and energy to search out the good recruiters and get them interested in you. Its the difference between an OK job and a fantastic job (and $10-$50/hour more
If I were a recruiter right now, I would have dismissed you as an inexperienced geek without any proper job skills. Sure you can program, but that is only about 50% of what it takes to be a good employee. You have to know how to fit into a company, how to deal with human resources, how to charm the MIS department to get more RAM, how to create weekly status reports for the project lead without being asked. If you know all that, the client will ask (beg!) for you to come back for another contract when you finish your current job. That is what a recruiter is looking for.
been there, done that
the AntiCypher
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 was just going over my resume and realised that all but two jobs were the results of personal contacts that directed me to the job.
In almost every case I learned about the job from a friend or a co-worker or a family member or a recruiter I knew personally.
The two jobs I took completely blind were both hell, and neither of them lasted more than 2 months. But each of them introduced me into a new crowd of people who got me follow-on jobs.
And if you can make friends with a recruiter who has a big list of jobs, you can just sit in her office some afternoon (bring chocolate:-), and browse through all the best jobs. Then you can say "I can do this one" and off you go to the interview.
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 just went on an online job hunt and found that it was hard going, at first. Email sent in, no reply or only an automated reply. After a few whirls at this I changed my game plan. I reformulated my plan around a few facts. First, I was looking for a geek job and knew that managers that tended to hire geeks didn't worry so much about what jobs they have req's for. If they find a good person, they hire them one way or the other. The second fact was that submitting resumes to the HR department is useless. Instead, I sent the email directly to the person in charge of hiring. In small companies (the only type I was looking at) the Director of Engineering is usually listed on the web site so figuring up who to send the email to is easy. (See below for how to guess email addresses from people's names.)
.doc) and the other as straight text, copy-and-pasted into my email. My general goal was to get their attention, do a quick sell of myself and then tell them I wouldn't be stalking them if they didn't decide to hire me on the spot. It seemed pretty effective. I got a couple of phone interviews and a job out of the strategy. I've included an editted version of such a cover letter below.
With this in mind, I picked the companies I was most interseted in and wrote a cover letter and included two copies of my resume with it. One as an HTML attachment (just say no to MS and
Neil
PS: A last detail to mention is that once you know who to send the email to guessing their email is usually simple. "John Doe" almost certainly has an email of jdoe, johnd, john.doe, or john_doe. You should send the resume to each one and wait to see if it bounces because some companies give individuals multiple email addresses and you don't want to bombard someone with 4 copies of your resume by guessing all 4 at once and having them all go through.
=========== Sample cover letter ============
John,
I am a senior engineer/architect/project lead who has recently become very excited about the possibility of working for XYZ. I'm concerned that if I just send a resume in via the web it is likely to get lost in HR so I thought I'd try this more direct approach.
There are several reasons I'm so attracted to XYZ. First, and most importantly, I'm looking to work in a dynamic, high paced, exciting environment with bright individuals. I was told that XYZ meets these by a director at ABC. (I think the quote was "Those people at XYZ seem to know what they are doing." which I considered to be a high complement considering the source.) Second, I've been doing web applications (both applets and servlets) for the last 18 months and want to continue working on web related projects. I'm quite excited by the challenges and excitement of working on the new technologies. Third, my 2 1/2+ years of Java programming have made me a real Java fan and I want to continue working with the language. Lastly, I'm looking for a small company where I can make a difference. I want a to work at a company that could be my home for years to come. I'm hoping that XYZ might be such a company.
I'd love a chance to talk with you or someone else at XYZ about a job opportunity. Even if you do not have something that seems appropriate for me now but might sometime in the future I hope you'll contact me so we can discuss it. I won't send you any further unsolicited emails so if you are not interested, this can be the end of our contact.
Hoping to hear from you,
Joe
Neil Smithline http://www.neilsmithline.com
So, why in the world haven't we begun to figure this out in the high-tech job area ?
In my experience, the headhunters don't do any intelligent resume evaluation. They just do "acronym matching."
They are unable to understand concepts like
"some exposure to technology X," "expert at technology Y."
They are reduced to comparing lists of keywords
and can really mis-represent you if you're not
careful !
Let's figure out a way to convince more companies to "go direct."
Middlemen just add cost and complexity to every
transaction...and in this case, little value.
shall
[When I started to write this, I did not intend for it to be this long - apologies in advance, and I'll try to be less verbose in the future]
:) ).
:)
First, a little about myself - education in social sciences, made a career shift several years ago to computer science/networking/programming, worked as a network engineer with personnel management and salary administration duties (in other words, I was the team leader), later, started my own (small) networking company (and no, we're not hiring right now). So, I've at least seen things from a lot of different perspectives - technical, hiring, personnel, salary, and even CEO.
