Re: not enough real programmers? (was Re: Byte Magazine: 18 Vintage issues, 1985-1986)

[Brian.dot.Inglis@SystematicSw.ab.ca (Brian Inglis)]

On Fri, 6 Aug 1999 10:40:28 -0400, "jsnyder" <jsnyder@trelis.com>
wrote:
>> > The 'skills shortage' is really an inability of the industry to bring
>> > in and evaluate employees. Preferring to expend endless time on the
>> > theoretical 'perfect fit' employee that can start from day one.
>> > I blame 'personnel services' somewhat. The hiring manager can specify
>> > his 'ideal employee' and create a 'skills shortage' for that job with
>> > no real expectation of finding his 'superman'. It costs them nothing
>> > unless the service finds the person they 'need'.
>> That's probably a lot of it.
>> The only solution I can see is to bypass the HR department.  Have the boss
>> tell *them* that he wants to hire you, don't rely on HR to bring you to
>> the attention of the boss.  It's not in their interests to do so, and in
>> fact the interests of the HR department are completely opposite to both
>> your interests and the boss's interests...
>This has been my experience over the last six months that I have been
>looking for a job;  25 years in the industry, h/w and s/w design.  But I
>don't fit neatly into the skill sheet that the HR droids use.  I even had
>one tell me that I didn't have the required qualification of writing
>'firmware' even though my resume lists 10 years of embedded work.  Thank
>goodness I have adequate resources to sit it out.
>-Joe
Joe,
Look at the wording used in ads for positions you can do, then
work those into a detailed resume for morons. My "technical"
resume is 15 pages long, including functional, chronological and
tabular formats, with the words "UNIX OS" appearing after every
such OS reference (don't expect anyone to know that SunOS,
Solaris, AIX, IRIX, Linux are UNIX), similarly "programming
language", "scripting language", "shell scripting language", ad
nauseam. In your case, replace every occurrence of embedded or
firmware with "embedded system firmware", and so on. This
"resume" is your marketing tool, to ensure that you get a crack
at any position you can fill. Keep the short, accurate version
for technical people who know the jargon. 
Thanks. Take care, Brian Inglis 	Calgary, Alberta, Canada
-- 
Brian_Inglis@CSi.com 	(Brian dot Inglis at SystematicSw dot ab dot ca)
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