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Feature:Geek Jobs
from the its-the-dream dept.
The following was written by Slashdot Reader Joseph Walsh
Getting a Geek Job
A 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?
What color is your parachute? (Score:3)
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.
Re:Putting a resume on your web page (Score:5)
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
As a receiver of resumes, I delete any attachments (Score:5)
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
Tried recruiters and gave up (Score:4)
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.
evolutionary tension (Score:4)
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.
Recent experience attempting to hire someone... (Score:3)
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 [mailto]. 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
Putting a resume on your web page (Score:4)
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 :)).
Re:Putting a resume on your web page (Score:4)
"So, are you looking?"
"No, thank you, I'm quite happy here."
"Oh, well, do you know anybody that's looking?"
"Nope, as a matter of fact if I did, I'd hire them, we've got openings."
"Oh, really??? What kind of openings do you have?
Instantly they go from wanting to place you somewhere else, to wanting to place someone else where you are. They've all got two faces.
Favorite recruiter story : After telling her no thank you and goodbye on the phone three times and her ignoring me, I hung up on her. I then got an email from her (turns out someone really *had* referred me) saying "I've never been hung up on before!" I told her she must not have been in the business long. Ironically, 3 months later I was looking, so I told my colleagues "Watch this. I could go over to her house and kick her dog, and she'd still love me and want to place me." Sure enough I called her and told her I was looking, and all bad feelings were forgotten.
The View from the Other Side (Score:5)
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:
Re:Techies Unite! (Score:4)
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
This middleman is a poor interface layer. (Score:3)
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.
Re:Geeks don't use Word, HR better deal with it (Score:3)
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