A geek's guide to getting hiredDave Ross for Uniforum Chicago

August 24, 2010

Dave Ross

• Lead Developer at Straight North

• Founder, Suburban Chicago PHP & Web Development Meetup

• 11 years experience

Dave Ross

• Star Trek & Doctor Who fan

• Linux user for 15 years

• Proposed to wife on a Scrabble board at a Mensa meeting

Turing

Finding Jobs

The big three

• Monster, Careerbuilder, Dice

• Recruiters, fake jobs

• Scams

Alternatives

Automate

• “Email me this search”

• RSS

• Yahoo! Pipes

The target area is only two meters

wide

• What jobs sound exciting?

• Focus your search

• Don't waste your energy

Higher-level jobs are not posted as often as lower-level jobs online. In-person networking may be needed to uncover these higher-level positions...

Tim Schoonover, OI Partners, qtd. Wall Street Journal

Your Resume

Multiple pages

• Automatic keyword filters

• Online viewing

• More detail

IT professionals...their roles are so complex and...they often wear multiple hats. It's hard for them to encapsulate everything they've done into just a few bullet points per position.

Shana WestermanRecruiting Manager, Sapphire Technologiesqtd CIO.com

Stand out

• PDF (have a plain Word version)

• Fonts(within reason)

• Color

• Humor

Get a life!

• Volunteering

• Open source

• Groups/associations (Uniforum!)

• Speaking

As long as your resume only shows accomplishments that others asked you to do, you are not showing signs of an entrepreneur.

Those of us who went the extra mile and did cool stuff without asking for permission or without being told to do so, that’s a major sign.

Alain Raynaud, Founder Institute

Tailor your resume for the position

Personal branding

• Companies do use Google, LinkedIn, etc.

• How do you sell yourself online?

• Github, Sourceforge

Cover letter

• Company name

• Hiring manager’s name

• Specific technologies they use

• Local color(restaurants,employees you’ve met)

Customize it

Call to action

• Review my resume

• Call/Email me

• Provide contact info

First impressions are important. Yeah, I know, it sucks and your technical prowess should speak for itself, but it doesn’t. Let’s face it, if you forget the “L” in Klocwork in your cover letter, I’m laughing too hard to pay attention to your superior coding skills.

Carolyn Perkins, Director, Human Resources at Klocwork

Submitting

• Usually only allow DOC or text resume

• Generic questions

• “I paid for this lead”

Form on a job site

• Job title in the subject line

• Cover letter as the body

• Resume attached

Email it

• Read about them

• Look for a career section

• Fill out forms or email

• “Someone was checking us out”

Company Web Site

Interviews

What should I wear?

• Learn the culture

• Dress one step better

• One thing that surprises

Do I need to say this?

• Be on time

• Dress nice

• Dress appropriately

• Be polite

We know you're nervous.

Practice interviews

• Spouse/siblings

• A mirror/your cat

• School career center

• Toastmasters

A year from now, my advice could be different. What worked five years ago for a resume probably doesn't matter now.

Shana WestermanRecruiting Manager, Sapphire Technologiesqtd CIO.com

davidmichaelross.com