

Ask HN: How can I make my resume better? - freework

Here is a link to my resume: http://imgur.com/0fsrJzI<p>For every 10 jobs I post this to, I get one response. For ever 5 responses, one phone interview comes out of it. For every 10 phone interviews, I get one invitation to interview in person. In the past year, I've had maybe 6 or 7 in person interviews. Not a single job offer. I have completely no idea why I have such a hard time getting s job. I am at a point in my ife where I think it is time for a big change. I am considering hanging up my programmer hat. As much as I love programming, there is something I'm missing that is preventing me from doing this as a job. People always repeat on here and other software communities that if you are a programmer who has even a very very very basic grasp of engineering that people will literally throw job offers at you. I have to beg companies to hire me, and I get nowhere. I'm starting to put two and two together. I much not be a programmer with a modicum of skill.<p>What I want to know: When you look at my resume, what do you see? Do you see someone who appears to know how to program? Do you see anything that I need to badly change about my resume? Most pf my experience is writing code by myself. The majority of my experience is on personal projects. My job history is very patchy (I havent been really employed since April 2012), so I have left that out.
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nayefc
It has no hierarchy. First, I would centre your name, address and information
and draw a line under them. I would then create sections: Projects,
Experience, Skills, Education

Then I would have a table (hide the grid/border) and be consistent where I put
the date, or position. Take a look at my resume: <http://imgur.com/6dGtlks>
(took out my address and phone number). If you need this template, email me
and I'll send you the word doc template for the table. It took me hours to
make.

Dates are under the same column. I used the same heading to emphasise the
position. And the location is under the same column. This consistency is what
will have employers take a look at it.

People who read resumes will immediately throw it away if you do not have a
nice way to present it, and guide their eyes to what is important. For my
resume, an employer immediately knows each block is a position. They can read
the position and jump to the next, back and forth, easily.

As a developer especially, you need to learn design basics. Read: Design for
Hackers by David Kadavy. Okay this is way overboard for a resume, but the
takeaway is that you need to know how to drive a reader's eye. When I looked
at your resume, it was not pleasant to look at it. I literally scrolled
through it in a minute and closed it. I had to re-open it again as I was
writing this paragraph.

Now, as I'm looking closer at your content, there is something there. But you
are not highlighting your achievements properly. I would write: \- Project
Name \- Position \- What you did --> Do not exceed two sentence. It took me a
long time to get mine done and had many people look over my sentences and edit
them. Do the same. Ask friends and family.

Do not include technologies there. It's better to have one big skills section.
Because an employer will quickly look at what you've done before, then jump to
your skills As soon as they see 5 buzzwords that they like and see, they'll
contact you.

I may be wrong, and please anyone correct me if I was wrong, but I was
contacted by Apple twice and Google once just this past month in March. I
interviewed at top startups in Silicon Valley and NY this year before I signed
an offer in February.

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EllaMentry
I would currently not hire, based on this resume, things that are missing that
I look for.

A clear story - What do you do now? What have you done in the past? What
skills do you have? All I currently see now is a list of projects (some with
very odd names).

An email address!? I have moved houses/apartments at least once a year for the
last 7 years, and countries a few times in that, hence my resume does not have
an address or phone number as those become out of date so fast! I instead have
an email address under a domain I own which is used soley as a professional
email address.

My CV is structured as follows

\- Education \- Current Job \- Previous Job \- Job Before That \- Skills \-
Open Source Projects

Granted, all of my experience is directly related to Computer Science Research
/ Software Development, but you can't hide where you come from!

Focus on roles not projects. Make it skim-able! On my first pass through I
just saw a lot of names of projects which did not make any sense to me! I
would present it in a format similar to the following:

\- Software Developer (2007-Present) (subheading - Flightlogg.in)

Improve the English. Write in complete structured sentences.

And finally, I would recommend typesetting (<http://www.latex-project.org/>)
there are lots of nice templates which give a professional look and feel.

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darkxanthos
If you're only getting one invitation to interview per phone interview and no
offers after 6 or 7 interviews then the issue isn't with your resume. It
sounds like there's something more fundamental at play.

First (focusing on your resume): Break the achievements out to a bulleted
list. If that'd make your resume too long then start cutting out bulleted
items and condense them.

Second: I see no mention of what kind of teams you're used to working with. No
agile experience or anything that really tells me you've done more than just
pet projects. That's ok but it greatly reduces the types of roles I'd look for
you to fill.

Third: I can't comment on how you interview since I've never experienced it
with you before... and I just realized! We could do a faux interview and I can
give you my feedback about why I would/wouldn't hire you. My contact details
are in my profile if you're interested.

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rzt
Hi, as a fellow OU alum (I miss Athens so much –– CASA NUEVA!):

First, add your email address and git repository to the top. Do you have a
LinkedIn profile? Add that. You also have some misspellings that should be
fixed ("...ad well as a Student Instructor at Ohio University..." You also
should just toss the <https://> from the links you're providing. They're ugly.
Also, if you can, bullet your lists of accomplishments and project metrics.

Then include a short sentence/mission statement that describes who you are.
"Developer with passion for X," X being a genuine professional interest.

Because no resume should be over two pages, I would consider deleting the
flight instruction background because a bulleted accomplishments list will
take up more physical room on the sheet.

nayefc has very good advice, too.

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ericb
The disembodied head on your github profile might not be doing you any favors.
You need to get in somewhere and stay for a couple years, then companies will
see you as a better potential investment.

I would work with a recruiter. For all the complaining around here, they can
really help you sell your story.

At first glace your repos have reasonable code in them...

I would also look at soft skills. A 1 in 10 conversion on phone interviews
seems low. Are you failing the phone screen, or the "hello" meet and greet?
Where do you think you are going wrong? You can usually read this by their
voice/reactions.

edit: you seem to be optimizing the resume part when that falloff is normal
(many positions will be filled, unless you are applying to new ones).

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musiic703
You might want to add your email..lol

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r_m_adler
your missing this section:

education:

B.S. [stanford|mit|caltech|berkeley|waterloo|et al.]

It's hard for companies to know if you are any good if you went to a mediocre
university. when people talk of a "shortage" this is what they really mean -
you will have to find other ways to prove yourself. It will probably be a lot
harder. good luck.

