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

[tmaier@bitstorm.net (Tom Maier)]

Victoria Welch <vikki@oz.net> wrote:


>Found this out the hard way, mine was once 13 pages.  Finally, some kind
>hearted HR type told me to re-write it down to *at most* two pages (he
>probably got tired of throwing them in the trash).  I crammed it into
>that as best I could.  Recently descovered that is gobbdegoop to the HR
>types just the same.
>

What HR is looking for is a one-to-one corespondence or the 
job as described by the company and your resume, so if you 
take your abbreviated resume and then highlight or underline
the words that show this corespondence to the position, then
the HR people will understand better.  For example, if the company
is looking for Moto processor experience and a smidgen of 
analog design, then go through the resume with the word processor
and boldface all the sections that could bring these two parts to 
be more noticable. The cover letter should explain in a very simple
way how your resume fits their want ad and anybody should
be able to see how they match up, no matter if they are 
technical or not.  Make the connection obvious.

In general, though, I've never had luck going through the "front
door" with a resume.  I always have the best luck when I
can bypass them and get somebody who speaks techno-geek
to look at it.  In a lot of cases the technical manager is looking
for a person who can pick up the ball and run with it and even if
you don't have too much experience in a certain area they may be 
impressed with your aggressive pursuit of some other facet
of design and they realize that if they turn you loose on this
other technology you will probably perform similar to how you did
in the past.

Tom