2/4/2010

12 Responses to “Job-Hunting Advice (or How Not to Get a Job)”

1. I don’t think that law student realizes how big a favor this guy did him.

   TakeFive (7c6fd5) — 2/4/2010 @ 3:07 pm

   
   

2. Good man, that Webster.

   Uncle Pinky (e4d7c2) — 2/4/2010 @ 3:32 pm

   
   

3. That was a kind thing. I wonder if the law student understands that.

   Pons Asinorum (ffeb5e) — 2/4/2010 @ 3:36 pm

   
   

4. Part of what I do for a living is review resumes for hires. Sometimes we put out a request for resumes for a specific job. Once I had to review 180 resumes for an executive chef’s position we’d advertised. I wrote a guide for resumes after my eyeballs started bleeding from reading all the wretched resumes for this position.

   Some of the resumes were so awful that I’ve copied them, crossed out the main identifying information and kept them in a file to help our employees when they apply for jobs. Like the one for an Assistant Director position written in crayon on ripped off at either end heat activated fax paper. THAT was my favorite. Well, the bit where he asked for $70,000 was the best.

   Vivian Louise (643333) — 2/4/2010 @ 3:45 pm

   
   

5. …Assistant Director position written in crayon…

   LOL!

   Pons Asinorum (ffeb5e) — 2/4/2010 @ 3:48 pm

   
   

6. “or how not to get a job”
   He just might get a job, now, owed in large part to the very kind mentor he happened to mistakenly apply to. Kudos, mentor, for any happy ending.

   m (dbd402) — 2/4/2010 @ 5:49 pm

   
   

7. Vivian Louise
   Wonderful resume tips. Wrought of apparently horrible experience.
   For possible updates:
   lesser turns: lesser terns?

   m (dbd402) — 2/4/2010 @ 6:00 pm

   
   

8. Good stuff…

   EricPWJohnson (d0c4eb) — 2/4/2010 @ 6:35 pm

   
   

9. I highly recommend Vivian Louise’s resume tips. But as good as they are, her blog is even better. Check it out.

   DRJ (84a0c3) — 2/4/2010 @ 6:53 pm

   
   

10. Like the one for an Assistant Director position written in crayon

    Why you would be making fun of President Obama is beyond me…

    Scott Jacobs (d027b8) — 2/4/2010 @ 8:09 pm

    
    

11. For my industry, at least, I think one of Vivian Louise’s recommendations is a bit off base: her instruction to never apply to something for which you don’t meet the minimum qualifications.

    The problem is that it is common for programming job listings to contain unreasonable job history qualifications (I once saw an ad requesting four years experience with Java at a time when Java had been available outside of Sun for less than two). In such cases the company is not going to be able to hire anyone who meets the minimum stated qualification, and every applicant will be alike in their failure to meet them – and either the company will realize that they can live without something they said they wanted, or it will decide to not fill the position.

    The trick is, however, that you have to (a) have enough experience to know when the stated qualifications are BS and why, and (b) have a resume which otherwise meets the listed qualifications.

    aphrael (9e8ccd) — 2/5/2010 @ 12:34 am

    
    

12. Aphrael – We had people applying for the executive chef’s position without any professional cooking experience, they just LOVED to cook. At home. Not for more than 20 people at a time, tops. We were hiring for someone to train, educate, write recipes, write menus, test products, etc, for an operation that feeds thousands every day. These people didn’t even have the most outside edge of minimum qualifications. You wouldn’t hire someone for an IT job if they were totally enthusiastic about playing minesweeper from time to time. It was the same thing.

    Vivian Louise (643333) — 2/5/2010 @ 3:22 am