I had a java developer send me his resume the other day and was looking for help finding a good job. He’s on the ‘junior side’ but has had a few good gigs that have given him valuable experience. But he was wondering why he rarely gets asked to interview. So I took a look at his resume and saw some very classic simple mistakes. I’m just sharing my note back to him….
Hi Jim,
I’m working with a couple of my clients regarding developer positions in SoCal. In the meantime, I wanted to give you a couple pointers on your resume.
1) Don’t use tables. Many of us in recruiting and HR have to use readers to get resumes into our tracking systems. Layouts such as yours can stop a recruiter from following through.
2) Your resume does not have your City, State, Zip Code info on it. ALWAYS have your currrent city, state, zip, email and phone number at the top of your resume. You don’t have to put your street address, but again, the rest is very important for our tracking systems. If I go back to my databases looking for someone close to 90245 (El Segundo) and you have no zipcode – you might as well be in Montana.
3) Drop the ‘objective’ section. It’s old school. Cover what your ‘objective’ is in the cover letter.
4) Add a ‘technology overview’ in place of the Objective. List your skills compared to the key technologies that you need to do the job that you’re applying for. TIP: This seems like a pain in the a** to do this for each position that you apply for – but it’s the easiset way to get your resume to the top of consideration. Imagine a recruiter or HR person, having to look through 200 resumes – he/she comes across yours and right at the top – you compare yourself to the requirements listed in the job description. You made their job easier and you’ll get a shot. I speculate that you’re 10X more likely to get your first interview.
The big picture: Companies paying a developer are spending a bigger amount than you think. A developer making 75k is actually costing 150k after adding in space, hardware, taxes, benefits, etc. If you’re going to work for that company for 3 years, that’s 450k in costs. They have to see the potential for you to be worth 2 to 3 times that amount as a bottomline. So they are making a million dollar decision in hiring someone for that job. Put your best foot forward and learn about that company and the best things you can do to be a million dollar candidate.
Please excuse any typos or grammer errors in this email. I was in a hurry to get this to you.
Regards,
JR Fent
