Moving Up the IT Ladder in a Poor Economy? 892
Andy asks: "As almost anyone who joined the IT industry on the tail end of the Dot-Com boom can tell you, trying to move up in the industry for the past couple of years has been like jogging up-wind in a hurricane. I have sent resumes to countless numbers of employers only to still be working in the same $13/hr. low-end outsource support job as when I started (and $13/hr. doesn't get you too far in Boston these days). Learning more and more languages/technologies/protocols has merely resulted in a larger skill set on my resume, with pretty much the same level of experience, and no new interviews. Has anyone else been able to get out of this sort of slump, either during this economic slump or a previous one? Should I just continue the path of learning as much as I can and applying for jobs? Would getting a cert (maybe an RHCE or some Cisco certs) help? Would it be worth it to get a degree in MIS or CS?"
Move! (Score:5, Interesting)
Big cities think in big company ways. You have management and underlings.
Get to some smaller city where you can work for a smaller business, learn the entire business and move up from there.
At aim for smaller companies ones without a set corporate structure that has no room for you anywhere but the bottom.
Nice hobby, crappy career (Score:4, Interesting)
My biggest problem is I am too good at what I do (I build Oracle/MS-SQL DB's for health care facilites). I also make enough money that the ROI on the MBA doesn't look that great. I'll have to work hard on forgetting what I know to be an effective manager. "I heard Mauve has more RAM". heh. Can't wait!
JON
small town (Score:2, Interesting)
Well... (Score:4, Interesting)
Currently, one month's pay at that rate that would pay my rent, food, utilities, cable, phone, gas, and 6 months of car insurance, with a sizable chunk left over.
Probably couldn't support a family on that amount, granted, but for anyone (single or splitting costs) not living right near a giant city, $13/hour would be awesome.
Experience... (Score:2, Interesting)
I finally went "professional" with all my computer knowledge in '98. No degree, no certs, just what was in my head from being a computer geek for 15+ years. Started out being an intern (at 29 years old) for a local security consulting firm and from there have rose through the ranks, worked with some of the countries brightest, and am now in a 100+ a year job as a Senior Network Security Engineer. I credit it all to wanting to learn everything, experience, and picking a niche' (security) to focus on and to excel in.
The above wasn't an ego trip just hopefully a nugget of guidance.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, many people ignore the requirements on the job-descriptions for new applications. It surprised me at first when requesting for a SQL engineer and recieving resumes specifying MSaccess experience solely as for a DB admin position. Resume's like this go to the shredder.
From my own personal attempts at getting hired (which were quite extensive.) My biggest problem was a "poisoned" reference. It made all the other references pretty much worthless. Upon calling this individual, I learned later of course, that most of the prospective employers just stopped and tossed the resume in the circular file.
Also, presentation and attitude helps a ton. If you're looking for a new job be as personable as you would be with a client, as they potentially are. The employer is attempting to find someone who is not only adept, but also socially capable. Shave the beard (or trim it), at least tie the hair back and wear at least a tie when you even HAND in your resume. A good hand shake helps as well as your eye contact, making sure they know who you are is good since then they will know you're not just some resume spammer.
A smart employer will hire someone based upon their experience, if you have no professional experience in an area you would like to move into donate your time somewhere for an NPO, or find a way to utilize it in your current employers setup. A class or certification only helps so much, experience counts for so much more.
Re:Move! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:5, Interesting)
1) Certification earned in the military most likely was tough to get, and thus is respected.
2) There are a lot of worthless IT certs in the civilian world, that's why we disrespect them. The poster mentioned "technically adept and smart employers"... headhunters rarely (at least in my experience) have a clue, they're just trying to match technology names to a resume. I once had this fellow quite confused, as it took 5 minutes to explain, that coding Java, and "writing java scripts" were not related. stoopeed headhunter...
The dreaded words....Marketing (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been keeping my programming skills sharp by freelancing when available and working on interesting projects for my website. In another 6 months I'll start looking for a programming job again but now I'll have 2 years experiance managing people, working out budgets, working on business strategy and an established protfolio of freelance work.
