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Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

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Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#71

Post by warrenm »

takrupp wrote: post #60

Technical recruiting is hard, but I think good technical recruiters approach things differently than this. Its not as black and white, everything lives in the nuances: We are looking for some sort of external validation: A really popular module on CPAN? Graduated with a 4.0? Graduated from Stanford? Hired full time by Google? That is all external validation, and it is something that shows me that other people / organ…

If you're recruiting by people who "love what they do" - that's awesome .. but don't forget they need to have a life and a family they're likely taking care of, too: if you're recruiting for the positions wherein 50 or 60 hours is "normal", then I hope you're only getting single folks who don't care if they have a life :)

The occasional long week is fine - but I'm going to be a lot more interested in someone who is good but expects a "normal" amount of work.

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#72

Post by warrenm »

monksy wrote: post #64
Ologn wrote: post #42

During hiring, I have looked through dozens, if not hundreds of resumes over the years, mostly for Unix systems administrator positions. You can tell a lot about what someone knows just by how they put together their resume, over and above the work experience. A question I used to ask on interviews was, "Have you ever worked with Gnu programs, like gcc, Gnu make etc.?" Hiring Unix admins in 1998, when you couldn't ge…

On the flip side of the coin, I've seen Unix Admin positions that ask for C++ experience. A sys admin being able to develop? Come on..

If you can't write at least some kind of program/script, you can't sysadmin.

And, in many places (especially smallish shops), the sysadmin is also a developer is also an interviewer is also is also is also...

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#73

Post by warrenm »

jiggy2011 wrote: post #39
shrikant wrote: post #36

I'm not so sure about this bit: > Resumes should be summaries, with more detail for recent positions, less detail for more distant ones. If you’ve been in industry for ten years, you can have a second page. No one needs more than two. I agree with this in principle, and strongly 'implemented' this approach as well in an earlier version of my CV. [To be fair, I'm looking for a product management role, and not a dev jo…

Every single person, whether they are a recruiter and project manager , a guidance counsellor or your mother has a different opinion about how long your CV/Resume should be and will have all sorts of reasons justifying why they are correct. So the only sensible thing to do is go with the length that you feel sells you best.

I can't agree more!

Mine has 'relevant' experience on the first couple, then 'other' experience on the last howevermany.

A fixed length is one of the worst things you can do, in my opinion: it needs to be how I heard an English professor describe her writing assignments: "It should be like a girl's skirt - long enough to cover everything, but short enough to keep it interesting"

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#74

Post by warrenm »

rrmm wrote: post #19

Does anyone have some examples of resumes they've used successfully; or from the hiring side, resumes that stood out to them? Anyone A/B testing their resumes?

Mine's served me quite well thus far - http://warrenmyers.com/resume.pdf

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#75

Post by warrenm »

Trezoid wrote: post #31
rrmm wrote: post #19

Does anyone have some examples of resumes they've used successfully; or from the hiring side, resumes that stood out to them? Anyone A/B testing their resumes?

As current student trying to come up with a good resume at the moment, this would be extremely useful.

This is my personal method of phone screens, but I've seen/heard it used similarly elsewhere: http://antipaucity.com/2011/10/03/doing-technical-phone-scre...

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#76

Post by andyjsong »

tiramisucode wrote: post #49
andyjsong wrote: post #3

This is great advice. As a person that is normally labelled as a job hopper (6 in the past 5 years) I finally settled down and got into tech by attending hackathons and helped ship apps (mostly android) it has given me the opportunity to work for a YC company and I am very happy here. It's just ironic that startups have been the most stable positions rather than corporate or bigger tech companies. Hackathons are rela…

It sounds like you are pretty savvy at getting hired. I am a computer science student who is graduating this December, and I would love to get hired as soon as possible! Do you have any tips for someone like myself? The only experience I have is interning at a very small shop where I build custom Google maps for other schools and companies.

I'm helping running this hackathon that is live right now: hackerrank.com/thanksgiving, show off your skills and get noticed. It ends today @ midnight PST and the winner gets a meeting with a YC Partner and Thanksgiving meal delivered to their door.

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#77

Post by smm2000 »

marcofucci wrote: post #54

"If you’ve had five jobs in the last five years, why should the recruiter think this time will be different?" Maybe because who is hiring is supposed to be better than the others? There are far too many terrible companies, especially the big ones, and honestly I would never stay in a company just for the sake of it. If recruiters think that this is a problem, it means that who is hiring is not confident enough or wor…

If it's only one short term job, it's totally ok. Two is ok but I will ask why. Three+ is a negative. 5+ short term jobs is pretty much no hire unless there is a very good explanation. There are no perfect companies and people have to compromise.

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#78

Post by dariot »

ucee054 wrote: post #57
dariot wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm from Italy and I can mostly confirm the comment.

I thought Bocconi had a good reputation?

I don't mean that everyone that goes to private universities here has bought his or her degree, but there are a few cases of famous people that went to Bocconi and well... let's say they don't need to make use of their degree. I don't know if you can read italian but this article (http://www.lettera43.it/persone/8320/il-lato-b-della-bocconi...) explains how many of the girls involved in the Berlusconi's scandal went to Bocconi and got one or even two degrees. That means either that the place is unusually full or very smart and very pretty girls or that there's something strange going on.

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#79

Post by smm2000 »

polymatter wrote: post #55
aneth4 wrote: post #23

Wow, if you are skilled technically and aren't annoyed by constant recruiter outreach, you are doing something majorly wrong. I'd also say technical recruiters are also doing something majorly wrong if your resume reflects your abilities. If you've coded anything that does something interesting, you should have no problem finding interviews, and frankly offers. If you haven't coded anything interesting, then why woul…

Be aware of the anti-pattern section of TFA though. The impression of job hopping really does "damage your chances" as the author put it. I hope its not too rude to talk about my own case. I lost a job in 2008 over the financial crisis (LIFO employee retention policy), had 2 short contracts (which really shouldn't count as job hopping!) a research position where I suffered a burnout and now recruiters don't answer my…

Some advice -Remove junior from all positions -Too much stuff about accounting if you are looking for swe job -More verbs - I did A, implemented B, saved C amount of money -Follow coursera courses = meaningless, remove it or at least put what courses you graduated from. -Fix grammar and spelling -Change objective to " I am looking for software engineer position where I can do ABC".

Re: Why won't anyone talk to me? What recruiters look for in a resume

#80

Post by polymatter »

smm2000 wrote: post #79
polymatter wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Be aware of the anti-pattern section of TFA though. The impression of job hopping really does "damage your chances" as the author put it. I hope its not too rude to talk about my own case. I lost a job in 2008 over the financial crisis (LIFO employee retention policy), had 2 short contracts (which really shouldn't count as job hopping!) a research position where I suffered a burnout and now recruiters don't answer my…

Some advice -Remove junior from all positions -Too much stuff about accounting if you are looking for swe job -More verbs - I did A, implemented B, saved C amount of money -Follow coursera courses = meaningless, remove it or at least put what courses you graduated from. -Fix grammar and spelling -Change objective to " I am looking for software engineer position where I can do ABC".

Thanks for the feedback.
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