How not to CV
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So we are on a "talent" hunt again. You wouldn't believe the kind of shit CV-s we are receiving.
The boss is WAY behind the curve on HR in IT. While other companies are hiring recruiters and hunting people through LinkedIn, he barely agreed to post a fucking job add, after months of failing to find anyone through the grapevine.
Anyway, here are a few pro tips for prospective candidates.
Tip 1:
If your English sucks, have someone proof read it. Or at least use the good old trick of googling for generic English phrases and stitching them together. Hell, even just sending it in your native language would have been better.
ANYTHING but this.
Tip 2:
If your CV looks like you banged it out in 5 minutes, what should we expect from your code?
Typos and poor formatting are fucking INEXCUSABLE in a CV. Instant fail.
Also, if a "drivinglicense" is your life "achievement", you should take a long hard look in the mirror.
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Why are you getting CVs in english and not serbian?
I always hate my CV one day after writing it, then I want to delete it and write a new one.
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Why are you getting CVs in english and not serbian?
We posted the job add in English, and require CV in English. It's a good way to estimate whether we'll have to keep the guy/gal locked up in a basement, or be able to show them off to actual clients.
Also, if you're in IT and have poor English, it's a huge red flag.
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When you open a position for this locked in a basement away from the clients job I'll send you my CV.
(not really, the commute to wherever you are would be complicated)
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I agree with you. A CV is something you have to take your time to write and keep on updating through the years.
One or two typos on technologies (like Codeignier) I can live with, but on something like "Drivinglicense" where you get that huge red line, just shows that you're not really good with computers in general or that you don't care.
Also, if you're in IT and have poor English, it's a huge red flag.
Totally. If you fail at English you fail at life. You can get along without talking, but not writing it. A few months we had a PM which spent more time on Google Translate than on Gmail.
Anyway, apart from the English, don't expect too much from juniors man, if I find one of my first CV's it probably sucks ass... Damn, I remember I made it on LaTeX
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Anyway, apart from the English, don't expect too much from juniors man
The worst thing is, these aren't juniors. We asked for 2+ years of experience.
if I find one of my first CV's it probably sucks ass... Damn, I remember I made it on LaTeX
I strong believe you. :-)
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if I find one of my first CV's it probably sucks ass... Damn, I remember I made it on LaTeX
I remember doing that for my first job. And printing it on a dot matrix printer because that was what I had. It definitely beat doing it in plain text and printing that, or even using a hand-written version, which was still a common enough thing back then. Of course, the content matters more than the tools, but it's nice to use good tools since the you're not embarrassed by the presentation.
Got the job so it must've worked out.
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The worst thing is, these aren't juniors. We asked for 2+ years of experience.
Those are still juniors, just not total noobs.
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Those are still juniors, just not total noobs.
In a perfect world, yes.
In the people starved IT of 201X-s, those are battle-tested mid to advanced level developers, already growing their graybeards and worrying about the pace of technology leaving them behind.
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Hey, with the kind of technology @cartman82 dabbles in, 2 years of experience means you're probably a dinosaur coder stuck with legacy code and dead techs. You could as well write COBOL.
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with the kind of technology @cartman82 dabbles in, 2 years of experience
Once you make it far enough, you end up thinking “oh no, not this shit again”. Over and over. Most of IT has the attention span of a goldfish.
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Most of IT has the attention span of a goldfish.
Very good po-- I'm sorry, what were we talking about again?
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If your English sucks, have someone proof read it.
Even if your English is awesome, you should have at least one person proofreed it.
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Also, if a "drivinglicense" is your life "achievement", you should take a long hard look in the mirror.
My life achievements are 8k likes received on WTDWTF, 10k karma on reddit, and 1284 hours on TF2. Is that better?
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your English sucks
That's downright intelligible compared to some of the CVs I've seen.
if a "drivinglicense" is your life "achievement"
I suspect they thought it'd help as a requirement for IT jobs that might involve business travel and didn't realize it's the norm rather than the exception.
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My life achievements are 8k likes received on WTDWTF, 10k karma on reddit, and 1284 hours on TF2. Is that better?
Likes on WTDWTF show that you're committed to IT beyond just the work. Reddit karma shows that you're in touch with all the current memes and jokes, making you a "cultural fit" for working with me. And half the life wasted on Team Fortress demonstrates you're team oriented and persistent in face of failure. On top of that, all these together hint that you're probably pretty fluent in English too.
Actually, just based on these achievements, I'd hire you in an instant.