This approach probably isn't for everyone but for it's made this recession bearable.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
Considering how much outsourcing there is in the industry, jack of all trades are becoming more popular. Companies want to hire people who have varied knowledge since the specific tasks can be outsourced. Managerial positions in IT where one can make decisions on what and where projects can be outsourced requires broader knowledge.
Re:Well... (Score:3, Interesting)
It is also somewhere barely above poverty... Hell I made 12 bucks an hour when I was in school 15 years ago. Yes, I got to live like a king in a small college town. But now I have a mortgage that is 3 times what I was paying in Rent - and frankly I like my nice stuff.
Now if you are in school somewhere in California, or expensive towns in the North East - I feel sorry for you that you can't make money. If you are in school somewhere in the midwest - I agree 13 bucks an hour is GREAT for a college student.
People always talk about outsourcing from California to India where the difference in salary is like 4 - 1. But you can get 2 - 1 just by relocating to the suburbs of Des Moines (of course I know more people here that would rather live in Bangalore than Des Moines)
I am not suprised that people/companies are flocking out of Silicon Valley for those savings
From some managers I have recently spoken to... (Score:3, Interesting)
I asked how they would rank their candidates on based on education, experience, and certifications.
While one preferred education over experience, they both agreed that certifications were a distant third and worthless without the corresponding experience.
However, since labor is a commodity and we are currently in period of high supply and low demand, you aren't going to get as much as you might want to.
There are a lot of very experienced and very educated people going for the same positions you are. As one manager put it, "Right now I can get an incredible amount of talent for a third of their last job, simply because they need the check and benefits."
These days, you either need an impressive degree, an impressive amount of experience, or a combination thereof.
As someone said above, your social networking skills are important, too.
Good luck.
Re:You don't have a degree? (Score:1, Interesting)
I have no degree.
I make $98,000/year in Boston doing IT work.
Re:What are your goals? (Score:3, Interesting)
When/where I'm from, degrees are in fields of knowledge, not technologies.
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Certifications are simply bad... (Score:2, Interesting)
My answer to my friend is below:
50% of all serious (those worth at least $3 million) IT projects still fail. Something that has not seriously changed since the 60's when Brooks wrote the seminal text on the subject (The Mythical Man Month). These projects are not failing due to a lack of in depth expertise or paper certifications, they fail due to basic issues involving interpersonal communications and a mis-alignment of rewards.
In my experience projects get into trouble when the staff is not fully versed in identifying complexity (a basic problem that the engineering profession addresses directly). In conjunction with a failure to translate that complexity into an appropriate risk assessment (usually the result of poor team communications and/or inexperience) which is where a well versed technical manager comes to play. Followed by an unacceptable delivery which is often times the result of a counter productive award system.
Having a PMP says that you are well versed in the lexicon of Project Management and communicating with other PM's. It does little in helping you effectively communicate with end users, line of business staff, or management. The same can be said for Oracle certified DBA's and MS certified software developers.
Re:Consulting (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:You don't have a degree? (Score:3, Interesting)
That having been said, we just did a round-table in an interview situation today (where the person in question did not have a degree yet), and 40% of us did not have a degree. Of the other 60%, only 2 of those people had a degree in CS
A degree is a good indicator of someone who knows something, and spent the time to learn it to some level. It's definately worth something in terms of indicating that the person is well-rounded and adaptable (which is just as important as specific fine-grained skills sometimes -- business needs change pretty quickly these days). I would at the very least seriously consider starting a degree program, it would at least show potential employers that you're working on that area. Even better, many of them will help you out with tuition (although like most things, those programs seem to be a little less common these days).
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
I won't point fingers or name names, but I surely won't use any business references ever again. Still this is old news, I kind of skipped over my point... I was eventually hired by those who had worked with me in the past and knew my skillset as well as my social aspect. I don't believe they even bothered to contact references.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:5, Interesting)
prod the market (Score:2, Interesting)
If the 1998-2000 tech boom and bust taught us anything where you're either a driver or a passenger it's that we need drivers. Translation: new business models that make money in the short and long haul. "Nickel and Dimed" author Barbara Ehrenreich [zmag.org] recently spoke at my school, saying: "You can't blame the poor economy on character defects alone. There's not enough money." In short, let's help the financial representation incorporate some good biz models (capitalism + sustainability + socialism = something short of outright greed) that bring in more money for everyone, not just CEOs, management and sys admins on a lofty perch.
