2008-11-27

Crucial Resume Advice

Hiring Technical People >> What Hiring Managers Look for in a Resume: "When I see a resume of more than 2 pages from a person with fewer than 15 years of experience, I generally put it in the No pile. That's because the candidate is not attempting to show me good judgement about their accomplishments. You have maybe 30 seconds to catch a hiring manager's attention. Don't waste the hiring manager's time."

Johanna Rothman outlines six absolutely mandatory components to a solid resume and, honestly, having gone through several resumes I can could on one hand the number of times I've seen someone who followed this advice. I have to give a thumbs down to so many people who just aren't qualified for the job and more often than not, their resumes don't match this thing I call "reality". It's true that resumes are frequently indexed and word searched by software these days, but playing Buzzword Bombardment is not going to win you any favors when a human starts to sift through your four-pager, turns it sideways, scrutinizes it, and says to himself "I don't know what the hell this says".

Bad resumes get pitched. Good resumes get phone screens.

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