AMA for getting a technical co-op job

[Tony]

Interesting real-world stat from someone hiring co-op students: Clearpath Robotics from Waterloo.

143 resumes in 60 minutes.

That's less than 30 seconds to survive the first screen, and clearly a lot of students are not doing well to be cut this quickly.

Coincidentally, Justin Lai - who is doing startups and recruiting - is offering to share his wisdom on the topic of getting technical jobs. I'll weight in on the questions as well. After 9 co-op terms (out of a maximum of 6), I figure there's quite a bit of experience that you guys might benefit from.

This will be an AMA (Ask Me Anything) style thread, so ask away.

[unoho]

i didnt understand the part about form cover letter? did he mean using templates and changing those?

[Tony]

I believe he meant a "generic cover letter" -- sending the same cover letter to multiple companies. It is extremely easy to spot, even with some differences like changing company's name.

[unoho]

too be honest, i did that few times last year. lol
but ya when you have assignments for six courses and jobmine is being extremely slow, i doubt people will write individual letter.. but again, i think it's just me.

btw, do you have a resume tony? it's always great to look at other people's resume and see how they organize info.

[Tony]

It's not just you -- it's a common strategy to have one generic package and blast it out to every opening. Though from employer's perspective it's a sign that you are using a shotgun and don't particularly care about their company any more than others. As Ryan points out -- a form cover letter is borderline offensive (wastes time and provides very little content (it must be nearly content free to be applicable to _every_ company)).

Re: my personal resume -- they are now very job specific. Between all my work experience, education, personal projects, and interests I have maybe 3 pages worth of content. So when I write a resume for a new job, I pick a page worth (never more than a single printed page) of best-applicable content and format that.

The headlines are typically:
- name/contact info
- work experience (about 50% of the page)
- studying at UWaterloo (maybe list exceptionally relevant courses, but Amazon/Microsoft/Google would be familiar enough with UWaterloo that it wouldn't make a difference)
- links to personal projects
- some interesting remark regarding company/this-specific-position (I have gotten interviews on this line alone)

[justinrmf]

Hi Tony,

Thanks for the introduction. I'm looking to gather a list of popular questions that people have about the entire process, and writing a blog post with my thoughts. I will link to it here when completed. In the meantime, I'll be more than happy to answer questions and take part in the discussion.

Tony: Your approach of customizing your resume for each job takes more work, but is a great idea. Having gone through a bunch of resumes in the past, anything you can do to make you stand out (outside of your experiences) is a huge plus.

Justin.

[mirhagk]

I don't know about technical jobs but I know for minimum wage jobs putting your resume into a plastic slip, and putting your name in colour, is a huge help, as it helps separate it from the ones around it, so they don't miss it, or throw it out etc. Is this true for technical non-minimum wage jobs too?

I remember helping my manager at a fast food restaurant pick out resumes that looked good. If something had a spelling mistake, or something that we didn't like (like someone acting kind of cocky in it, or better than this job) we threw it out without even reading what was on it. We also didn't read cover letters until after finishing the resume, as the resume was the important part.

I'm just curious how much of this applies to non-minimum wage jobs and how much doesn't. For instance we also looked for people that were over-qualified (that had like 4 years of some useful university degree) because they were likely going to be leaving in less than a couple of months, but I'm pretty sure technical jobs don't look for people over-qualified.

[Tony]

It's a different game. For one, your resume will live as a PDF (unless specified otherwise, best file format of choice). The other part is that technical jobs will be looking at your education and experience more than on arts-and-crafts skills put into the resume.

Still, some parts are universal. Poor writing will be a disadvantage when applying to any job.

It's an interesting question regarding over-qualification. If there's a gross mismatch, then it's a red-flag that something is up. A candidate might simply be lying ("expert knowledge in 12 programming languages. I can haz QA job?"). Others assume that there must be something wrong with the candidate (social validation).

When I was just starting co-op and was applying to everything, I once ended up in an interview where the interviewer realized that I would be grossly over-qualified for the job. He decided that I would just very quickly get bored and start causing trouble. In retrospect, I think he was right.

[unoho]

how about reference? i hear people say reference (from your friend/classmates) is a really good way to land a good job.
but how do i write that in my resume?

[Tony]

my understanding is that those "awesome references" are for internal cases. At a Google scale of incoming resumes, it took an internal reference for someone to even look at my application.

When applying to a particular startup (small companies, so unlikely to already know someone on the inside), I had my reference (who personally knew the CEO) to make the introductions in place of a cover letter (the point of a cover letter is to get someone to read your resume. An introductory email from someone familiar to company is better than anything you can ever write about yourself.)

Think is where LinkedIn and their "this is how you are connected" graph is _amazing_. Build your network!

Lacking such introductions, I've seen people use lines such as "references available upon request"; but I don't bother with even that. If the company wants references, they'll ask anyway.

[Tony]

Tony @ Wed Oct 05, 2011 3:36 pm wrote:

It's an interesting question regarding over-qualification. If there's a gross mismatch, then it's a red-flag that something is up. A candidate might simply be lying ("expert knowledge in 12 programming languages. I can haz QA job?").

I've been thinking about this, and an interesting discussion point is, in the words of Dr. House: "Everybody lies." More interestingly is that employers lie too. Reasons vary... sometimes they just exaggerate things, same as a candidate might be tempted in. Other times there's simply a mismatch between non-technical HR/recruiter writing the job posting and the technical reality of things. It's always hilarious to see the requirements for "must have N years experience with TECHNOLOGY" where that technology has existing for less than N years.

Try to make sense of the position. You might very well be qualified for the job, even if you are missing some of the "requirements".

[justinrmf]

It's very interesting that you're mentioning references and referrals. It's definitely the case out there that it's who you know, more than what you know. Tony and I actually met not just because we had friends in common, but because we are both actively networking to get to know new people.

Similarly, the recruiting firm that I work with is based purely on referrals. We have built relationships with executives at the companies and serve as your referral into the company as we've found that it's much more productive than sending resumes along with everyone else to HR.

You don't need to write references on your resume, but an intro email to the right person can do wonders for your chances.

My advice: meet people before you need anything. Build up a relationship/connection with no objectives other than to get to know the other person. It's more genuine that way.