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I suspect they thought it'd help as a requirement for IT jobs that might involve business travel and didn't realize it's the norm rather than the exception.
Or more like, he was looking for anything to fill in this space, and that was the first thing that came to mind.
Another thing I saw in that "slot": Non-smoker
Umm... good job, I guess? You can also add "non-junkie", "non-murderer" and "non-serial-flatulator" too.
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That's downright intelligible compared to some of the CVs I've seen.
agreed. and those are the CVs that i get after HR filters them!
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You can also add "non-junkie", "non-murderer" and "non-serial-flatulator" too.
There might be a reason he went with non-smoker, you know.
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"non-serial-flatulator"
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Likes on WTDWTF show that you're committed to IT beyond just the work.
Likes on WTDWTF show that you're posting bullshit on the internet instead of actually doing your job.
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Also that you're likely to mock your company on the internet.
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1284 hours on TF2
Needs more hours in TF2. I mean, I have nearly 6000 now!
Filed under: Yes, I have no life. Why do you ask?
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@anonymous234 said:
1284 hours on TF2
Needs more hours in TF2. I mean, I have nearly 6000 now!
Filed under: Yes, I have no life. Why do you ask?
https://what.thedailywtf.com/t/878-years-and-counting/47572/1
For the lazy ones - I have over 7.6 million hours of playtime in a game.
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My life achievements are 8k likes received on WTDWTF, 10k karma on reddit, and 1284 hours on TF2. Is that better?
Only if you did it all while driving.
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@anonymous234 said:
1284 hours on TF2
Needs more hours in TF2. I mean, I have nearly 6000 now!
Filed under: Yes, I have no life. Why do you ask?
Damn, and I thought my 2500+ was a lot.
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For the lazy ones - I have over 7.6 million hours of playtime in a game.
866.98 years (using 24 hour days and 365.25 day years)
massively multitabbed?
In game time, not clock time?
glitch?
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Granted, I did spend nearly a solid month idling back when the drop rate was uncapped (prior to April 2010). Still, that means I've played over 5000 hours.
Of course, playtime includes when I was doing any testing on the Team Fortress 2 server plugins that I write as well.
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You should write a server plugin that supports Markdown in voice chat.
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Needs more hours in TF2.
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Buying TF2 ≠ playing TF2.
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Fun fact: I bought the game a week before it went F2P.
OK, it was the Orange Box. But still.
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You can also add "non-junkie", "non-murderer" and "non-serial-flatulator" too.
Well, two out of three, anyway.
Filed under: Depending on what I ate yesterday.
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I've got about 2k hours between TF2 and Dota 2, and another 1.5k-ish in Guild Wars 2.
Although I do have a certain hat...
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Also, if a "drivinglicense" is your life "achievement", you should take a long hard look in the mirror.
BSC, SSC.
Yes I have been rewatching Red Dwarf recently.
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What's so special about having the Kritzcast hat?
Heck, I have one of those too!
Oh, and if anyone ever wondered what my avatar is wearing, it's wearing this item and this item.
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Also, if a "drivinglicense" is your life "achievement", you should take a long hard look in the mirror.
B曲, in Hong Kong, if you're under 20 and can get a driving license, that would be quite an achievement.Although you can apply for driving license at 18 here, if you're under 20, the examiner in driving test will make the test harder to pass for you.
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My first CV is handcraft HTML embedding in email, nice for the web development position I'm applying for, especially when most other people use FrontPage or Dreamweaver to make their webpages at the time.
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Tip 3:
If you include URL to your personal site in your CV, MAKE SURE IT FUCKING WORKS.
Tip 4:
No. Just, no.
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How hard is it to join MENSA? I've seen a lot of idiots claiming to be members.
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How hard is it to join MENSA? I've seen a lot of idiots claiming to be members.
Smart enough to pass their test, stupid enough to pay them for membership. The famous Mensa goldilocks zone.
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How would you think if you compare that with when it includes "Member of Sherlock Holmes Society" ?
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No. Just, no.
They're interested in
- Member of the MENSA
- high IQ society
- Blood donor
- Texas Hold`em
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My life achievements are 8k likes received on WTDWTF, 10k karma on reddit, and 1284 hours on TF2. Is that better?
I did seriously debate if I should put my TDWTF writing experience on my last CV. I ended up leaving it off, partially for space. I figured if anyone there recognized my name, it means they read TDWTF, and that's a place I'd want to work for.
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There's a problem with your conjecture. I read TFWTF. I work for WtfCorp.
You assuredly do not want to work at WtfCorp no matter how awesome I am.