No Certs, Lots of Work (Score:3, Interesting)
I have none of that (well, I used to have the CNA, but that was back in '93). I have been employed every month since '90, making embarrassingly large sums of money (which I still manage to spend and remain broke-- go figure).
Everone has a story. Some are successful because of the number of acronyms on a resume; others (like me) are successful because... well, I don't know why I'm successful. I've been a damned hard worker, I'm good at what I do (programming, DBA, sysadmin stuff like email and web, and networking), but really there's nothing fantastic.
I think a lot of it has to do with you. Yeah, getting your foot in the door can be difficult. Me, I started my professional career as a student worker, first fixing media equipment (TVs, VCRs, microfiche readers, etc), then by running the library's LAN. I never got a degree; real work interfered, as I was hired directly from student work into the LAN position.
But, if you haven't been to school, go. Work as a student, make contacts in the area, build a reputation. Me, I'm one of those jack-of-all-trades that other people have said to avoid becoming. It's served me well: I can do anything at all.
But each person has a story. They are all different. Any advice we can give you worked for us; it might not work for you.
Re:Find the back door... market yourself different (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:5, Interesting)
I worked as HR Database Admin for a fairly large (6000+ employee) manufacturing company with plants all over the US. A monster ad for a new Network admin brought in 500+ resumes.
The position reported directly to the CIO, so he was running the hiring process. You don't drop 500 resumes on the CIO's desk. You don't even drop 100 resumes on his desk.
We told him how many applicants we had, and he basically said "OK, throw out everyone who doesn't have a degree, everyone who doesn't have a certification, and everyone who doesn't have a stable work history and at least 5 years of experience. Let me know how many are left."
That got us down to about 60 or so. Did we toss out the best candidate? Very likely. Did we have the time and manpower to give each of those resumes the attention it deserved? Hell no.
Re:You don't have a what?! (Score:2, Interesting)
With experience. I started with a $10 per hour job with no experience or formal education in computers. My pay just about doubled every two years for 6 years, then has leveled out after the dot com bubble burst. Still no formal education in computers, but I've never had trouble finding a job and advancing.
My question is why you would exclude a candidate with all the knowledge and experience just because he lacked a degree? After all, it is just another cert.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
As an admin, are you in the position to do any hiring, or provide an serious feedback to the process? I've always wondered what weight a guy like me gets. For all intents and purposes, no formal education, but I do have a very strong grasp of Perl and a rapidly improving (we shall call it's current state "amicable to average development jobs") grasp of db design and SQL. I have a strong enough understanding of the major C concepts and enough experience with the actual language that learning derivative languages is basically just an exercise in syntax familiarization.
Despite my Slashdot postings, I also have a strong business communication background and I have 3 years of experience in all these areas to back it up...
... but no formal training. I'm sure I'm not the only person around here wondering where that puts folks like me.
Re:You don't have a what?! (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm not going to attack spending several thousand dollars and four years to get an education. However I do take issue with the idea that there is no other way to become skilled. A highly motivated person can reach the same amount of skill as an educated person in the same amount of time at a much lower cost and often with real world experience colleges don't supply.
The downside is the requirement for motivation. Obviously if sleeping in until noon, skipping class and writing all your papers the night before they are due is you preferred method of working then picking up some books from the library and reading them isn't going to do you any good; the books will go unread.
But how is this method of learning, which many people use to get their degrees, of any benefit? Long term memory takes repetition and association. This is not something that happens in a night of binge studying especially when those newly formed links in the brain are hammered with beer as a celebration for finishing final exams.
Some fields, such as law, have no alternatives. The bar exam requires the sponsorship of a law school. And, of course, a highly motivated person is likely to excell within the education system as well as outside it. So, as I said first, the decision is complicated. To buy a degree or not? That's a fifty thousand dollar question.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah, that Leondardo fella from Vinci... what a loser!
