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Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

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Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#121

Post by gcanyon »

ianburrell wrote: post #106
gcanyon wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was applying, I had a situation where sometimes the ATS system would show me as Geoff and other times as Geo, with no clue why. Obviously, that's not a fatal issue, but it was indicative of other problems with my résumé, and I saw those in the auto-generated job histories. Pixelmator Pro just released a feature where it can open PDFs to show you the internal structure. I opened my résumé and sure enough "Geoff…

"ff" can be a ligature,ff. It is possible their system doesn't like the Unicode character. Even if isn't ligature character in PDF, the renderer could make it. Decomposition errors are common, as are not handling Unicode.

It's not a ligature, but you're definitely onto something. I checked again, and all the characters of my name are individual paths, except for the f's. I put a space between the f's, and now they're two separate characters as well. I double an n, no grouping. I put in a double f elsewhere, the grouping happens for those.

It's amazing to me that the PDF ecosystem is this broken after thirty years. I'm boggled that there isn't a commonly-used way to add structured data to a PDF to enable it as a machine-communication standard as well as a human one.

Edit to add: I found a "disable ligatures" option in Pages. Setting that didn't fix the "f" grouping. :-/

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#122

Post by mejutoco »

giantg2 wrote: post #87
gcanyon wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet they don't. When I was applying some systems got my name wrong. They would chop off two characters. I assure you, that's not how it looked in the PDF.

If they're expecting text, then why even submit in PDF? Wouldn't a Word document be better? At the very least, if a system has limitations or and expected rigid input, then it should provide that information to the submitter. I'm sure there are terrible systems our there, but I'd be surprised if the average ones aren't decent at OCR.

A word document is also a binary format (unless it is an xml monstrosity) not too different from pdf, but more proprietary. Plus one vould embed an image on word.

With a markdown format I would agree, though.

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#123

Post by somsak2 »

midasuni wrote: post #18
perfect-blue wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really that apocalyptic? What’s the big deal. Honest question.

Fees like a browser extension could block such posts if someone’s really bothered.

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hide-feed/nfnpeneo...

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#124

Post by ethanhoroschak »

ppeetteerr wrote: post #36

Their job recommendation system is just awful. I really hope they put some money into improving it.

Their job classification needs some major work - I get way too big of a range of experience levels in postings.

Checkout Simplify: https://simplify.jobs/ been working hard to make actually relevant curated matches

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#125

Post by mejutoco »

moltar wrote: post #41

IMO job sites were dead the day the launched. I posted a job ad on jobs.gc.ca in early 2000s which is a government site, with junk UX and even then I got about 200 applications. Then about five years ago I have talked to my last employer. And they used StackOverflow jobs and got 350 applications just the first day for a super niche position (Perl related). No doubt most applications are unrelated spam. Now, how do yo…

I bet saying reply with text x to show that you read this text in full would cut the valid applications in half.

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#126

Post by lopatin »

satellite2 wrote: post #110
lopatin wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1 for using a recruiter. I used to think that it was for scrubs. Then after trying one, so many interviews and doors opened, and then after I got a couple offers, they even negotiated a higher salary for me ( playing one offer against the other .. something that is necessary but I suck at)

Where do you even find a recruiter for hire? All those I contacted turned down offer to pay them stating they are paid by the recruiting company, which prevents our interest from being aligned.

I contacted on LinkedIn by a recruiter, who I saw there were mutual acquaintances with and she even was my dads recruiter for a while. She did her work and now gets a percentage of my salary. That was an arrangement between her and my company, so I never paid her personally. The fact that she negotiated my salary up by 10k and the opportunities she made possible makes it a win win in my eyes.

In other words, I don't think them being paid by their recruiting company makes it a conflict of interest. In fact, this gives them an incentive to negotiate the highest salary for you.

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#127

Post by pd187540 »

valdiorn wrote: post #62
stuaxo wrote: post #43

Don't think I ever used indeed.com, just got something recently, the market for the last few months in the UK has been the worst I'd seen since 2008

FYI, this is a dirty secret, but the correct way to use Indeed is not to apply for the job per se; it's to get in touch with the people doing the hiring. Basically, submit your "application" for a job, get a call back from the recruiter, who will then promptly say "yeah forget about that job, I've got 20 other interesting jobs that might fit you better". ... I'm pretty sure in most cases the initial job doesn't even…

[flagged]

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#128

Post by akomtu »

expertentipp wrote: post #53

Personally for me all three trains parted and there are no more trains arriving: job search, dating, real estate. I guess I will seat on the chair over here waiting for the third end of the world, because the two previous world ends I have also missed.

The end of the pisces age will be in 2150 a.d. so unless you expect to live for another 125 years, you gotta get off that chair.

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#129

Post by jahewson »

gcanyon wrote: post #121
ianburrell wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"ff" can be a ligature,ff. It is possible their system doesn't like the Unicode character. Even if isn't ligature character in PDF, the renderer could make it. Decomposition errors are common, as are not handling Unicode.

It's not a ligature, but you're definitely onto something. I checked again, and all the characters of my name are individual paths, except for the f's. I put a space between the f's, and now they're two separate characters as well. I double an n, no grouping. I put in a double f elsewhere, the grouping happens for those. It's amazing to me that the PDF ecosystem is this broken after thirty years. I'm boggled that the…

There’s a way, it’s just not commonly used. (See: PDF/A).

Re: Why Resumes Are Dead and How Indeed.com Keeps Killing the Job Market

#130

Post by expertentipp »

akomtu wrote: post #128
expertentipp wrote: post #53

Personally for me all three trains parted and there are no more trains arriving: job search, dating, real estate. I guess I will seat on the chair over here waiting for the third end of the world, because the two previous world ends I have also missed.

The end of the pisces age will be in 2150 a.d. so unless you expect to live for another 125 years, you gotta get off that chair.

I meant covid and Russian invasion, awaiting the crisis which seems even lazier than me.
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