Jobs you won't list on your resume



  • The current CPound "knickknack" thread reminded me of a job I had in the past. I'm ashamed to even mention that I worked at a place like this, and I definitely don't list this one on my resume. I thought I would share my experience because it gives some perspective on the "get rich quick" and knockoff type mom & pop stores.

    Back in the dot bomb days, I did a stint with this wholesale lingerie site. It was bad. Very bad. For several reasons.

    First of all, unlike many lingerie sites back then (and even now), their stock was in house. Meaning, they did not place an order with an off-site supplier after a customer clicked submit. That being said, you can imagine what it was like. Their "warehouse", which was essentially a back room, was stuffed with all sorts of knockoff lingerie. It was extremely disorganized. There were boxes all over the place and when the guys had to go back to fill the orders, they rifled through the stuff to find what they needed. There was no concept of "put it back where you found it". If a box was torn open, it was left open, with all the clothes strewn about.

    Now on to the clothes themselves. And this is where it gets shady. I'm pretty sure they got their deliveries from Singapore or some third world country where manufacturing standards aren't the highest. We had the highest customer complaint ratio for orders shipped because the goods were...shall we say...cheap? You could tell right off the bat they were poorly made. The fabric basically disintegrated in your hands. Or it would have runs in it or would be coming apart at the seams in places. The order fillers wouldn't care and stuffed whatever they could in a cheap envelope (or small box) and shipped it. There weren't even professional shipping labels. It was all handwritten.

    Another thing that anybody with eyes could tell, was that the lingerie was not in any way, shape, or form...sexy. These were frumpy outfits that look like they were made for people shaped like tree trunks. So it wasn't like employees got "hot and bothered" looking at this stuff all day. Honestly, I'm surprised they shipped any inventory at all.

    Needless to say, the company folded rather quickly. The guy in charge made a fortune of course and disappeared from the scene, as most of the bad business guys did back then.

    I don't list this job on my resume because a) the type of industry raises eyebrows and b) they were a bunch of crooks who sold cheap merchandise.

    So be careful when you see these posts about how great an upcoming mom & pop site sounds. It's usually too good to be true.
     



  • You see a lot of these jobs on Craigslist nowadays.  Here's one I wouldn't put on my resume: 

    We are seeking someone to build an online adult retail store for us that has a compatable ecommerce store...We are also entertaining the idea of a partial ownership with a responsible serious individual with web knowledge. You would not need to put any money down simply aid our growth and help with online promotion / web design & a few updates we cannot do ourselves. The more money the site makes the more you make. It would not be half onweship only partial keep this in mind. an example of a website that we would like to look somthing like is Extremerestraints.com of course no where near as much content

    http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/cpg/459407364.html

    I also don't list my One Week Job, or the 6 week job at The Company That Shall Remain Nameless, or the 3 week job for the Cheap I.T. Bastard that had me working on a P3 in 2006.



  • ...and that's why I've never felt compelled to look for work on Craigslist.

    -cw



  • @TunnelRat said:

    You would not need to put any money down simply aid our growth and help with online promotion / web design & a few updates we cannot do ourselves. The more money the site makes the more you make. It would not be half onweship only partial keep this in mind.

    I'd read this as: "you aren't getting paid."



  • @TunnelRat said:

    I also don't list my One Week Job, or the 6 week job at The Company That Shall Remain Nameless, or the 3 week job for the Cheap I.T. Bastard that had me working on a P3 in 2006.

    I'm currently on week 8 of what should have been a 2 week job... Only 4 more until I get to leave without having to return my signing bonus.

    So, how do I go about listing this one on my resume, and what's the proper way to describe it when recruiters/hiring managers ask?  I can't just say, "gee this company really blows and they treat their employees like dogs" without it sounding like I'm some kind of asshat, and if I leave it blank it looks like I've been unemployed for the past two months.

    I haven't really been actively looking for a new job until just this week.  Kept hoping the current one would shape up, but now I'm ready to give up.  A recruiter found my old resume on dice and called me earlier in the week.  She sounded interested and wanted to see my updated resume... the only thing changed was that I listed the current job (with some lame description like "developed enterprise java applications for global trading environment").  Haven't heard back from her.  Did I do it wrong, or is this recruiter just a flake?