Sometimes a generalist is exactly what the job calls for. Large corporations don't have much use for them, but a small organization can benefit dramatically from someone who not only knows how to code, but can crimp RJ45s, do staff training, and lay out marketing materials. The generalist may not be as experienced at any one of these things as a specialist... but not everyone can afford a bunch of specialists, or make full use of their skills. Sometimes "good enough" really is good enough. And a generalist is also more likely to adapt better to changing needs. As an OS generalist, I wouldn't be fazed if my employer said we were replacing the Win2K boxes with Linux, or the Linux boxes with Xserves; an OS specialist probably would..
The bottom line is whether the person can fill the employer's needs effectively. And sometimes the employer really just needs a good swiss army knife.
I don't know if it will help... (Score:2, Interesting)
* Do they have a degree? If not, and unless they have 7+ years experience, trash.
* Is all their experience in an LLC? I'm not dumb, I know lots of people try to strike it out on their own for a while, fail, and then count it as experience. While it is, I value it less than experience in a larger company where they answered to more than themselves or their best friend.
* Do they move around a lot? If they can't spend more than 2 years somewhere, why should I waste my time training someone who's just looking to constantly jump ship?
Finally, certs look nice, but right now everyone seems to have either certs or masters degrees, and honestly neither really make a resume stand out to me. I want to see real involvement in the SLDC, following at least several major projects that take a year to fully complete from beginning to end. It sucks, and I was in the same boat as you, but with so much supply and so little demand, everyone's incredibly picky right now.
You left out a key word (Score:3, Interesting)
There are plenty of "actual" schools that will claim to have a "strong" background. The word to look for is accredited.
A particular program (say, Bachelor's in CS) will receive accreditation only after being reviewed by national standards bodies (ABET, in the CS case, I believe). It's the seal of approval for that degree, basically. Non-accredited programs from good schools might be okay, or they might suck, and you'll note that the diploma-by-mail spam is careful to point out that it's a non-accredited "school", which gives you an idea of what non-accredited degrees are worth.
Claiming acreditation without having it is fraud at the federal level, so if you get diploma spam selling you an acredited degree, feel free to take them to the cleaners. :-)
BTW, America calls them universities too. Multiple colleges accrete into a university.
Re:Returning Heros (Score:3, Interesting)
I seem to recall that we decided to label the Vietnam Veterans as "baby killers." Those on the far right seemed to think of them simply as losers. Regardless, the way the army ran itself in Vietnam, they managed to mess with the heads of the soldiers fighting during the war.
The fact that no-one wants to repeat the aftermath of the Vietnam War is likely to cause a different reaction. The reaction after WWII was a boom of babies.
Regardless, we will have a large number of people re-entering the US economy. It could be that they will go on a massive post war spending spree, and create jobs left and right, or they might add to economic malaise. Regardless, the return of people going abroad in the war on terrorism will have a big economic impact.
You could consider emigrating (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm currently finishing my degree in Computer Engineering, and my program consists of six 4-month work terms as well... The ones I did in Canada were fine, but I did a couple in Denmark, and they were practically begging me not to leave. I don't know if this is a large tendency or not, but if you have any contacts outside the US you could consider it.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
Whenever I see someone require a college degree for an IT position, I think, hey, there's someone who doesn't really know how to assess someone's skills much.
I have known, throughout my relatively long career, many talented people in software development with either no degree at all, or an 'unrelated' one (art, music, etc).
I myself have no degree, and I have never been unemployed. I've chosen my career moves as wisely as I can, and avoided the urge to 'job-hop'. I've developed good relationships with not only my fellow programmers, but with the business-folks I've met.
As a direct result, I've been earning over six-figures since around 1999 and am about to close on a 35 foot sailing yacht as a reward for my hard work. And yes, I am bragging, but it's to make a point.
Success in this business requires being good at what you do, but that only gets you part way, the rest is all about people. The relationships you've made, the bridges you've burned, all of it.