Now, my comments about your situation, then some more general comments:
First, it sounds as if you might be considering doing without a college degree. If this is the case, I _strongly_ encourage you to reconsider. While some of the most technically talented people I know don't have degrees (and some do), I can also tell you that skipping college will be something you'll have to spend the rest of your life explaining every time you are trying to find a new job. Not to mention the many other reasons(non-educational) for higher education (social, etc).
If you are going to college, consider summer internships. If those are impractical, find a local business that needs some technical help and offer to contribute your talents for free or minimum wage in return for the experience and good recommendations. Small, non-technical companies (e.g., self-employed doctors, CPAs, etc) are probably your best bet here.
Why do I say this? Well, you hit the nail right on the head - your current situation is that you _don't_ have a lot of experience, meaning specific, _documentable_ technical skills (i.e., references and certifications), plus, equally important, you don't have much "real-world" experience (workplace culture). So, you are trying to build up these areas. To put it another way...
Put yourself in the position of someone who is considering hiring you. If you were sitting across from my desk, I would have little more than a high school transcript and a few gut impressions to go on. Meanwhile, here are some of the questions I'd be asking myself:
1) Does this person understand, and can s/he handle, the responsibilities of functioning in a workplace?
2) Do I like this person? (Surveys of employers and managers show that this is a lot more important in an interview than most people realize; after all, if I hire you, I will be stuck with you in my face for at least 8 hours per day).
3) Does this person have creativity? Imaginiation? Intelligence? Can he or she come up with new answers to some of the challenges s/he will encouter?
4) Does s/he have adequate social skills? Can I send him or her to a client site without worrying that he or she will do something unprofessional that will make me look foolish?
(I am getting tired of constantly typing "he or she" - so, from now on, I will just use "she", since "he" is overused. No offense to the dudes; and in case anyone cares, I am part of the half of the human race that pees standing up
5) Maturity - this person, being on the low end of the totem pole, will almost certainly have a lot of "grunt work"; will she get upset or discouraged?
To sum it up, I would look for someone, in your situation, who is not necessarily highly skilled technically (very few high school students are), but who:
* has made the most of every opportunity they _have_ had
* has displayed creativity and intelligence, both in their school work and in extracurricular activities
* who is likeable
* who can communicate well, both orally and in writing
* who is curious and has interests other than technical ones
See why I mentioned internships or giving away some work at first? From a potential employer's perspective, having _some_ prior experience - _anything_ - will mean that you have demonstrated this before in a workplace setting, even if all you've demonstrated is that you're a pleasant, intelligent person who shows up on time (you'd be surprised how many young people don't!).
Small companies will be fine for internships and such, but you may have a problem getting your first "real" job at one. Why? Well, with your lack of experience and skills (no offense, but that is where you're at), any employer is going to have to train you at first, and wait a while before getting real results back. As a small business owner, I can tell you that small businesses usually can't afford to do that; they usually need someone who can be productive immediately. Larger companies will almost certainly have more opportunities.
Now, with all that said, some dos and don'ts...
DO:
* be ready to talk about yourself, your hobbies, etc.
* try to develop a track record of seeking and successfully handling responsibility and interacting with different types of people. This does not have to be technical; organizing and managing events for your church, some charity, a school club, whatever, would be fine for this.
* show that you have initiative, that you are a "self-starter". Be ready to give examples where you have, on your own, extended your technical knowledge or experience. Show that you are the kind of person who digs into a problem, rather than just doing the bare minimum necessary to get by.
* have someone with a lot of work experience (preferably someone with experience interviewing and hiring people) look over your resume and offer constructive criticism. I can't tell you how many times I've seen resumes that had significant grammatical or spelling errors, were poorly organized, or were indecipherable for different reasons. (One humorous example - the resume of a job applicant I saw a few years ago was full of statements like "I installed Allegro on Orange and Ringo". Turned out that Allegro was a purely internal application at a previous workplace, and Orange and Ringo were the names of two of their servers. How was I supposed to know that? Needless to say, that applicant was not hired. When writing, _consider_ _your_ _audience_).
DO NOT:
* appear cocky, arrogant, etc. This is a little hard to do - a job interview seems to almost require it at times. The keys seem to me to be 1) while expressing pride in your own accomplishments, be ready to respect and acknowledge those of others, and 2) show a little modesty. And whatever you do, DON'T come across as a Self-Important Legend-In-Her Own-Mind Thinks-She-Knows-Everything Wannabe Computer Deity. Such an attitude will only demonstrate that you a) have an unrealistic assessment of your own abilities, b) probably cannot communicate well with non-technical people, and c) will probably be unpleasant to work with.
* get upset, angry, or contemptuous if the recruiter or your potential boss knows less technically that you. Being an expert is not her job; knowing enough to be able to recognize talent and manage it effectively is her job.
Which actually leads me to the next and last part of my post - your reward for bearing with me this far
THE SECRET WEAPON WHICH WILL ALMOST GUARANTEE YOU JOB OFFERS
Interested? Here it is...