  • @real_username_witheld said:

    the only thing changed was that I listed the current job (with some lame description like "developed enterprise java applications for global trading environment").

    Are you sure they were enterprise and not just "enterprisey"? 



  • @real_username_witheld said:

    if I leave it blank it looks like I've been unemployed for the past two months.

    There's worse things than that.  If anyone asks just say "The previous job was pretty intense and so I thought i'd take a bit of time off and recharge and spend sometime learning [insert hot technology], but I was starting to itch to get back to it, so here I am."   Doesn't work with 6+ months unless you can convince them that you've got some serious money hiding away somewhere, but 2 months shouldn't raise any eyebrows.

    @real_username_witheld said:

    Did I do it wrong, or is this recruiter just a flake?

    Probably the latter, or they filled the position, or you weren't quite the skillset they were looking for.  A lot depends on where it is you're looking for work.  When i'm on the market, I get email from a hundred recruiters, and only 50% of the ones I bother to respond to actually respond back to me.   If it was a job you felt really looked interesting, email her back with a "just getting in touch" email.

    -cw



  • @CodeWhisperer said:

    Doesn't work with 6+ months unless you can convince them that you've got some serious money hiding away somewhere, but 2 months shouldn't raise any eyebrows.

    I've done the 6 months thing. It worked. But I'm guessing barely. Best not to chance it.

    @CodeWhisperer said:

    When i'm on the market, I get email from a hundred recruiters, and only 50% of the ones I bother to respond to actually respond back to me.

    Oh wow. Hold back the pride a little, will ya? That blast of "Uber" software developer just knocked me out of my chair. 



  • @CPound said:

    @CodeWhisperer said:

    When i'm on the market, I get email from a hundred recruiters, and only 50% of the ones I bother to respond to actually respond back to me.

    Oh wow. Hold back the pride a little, will ya? That blast of "Uber" software developer just knocked me out of my chair. 

     
    Although i agree that  he's blowing his horn a bit too much there, it isn't exactly impossible.

    About half a year ago i put my resume on some online job board called monster board, i got on average 3  offers a day. Hardly because i was so good or anything, but because there are just so many IT businesses at the moment whom just want to invite everyone who has ever done anything with a computer and cherry pick the top 5%. I also got a few offers from different companies for the same job. Either that or there is some site out there that offers copy&paste job requirements and job descriptions :)

    After 2 weeks i had about 30 job offers, where 90% was just cruft where you do a competence test and get hired if you score high enough, and one or two that looked interesting but where simply too far away. Then i just removed my profile and looked around the old fashion way. (by googling companies in my region)

    To clarify those companies i mentioned are generally known as really shitty employers. Yeah you get a car on lease and high profile clients, but the pay is shitty and you have to continuously do test to improve yourself otherwise you get stuck at your current salary/position. Companies like pinkroccade and peak IT and such.   



  • @CPound said:

    Oh wow. Hold back the pride a little, will ya? That blast of "Uber" software developer just knocked me out of my chair. 

    Live somewhere with a real tech industry and get 20 years experience under your belt and this won't seem like so much boasting as just reality.   There are thousands of unfilled jobs in my area, and competition is fierce.  Then you get the folks from around the country who seem to think that I want to move to Rhode Island for a 3 month contract being a tester...go figure. 

    As a point of comparison, I have 20 recruiter inquiries in my inbox since 10/16 -- I'm not on the market currently, that's just left over from when I was a couple of months ago.  Some are from little shops, some are from Microsoft & Amazon; some are contract, some are fulltime.  Some are what I would actually be looking for, and some are...well, test positions in RI.

    It is what it is.

    -cw 



  • @CodeWhisperer said:

    @real_username_witheld said:

    if I leave it blank it looks like I've been unemployed for the past two months.

    There's worse things than that.  If anyone asks just say "The previous job was pretty intense and so I thought i'd take a bit of time off and recharge and spend sometime learning [insert hot technology], but I was starting to itch to get back to it, so here I am."   Doesn't work with 6+ months unless you can convince them that you've got some serious money hiding away somewhere, but 2 months shouldn't raise any eyebrows.