Re: military certifications (Score:3, Interesting)
Military certifications are even easier (from an academic standpoint) than correspondence-schools. Anybody with a good short-term memory should be able to memorize enough garbage to ace a military certification test. And as anybody with a real military background can tell you, test scores are not in any way, shape, or form indicative of real technical ability.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:2, Interesting)
I got out of the Navy after 6 years. I was an Aegis Radar Display Technician. I had been told repeatedly by others in the Navy that my training would really help when I got out. Turns out, they were wrong.
After 6 years, got tired of playing around so I got out of the Navy, went back to school and got a bachelors degree in Computer Engineering. I Thought that with my degree and Military experience working with electronics, I would have no problem getting a job. Surprisingly though, at many of the places where I was interviewing, I was asked to submit a copy of my resume without the military experience included.
Turns out when the choice was between me with my 3.0 GPA and 6 years military experience working with electronics and little Johnny with his 3.8 GPA and never worked a day in his life, most places would choose little Johnny.
The truth is, military experience is just that. It's what you have as long as you are in the military, once out it means basically nothing.
Re:You don't have a degree? (Score:3, Interesting)
Do you at least ask "why not?" instead of just thining it? I don't have a degree. I spent 3 years in college and then ran out of money. A few months later, I found a new job and have been working at that job ever since.
I'm now the senior programmer and my job is in no danger of being outsourced. My job worked out so well, I turned down a 60k starting salary job offer at Intel.
I have the money to go back to school and finish my degree now, but I haven't really seen the point. My years of experience say far more about my abilities than a degree would.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
A person who has spent 19 years in the military has nearly reached the 20 year retirement mark; you entered a contract with the government that they will provide you with certain benefits if you spend 20 years in service.
this has no conflict with libertarian thoughts as far as I know.
Re:Not gonna be a popular answer... (Score:2, Interesting)
I worked for 7 different companies in 6 years, and I only left one of them voluntarily--The rest were companies that went out of business (I work in the games industry which can be pretty volatile that way). Maybe it was bad luck, maybe I just picked poor companies to work for, but it would be unfortunate if a spotty job history automatically sent someone's resume to your circular file.
Military IT candidates were worst for us. (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm a network admin, and one step below the guy who does the actual hiring at my job. The last three tech support positions that we filled with ex-military applicants, because we once felt the same way about them, all turned out to be duds, and all three were just alike in personality and professional demeanor. In the interview, they all seemed very competant, yet humble and eager to learn and play on the team, but once aboard, all three had one and only one goal in mind: to see how fast they could push their way to the top and see if they take over mine and my boss's jobs. Rules and procedures be damned... those were just a hindrance to their goals. We had a constant mess just cleaning up all the unauthorized, unlicensed software they kept installing all about the organization and fixing all the network shared filesystem ACLs that they'd open wide up to full access to everyone because they thought ACL management was too big a hassle. One of them would deliberately install more unlicensed software on the users machines after each time my boss busted him for doing it. They turned out to not be team players at all, except when they got together to conspire against our boss and undermine his authority. My boss is an ex-Marine, and he swore he'd never hire another ex-military tech again if that's the way Uncle Sam is making them these days. Our two best, most productive, sharpest, and easiest to keep-in-line techs hired since then are a couple of typical total geeks. One is a complete Microsoft fanatic, and the other is a totally rabid anti-MS Linux & BSD fanatic. Thet get along great at work, no sh!t.
Re:You don't have a degree? (Score:3, Interesting)
I've hired a lot of people into good jobs in the last few years, as their manager. Some had degrees, some didn't (and at least one does now that he didn't then - congrats). The junior people I hire almost all have degrees; the others had the experience to back up their claims of abilities, which made them not junior anymore. But someone else took the initial risk.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:1, Interesting)
My view of education (disclaimer: I have one) is that there are some things that are hard to learn from experience. Personally, I'm a mechanical designer. I work with a lot of guys who learned by experience. They're very good, and I usually talk to them and take their advice about who to do things. However, they can't tell you exactly what the stress on a joint is (and therefore whether it's safe). They don't know the endurance limit for Aluminum or in what situations to use cast iron. They couldn't choose the best pump for a water system. Experience leaves out that kind of stuff (Math doesn't exist in the real world).
