The Tech Resume Inside Out - Gergely Orosz

On the importance of Resumes

The goal of the resume is to sell you for that specific position—and do this in the less than 10 seconds that the recruiter or hiring manager will be reading it.

Get on the “Yes” pile, which will proceed to the interview.

Great resumes are ones that showcase rare and valuable experience or skills that are exactly what the job needs

Great resumes can also be ones that show solid career progression towards the current role.

Journeyman resumes tell a story with zero, or close to zero progression. For long stretches of time, little to no career progression is visible.

Hiring managers are looking for people who can help them with their current challenges of building software and shipping value.

LinkedIn resume is not enough because it is not tailored to a specific position

The hiring pipeline

Hiring Manager writes the Job description. Make the final hire/no-hire decision. Recruiter guides the candidate through the interview process. Sourcer gets people interested in starting the process.

In small companies or startups the Hiring Manager and Recruiter is the same person.

Applicant Tracking Systems do not reject resumes, humans do. Recruiters would not trust automated systems as they could lose good candidates.

Although some recruiters will be pattern matching keywords.

Referrals almost always guarantee an in-depth resume review.

The resume

Ask yourself: “am I making a good case for why I am a good fit for this position that I am applying for?”

Avoid listing the expertise level with a tool or language. Mention what you are proficient with and what is relevant for the job.

It’s okay to adjust your job title to reflect your actual work done.

do mention if you picked up a technology to speed up a project, to stretch yourself, or other reasons.

Your resume is there to get you the interview. On the interview, you’ll have the opportunity to talk about the various things that you did that are not on the resume. Be ruthless in removing things that don’t help convey why you are a good fit for the position.

Use active language, you “improved maintainability” instead of “improving maintainability”. You “led”, “developed”, “shipped” and “operated”.

On formatting: Avoid bolding anything inside of sentences, avoid “spoken languages”, a photo and too much social links, or social links that point to outdated websites and github profiles that do not show any commits or projects, fancy layouts (you are not applying for a UI/UX position)