Realize, understand, and always keep in mind that the purpose of any business is to make money.
That's it. Pretty simple, huh? But, you would be amazed at how many entry-level people don't seem to understand this.
If you are not doing it already, start reading the Wall Street Journal, watching CNBC, etc. Learn what corporations, proprietorships, and partnerships are. Develop at least a passing acquaintance with the principles of bookkeeping. Understand what depreciation is. Know what corporate directors, corporate officers, managers, and supervisors do. And so on.
Additionally, find out (before the interview, if possible) who your potential employer's major competitors are. Is their stock publicly traded? If so, try to get a copy of their annual report before you interview (one way to do this is to call the main office and ask for the Investor Relations Division, and tell them you are
considering purchasing stock and you'd like a copy of the annual report).
If you ask questions like "What are your responsibilities in achieving the financial goals of this company, and what will my place be in helping you achieve those goals?" - and, if you have done your homework and are prepared to discuss these issues intelligently, I _promise_ you that even if you are not offered a job immediately, your resume _will_ be placed in a special "hot people" file, you _will_ be asked to "stay in touch", you _will_ be called at some later time by someone at the company who say "we've got an job opening, I remember talking to you before and think you'd be a good match, would you like to come back in and talk to us again?"
If this sounds like a lot of financial stuff to learn, keep in mind, you're only in high school! No one expects you to be an expert. Just showing that you're interested in these issues and are thinking about them will be enough, believe me.
It goes without saying that techies who consider managers as "dweebs", "suits", or "beancounters" find their prospects for advancement _very_ limited. I personally know a couple of people in their late 30's who are still working entry level jobs, not because they love the work, but because they can't get past this attitude. And, I've seen a few others. Your boss's job will be to achieve a set of goals assigned by _her_ superiors, and to do it with a limited amount of money and time. And ultimately, that is the basis on which you will be evaluated.
Realize that, although your boss may like you and respect you immensely, her _professional_ duty is to consider your salary, your PC, your chair and desk, your phone line, the square footage of your office or cubicle, as money spent, and the work you produce as money returned. To remain employed, the revenue you produce must be greater than the money the company spends on you; or, you must at least show the promise of becoming profitable fairly soon. (Actually, there are exceptions to this, but anyway...) Any time you make a request or suggest an idea, be prepared to justify it in financial terms. I've seen more than a few programmers who simply _must_ have the hottest, latest PC on their desk, when a middle of the road PC would be perfectly adequate for them to do their work. Don't ask for a faster CPU or more memory unless you can justify it in terms of productivity (less of your time waiting for compiles, etc). You don't have to have hard
dollar amounts, but the more you can put things in dollars and cents, the more attention your bosses will pay to you and the more they'll respect your opinion.
Well, as long as I've blabbed for this long, I'll throw in a few last thoughts on interviewing advice.
* Arrive early - give yourself 15 minutes to get stuck in traffic, use the bathroom once you get there, catch your breath if you had to climb stairs, etc.
* Dress appropriately - just because the company may be casual dress does not mean you can show up in blue jeans. For interviews, business attire is simply expected.
* If the person interviewing you has an unusual name, find out how to pronounce it _before_ talking to them (easy to do - just ask the receptionist).
* If you get sweaty palms, stick a few tissues or a handkerchief in your pocket, and give your hand a discreet wipe just before shaking hands.
* After arriving, but just before the interview, go to the bathroom and give yourself one last check in the mirror. Hair still ok? No lettuce stuck in your teeth from the sandwich you ate on the way over? Nothing hanging out of your nose? (I've seen that happen!)
* Bring a couple of copies of your resume with you. In other words, assume that the copy you sent in earlier will be buried somewhere on your interviewer's desk, and she'll be unable to find it.
* If you do not get the job, call back, ask to speak to the person interviewing you, and ask why (without being defensive or argumentative, of course). Explain that you are trying to get your first job, and you'd like some constructive criticism on what you did right and wrong.
Finally,
* Make sure you talk to the person who will be supervising you, and the people you will be working with. I learned this lesson the hard way; I interviewed at a company where I was told that my potential boss was busy "handling an emergency", and someone else would be conducting the interview. What I found out later was that my potential boss-to-be was such a bastard that no one who had interviewed with him had considered the job. Fortunately, I found out before it was too late. At another company, the bosses talked at great length about what a wonderful company it was, how everyone was so motivated and excited, etc. Talking with some lower level employees, I saw that this was not the case. Conclusion: management was horribly out of touch with the workers, or was trying to do a sales job on me.
* Trust your gut feelings - this is easier said than done, but if the job doesn't feel right, and you can afford to wait for something better, don't be afraid to turn it down. Remember what I said about your boss having to put up with you 8 hours per day? Same thing applies to you.
* Don't get discouraged if your first few interviews don't go well. Interviewing skills are like anything else - they take practice.
Well, that's it...Good luck!