This isn't quite as big a deal in programming. Since programming is so text and documentation oriented, programmer tend to read a lot, and may end up reading a curriculum's worth of textbooks. At that point, they may have the equivalent of an education. I'm a self-made programmer with lots of experience, and I'm pretty decent, but on a regular basis I can come across things that I know nothing about. I haven't read a lot of things like OS design, compiler design, database design, memory management techniques, etc, because I'm a mechanical designer and I'll never do that kind of thing. I'm also very lacking in algorithm design and analysis (you know, that math stuff). Not knowing this stuff keeps me out of the real programming field, and what I do write may suffer from not knowing what's underneath, as well. So while I work well based on my experience, I won't have any real depth until I get myself a real programming education one way or another. (I'm not going back to school for that, but I could read a lot more.)
Re:You don't have a degree? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:5, Interesting)
I see so much potential for programmers, it is unreal. I look into the void and see a major shortage of applications for many industries that run on Linux. I have been searching for many, many months, and have not found any of the software I need to change the network to a *nix environment. I don't even care what flavor: Linux, BSD, OSX, whatever. SAPs suite only runs on Windows, and they don't want to support Linux as a Windows file server. Many calls to IBM have resulted in dead end leads. Oracle is just too much for this job, and slightly out of budget for only a 4 year license (and we have a fairly liberal budget).
I hear alot about skilz and such, but most small to medium business owners care about the results, not the methods. Often, you have to be able to fill more than one pair of shoes to get in. One way is with the ability to produce/demonstrate some software that will address some problem they have. Desperately. Business owners need solutions. We need software. We need a reason to fully embrace Linux. We want to. And we can pay fairly for it, and for extra support. But we can't if we can't the software to run the business to begin with.
I can't say what the solution is, but Linux desperately need commercial programmers to succeed, and I know there are lots of people willing to pay for it. I am one of them. It seems there just HAS to be lots of opportunity for a programmer in this environment. The economy is not bad. It WAS bad, and its getting better fast. Some industries and/or companies didn't really have a recession. They saw growth every year for 10 years or more. Even new startups need software, and MS is so expensive for a small network (think 20 to 40), that GNU/Linux can compete if it has the right applications. None of the licensing headaches, get to use older hardware, more stable, easy to customize, much easier to administer. Yes, we believe you, we already use Linux for routers and web servers. Now give us the biz apps. Here, have some money.
Nothing would make me happier than being able to say "Yes, this is exactly the software I need. I will gladly pay you your asking price, and full support as well.". Everything out there is either too small and simple, or too much for a company with under 50 employees. There simply IS opportunity out there. Now would be a good time for some visionary capitalist to finance it and make themselves rich in the process. Once Linux becomes the dominant OS and bgates is irrelavent, we will need someone new to kick around anyway.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:5, Interesting)
Amen to that. When I see people with 5-10 yrs experience doing one type of work, I run. This typically means that they either can't or won't learn new things. I've been a tester for a diverse set of projects, but there are others in my group who have been working on the same set of technologies for 10 years. Guess who understands the company better? Guess who is more employable (especially outside of telecomm, where I currently work)? Yep, me. I have a lot of knowledge and I've proven that I can and will learn and improve.
So to the question at hand. My advice is do something to show you want to do more than what you are doing now. All you have proven is that you can handle a $13/hr support job. Fine, I have no problem hiring you to do that for me. But you want more. If I were interviewing you, I would want to know what job do you want and what have you done to prepare yourself for it. With the way support is being outsourced, you can't expect to stay in that field and make more money. You need to do _something_ to move yourself where you want to go. Certs? Degree? Depends on what you want to do. But if you aren't willing to go get some of the easy certs how would I, as a hiring manager, know that you will really stretch yourself at my company. I've seen a lot of resumes and everybody with a few years of experience can list lots of technologies, even if they don't really know them. You have to do something to prove you are different.