    Wouldn't it be easier to just say "I was in negotiations with another company, and we were very close to signing the employment contract, but eventually their budget was cancelled and the position no longer existed"? Happens all the time...

    For the 6+ months, a plausible explanation might be "I wanted to create a startup, but after n months of preparation, the idea (localised facebook clone, generic b2b portal, whatever) did not seem very good any more and I've found out that I prefer a regular job."

    But then, why would you need an explanation at all for a job of 6+ months? 



  • @CodeWhisperer said:

    As a point of comparison, I have 20 recruiter inquiries in my inbox since 10/16 -- I'm not on the market currently, that's just left over from when I was a couple of months ago.  Some are from little shops, some are from Microsoft & Amazon; some are contract, some are fulltime.  Some are what I would actually be looking for, and some are...well, test positions in RI.

    And let's not forget: about half of them are probably lies from agencies, who are advertising made-up jobs in order to collect CVs. 



  • @asuffield said:

    And let's not forget: about half of them are probably lies from agencies, who are advertising made-up jobs in order to collect CVs. 

    I suppose; but to what end?

    Certainly I see the same job being offered by different recruiters -- when I was last looking, my resume was turned away by a company when presented by one recruiter, and I was brought in for an interview when presented by another.   (4 interviews, actually... that was a WTF all it's own...)

    But do you think they're just collecting resumes/cvs?  That seems unnecessary since most of them are going through Monster or Dice.com and have access to the resume anyway.  They don't actually need me to respond.

    -cw



  • <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>I wouldn't get too excited about getting a lot of recruiter responses.  Whenever I go back on the market and activate my resume on Dice, I get a wave of responses from the fly-by-night recruiters and the Indian placement firms (they usually have some barely fluent clown calling me from the other side of the country).</FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>Most aren't "real" jobs.  Many are phony reqs posted by companies trying to fulfill the H-1B requirement that they need to look for U.S. citizens first before importing a cheaper programmer.  Many agencies grab those direct posting and attempt to find a match that they can pitch to the company.  </FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>For a real WTF, I was in a recruiting agency once (it looked like a boiler room) and they pitched me a position with one of their "exclusive" clients.  Yeah, so exclusive that I had already got an offer from the company after responding to one of their direct Dice posts -- the agency was fishing for candidates to present to the company, hoping to find them before the company did.</FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>Finally, the most common scam in the biz is to pitch a hot "job" to a candidate, and tell him that he's a perfect fit and can get an interview as soon as he sends over three references.  Guess what -- there is no job, and your references will be hounded by the aformentioned barley fluent clown who is trolling for openings that his agancy can fill.  Never, ever send references until you after an interview.  </FONT>



  • @TunnelRat said:

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>I wouldn't get too excited about getting a lot of recruiter responses. </FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>

    </FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>Did anyone seem overly excited?</FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3><FONT face=Arial size=2>@TunnelRat said:

     </FONT> Whenever I go back on the market and activate my resume on Dice, I get a wave of responses from the fly-by-night recruiters and the Indian placement firms (they usually have some barely fluent clown calling me from the other side of the country).
    </FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>This is an unfortunate truth.  I get calls from "Maxonic" every week, even though I've told a half-dozen of the callers that I'm not on the market.  Each of them are barely understandable.</FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3><FONT face=Arial size=2>@TunnelRat said:

     </FONT>Most aren't "real" jobs.  Many are phony reqs posted by companies trying to fulfill the H-1B requirement that they need to look for U.S. citizens first before importing a cheaper programmer.
    </FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>Your opinions have been made quiet clear.  I can't say that I've ever felt that I was passed over for a cheaper H-1B candidate.  But then I've rarely responded to any of these calls, they tend to be the "Tester in Rhode Island" type roles.  Yeah, the next big step I'm looking for in my career is a 3 month testing role on the other side of the country, thanks.</FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3><FONT face=Arial size=2>@TunnelRat said:

     </FONT>the agency was fishing for candidates to present to the company, hoping to find them before the company did.
    </FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>This is standard.</FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3><FONT face=Arial size=2>@TunnelRat said:

     </FONT>Finally, the most common scam in the biz is to pitch a hot "job" to a candidate, and tell him that he's a perfect fit and can get an interview as soon as he sends over three references.  Guess what -- there is no job, and your references will be hounded by the aformentioned barley fluent clown who is trolling for openings that his agancy can fill.  Never, ever send references until you after an interview.  </FONT>

    Never had this happen to me.  What would be the sense of checking resumes for a non-existent jobs?  Based on your resume they will know if there is a job you might be wedged into, in which case there actually _is_ a job.

    -cw



  • Checking _references_ I mean.  Sigh.

     



  • Guys, my imperative here is to tell the truth in the most convenient way, not lie about it.  i.e. "Well, after two months I realized I wasn't a good fit for the company.  I didn't know the industry I was supporting and found that the more I learned, the less I liked it" sounds better than "their web filters and low cube walls prevented me from looking at pr0n in my cube all day".  Obviously "I was in Afghanistan helping orphans while proving that P=NP" sounds even better, but I'd rather not lie in a job interview.

     

    @stratos said:

    many IT businesses at the moment whom just want to invite everyone who has ever done anything with a computer and cherry pick the top 5%.......To clarify those companies i mentioned are generally known as really shitty employers

     

    Yeah, that's how I got hooked up with the current job.   



  • @CodeWhisperer said:

    <font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Arial" size="2">@TunnelRat said:

     </font>Most aren't "real" jobs.  Many are phony reqs posted by companies trying to fulfill the H-1B requirement that they need to look for U.S. citizens first before importing a cheaper programmer.
    </font>

    <font face="Times New Roman" size="3">Your opinions have been made quiet clear.  I can't say that I've ever felt that I was passed over for a cheaper H-1B candidate.  But then I've rarely responded to any of these calls, they tend to be the "Tester in Rhode Island" type roles.  Yeah, the next big step I'm looking for in my career is a 3 month testing role on the other side of the country, thanks.</font>

    I generally don't want to be one to stereotype, but my current company has a pretty high percentage of foreigners.  My assumption is that they're the only ones who stick around because they have to stay in one place to get citizenship.  Everybody who can run away, does.
     



  • @real_username_witheld said:

    My assumption is that they're the only ones who stick around because they have to stay in one place to get citizenship.  Everybody who can run away, does.

    That's a whole other problem, and I've worked for places like that; particularly in small towns, places trap grad students and anybody else they can make work for cheap.

    The company I work for now is about 80% "foreigners", in fact, it's an indian based company...and I don't think there are any H1-Bs on staff, and people who don't cut it are quietly escorted out the door after about 30 days. 

    -cw



  • @CodeWhisperer said:

    But do you think they're just collecting resumes/cvs?  That seems unnecessary since most of them are going through Monster or Dice.com and have access to the resume anyway.  They don't actually need me to respond.

    This behaviour is sadly common from the less reputable agencies (who tend to be in the majority). It's all about being able to go to companies and say "We have personal contacts with 150,000 people currently in our files, which we can use to fill your position with the best person possible, so you should agree to our exorbitant finder's fee".  Posting fake job ads to make contact with people is how they build up that database - if they had just trawled monster or dice, somebody could hit them with a false advertising suit. Doing it this way around doesn't cost them any more, but it sounds better than saying "We have 150,000 CVs on file that we can cold-call for you".

    I hate agencies. 



  • I don't know, if those agencies can stay afloat it's a sign there are many more jobs then qualified people. (If companies had qualified people for the picking they wouldn't need to even talk to hiring agencies)

    So all in all, it's a sign that where just worth more at the moment, which i don't find bad at all. 



  • @stratos said:

    I don't know, if those agencies can stay afloat it's a sign there are many more jobs then qualified people. (If companies had qualified people for the picking they wouldn't need to even talk to hiring agencies)

    Alas, that ascribes far more competence to the industry than is typically present. Agencies are basically a tax on naivete in small and medium businesses. They exist to extract money from people who don't know any better.


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