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I automated my job application process

blog.daviddodda.com

761–770 of 884 posts

Re: I automated my job application process

#761

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100%, this is a natural reaction to the situation companies have created. When you get a rejection response mere minutes after submission that claims "after careful consideration..." then of course I'm not going to spend any more time than that applying to any jobs anymore. Prove a human actually took the time to review my resume and I'll actually apply to your company like a human.

If I get 500 applications to a role and spend 1 minute writing each person a personalised no sorry, that’s 20% of my week just writing rejection emails (never mind actually reviewing the resume). I’ve hired for 3 companies for engineers from entry level to staff level, and for non technical candidates for other departments. Applicant tracking systems like greenhouse send me an email for every application that comes t…

I don't assume it "wasn't looked at", but I absolutely do think that a lot of the time it "wasn't understood" because the recruiters reading it only have very simply "keyword lookup" ability, instead of actually reading the resume.

I don't fill my my resume with a bunch of spam buzzwords for every adjacent technology I've ever used, because certain things are kind of implied by other things. If I put "set up multiple clusters across different Linux systems", I don't also cram in "systemd, bash, upstart, scripting, ls, cp, du, nohup", despite the fact that I know how to use all of those things, because I think they're implied by "me setting up Linux clusters".

A software engineer reading my resume would come away with a decent understanding of what skills I have, but a recruiter who doesn't know anything outside of keyword-matching and hitting the `fwd` button in Outlook (which appears to be most recruiters) will see "HE DOESN'T KNOW BASH, SEE HE DIDN'T PUT IT ON HIS RESUME."

Now, of course, most of this is on me, it's up to me to learn how to play the game, whether or not I like the system doesn't really change anything, but as far as I can tell, the "solution" to this is to turn my resume into a low-quality SEO-spam piece of shit so as to try and satisfy the most incompetent person who might read it.

Re: I automated my job application process

#762
post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i saw a tiktok where the guy had his phone propped up but not in view of his webcam, and basically the interviewer's mic was going through his phone on some llm and the llm was spitting out responses for him to reply to the soft questions his interviewer was asking. the interviewer also made him "quickly" turn on his screen sharing so he could see that his computer didn't have anything assisting him. i haven't done a…

But like.. what happens after this supposed trick? I don’t understand how they wouldn’t just be fired after the first week if they can’t actually do the job? Is it that they are applying to places where you don’t pair program?

In most cases in corporations you are not interviewed by people you will be working with. Interview stage is a generic assessment by random people. Yo simply need to pass them. Also they are usually asking questions not related to the real job.

Re: I automated my job application process

#763

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? Is this a 'love it or leave it' comment? I genuinely don't understand what you're meaning to say here.

What I mean is unless your ideal is autarky or USSR under Joseph Stalin, it is hypocritical or ingenuous to expect having a market where you can sell goods and services worldwide but not allowing workers applying and getting jobs worldwide for same companies. That is called free market. So if you happen to think you are missing jobs because they are given to people living in another country, you also have the choice…

ha lets see…

In economics, a free market is an economic system in which the prices of goods and services are determined by supply and demand expressed by sellers and buyers. Such markets, as modeled, operate without the intervention of government or any other external authority.

if you think america is “free market” I have some Enron stock to sell to you :)

Re: I automated my job application process

#764

I'm seeing a lot of back in forth in the comments between hiring managers and employees discussing who is more responsible for the current situation, but from the perspective of someone looking for a job what should I be doing? I've been pretty aggressively looking for a job for the past six months or so. I have 10+ years of professional software dev experience so I've mostly been looking at senior dev positions. I h…

I am in the exact same situation

And I wish I had something encouraging to tell you, but I don’t. I’m extremely broke and getting ghosted on application after application, or turned down months later via robot email. Never any human contact any step of the process.

I’m looking at getting into another industry, tbf.

Re: I automated my job application process

#765
post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because MCSE was such a success? This article unintentionally perfectly rebuts the idea of licensing: https://mcpmag.com/articles/2005/05/11/the-death-of-paper-mc... Our industry is one where actual skills should and do matter, and much gatekeeping has been reduced. Professional rote learning is great for mandarin jobs where you are working within a static prescribed framework (legal, accounting, building codes). It…

> Our industry is one where actual skills should and do matter [...] Professional rote learning is great for mandarin jobs where you are working within a static prescribed framework (legal, accounting, building codes). Saying things like this reflects poorly on our community and demonstrates a poor understanding on how much creativity and thought goes into legal and accounting. There's a reason there is a large pay b…

Creativity and thought going into accounting ought to be illegal. Albeit I am sure there is plenty of demand for “creative accounting”.

Re: I automated my job application process

#766

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK job market is pretty screwy. I got made redundant back in March, applied for a bunch of stuff I matched profile for and maybe got 5-6 interviews off the back of it. The worst was the agency that lined me up for a contract role, got me to fill out all the paperwork only for the job to fall through because the client apparently never got budget signed off for the position.

> The worst was the agency that lined me up for a contract role, got me to fill out all the paperwork only for the job to fall through because the client apparently never got budget signed off for the position. I could be wrong, but I think that might have been a lie. I've heard it before, too, and I've come to doubt it; I think it too unlikely to be heard with such frequency as I do hear it. I've also had on three o…

> I could be wrong, but I think that might have been a lie.

> I've heard it before, too, and I've come to doubt it; I think it too unlikely to be heard with such frequency as I do hear it.

Maybe but it sounded plausible, this would have been a 3 month contract with Moodys in Canary Wharf so not some rinkydink outfit. I could just be gullible but they gained nothing from stringing me along

Re: I automated my job application process

#767
post #719
post #645

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People seem to want to pass laws that treat the symptoms, not the cause. “You keep getting the stomach bug. Here take this, it’ll calm your stomach. No no, you can keep eating that expired cheese, it’s all good”

> you can keep eating that expired cheese Why are you anti French ?

My oldest kid hate experiencing vomit, she transferred that on to me as a “gross gross thing” and it was the first thing that came to mind.

I’m a huge fan of French onion soup.

Re: I automated my job application process

#769

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not arguing for feedback, I'm arguing for an answer. It's just common decency. "Sorry, we're not continuing" is not going to get you sued.

See after just having through 3 rounds of recruiting over the past three years, I don't think the ghosting is intentional from most companies. I would say 60% of companies give a "not continuing" response after 1-2 months from application, while ~25% seem like they have a configuration/software mistake that causes it to send the rejection 6 months - a year later, which people in the meantime think was just ghosting.…

I think there's something wrong with a hiring process where it takes 1-2 months to decide whether to proceed to next step (screening call, or interview, or offer) with a candidate, not to mention the fact that a well qualified candidate isn't going to be waiting around that long - they'll be applying to other jobs at the same time, and if good will be snapped up.

The time to send the "Sorry, not continuing" email is as soon as the company has decided that, and if that really is 1-2 months later, you may as well have just ghosted the candidate.

Re: I automated my job application process

#770
post #495
post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by "can't afford to?" Because you can't possibly mean you think candidates are going to fly out for an interview at their own expense. Traditionally (i.e. pre-Covid) flying out a senior candidate was the standard signal that both sides were taking the process seriously. And for competitive hires, the quality of the hotel and the restaurants they were taken to and the seniority of the people who joine…

Yeah, flying someplace for interviews used to be pretty much the necessary stage for interviews after (maybe) a phone interview.

On the employer's dime though.
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