I personally think a degree is the way to go. It gives you the background you need for other things and shows you are willing to work hard to improve yourself. It is the key to most of the higher paying jobs out there. Without it you will always be chasing after the latest certificate.
Re:Learn How To Sell!!! (Score:3, Interesting)
yes actually, I had to get MORE competative. (Score:2, Interesting)
Instead of using a
If the job requires java and javascript, vbscript and c#. Than I use those tech's to build a resume to show off my skill with those techs.
And I can honestly say it made the difference.
Not to mention I was able to get my foot in the door with a cdrom WAY before the call back a paper resume requires.
My current resume release has a video interview a friend helped me shoot stuck right in it. Comes right up when they stick the cd in the cdrom. Answers most of the common questions one is asked in the interview process.
Not to mention tech testing and the character reference portion of the interview process is already answered.
A cdrom put me at the top of the stack, and I don't even have a degree.
Writing skills (Score:2, Interesting)
One item I would add to that list is documentation. You write code for the computers and write documentation for the humans. Managers and higher-ups can be so far removed from the code that they need clear, well formed and diagrammed documentation. Have a portfolio of clean code and good documentation for your future interviews.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:1, Interesting)
The Other Side (Score:2, Interesting)
70% of the resumes I got had no professional C++ experience. Either college only experience or unrelated experience (network admin, web design)
20% lacked really basic knowledge. Had no idea what STL was or what a binary tree or hash table was.
The other 10% had a myriad of problems. I don't think I'm being too picky; these were real problems.
Hey, if you know some smart C++ people that want to work in Austin, TX, I'd love to be proven wrong!
I've read a millions sites and articles and forums like this that give you the impression that there are great people everywhere but that's really not what I see.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:2, Interesting)
While you were putting in your four years I was right there beside you in all the tech courses. I was there in some of the courses you might have taken if you went to grad school. The difference is that while I was doing that I was employed putting the theory to work on real-life projects. I didn't take all the general-ed requirements to become "well-rounded" as a person. So the schools weren't willing to give me the degree. I didn't have time to. I was producing stuff that was too fascinating and I already had dependents to support.
In many of my jobs my peers had PhDs. Generally speaking they did far better literature searches and wrote better white papers and presentations. But over and over again I produced better designs, faster and convinced them of benefits of what I proposed. I have done things that are world class and have pushed state of the art a surprising number of times for being a non R&D, commercial hacker. Theory you say? I am usually the one who brings in theory and makes it real even when the PhDs don't think they can get it past management.
So be very careful with your assumptions.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:1, Interesting)
"Good decisions come from experience. Experience comses from bad decisions."
This is true no matter how many degrees you have. What I've observed at a number of companies, is that the state of computer science education today is somewhat lacking when it comes to doing things right in a real world production environment. What works in theory, doesn't necessarily work in practice.
Many comp sci programs stress the development aspects of things so much, that the grads have no clue of how to do things in a systems friendly way, and try and solve problems by throwing code at it instead of leveraging the tools available to them.
I've worked for a company that did the following:
- wrote their own job scheduler
- wrote their own MTA
- wrote their own reporting engine
- wrote their own ssh client
None of these things worked very well, and for each of them, their were tools or product (often included for free in the operating platform) that should have been used. But they weren't written in java. so of course were overlooked.
There's no substitue for real-world experience coupled with a strong theoretical background as well.
Re:It's who you know, and what you know (Score:3, Interesting)
Because he's smart enough not to waste his time and money on meaningless Mickey Mouse "qualifications"? ;-)
And here's the serious comment: you could start by listing how much experience you really have in each skill. A list of buzzwords is indeed fairly meaningless. A well-chosen list of buzzwords related to the job for which you're applying, divided into "strong", "working knowledge" and "some exposure", is much more informative.
If you've got the experience, it's hard to go wrong with giving a concise description of how much you've used a skill and how long ago, e.g., "Java (3 years, last used Sept 2003)". That's clearly more informative than "Java" on a resume, but still easy enough for someone to scan. If they're trying to get an overall picture of your skills and how useful they would be for the job you want (and any competent personel people will be doing that) then this should give them a good enough idea to know whether to shortlist you for interview or not.