
Ask HN: Hey recruiters, do you look at my personal website? - dudeget
Recruiters, what do you look at?<p>on my resume do you look at:<p>my website? my github?
my past work experiences, if so do you read the description of what I did?
my projects, if so do you read the description of the project?
the languages and technologies I know?
======
liquidcool
I do, but I'm an outlier. I have a CS degree and 20 years of software
experience, so I'll actually look at your code and if I know that language,
take a look at your style. I've seen someone check all her Emacs autosave (~)
files into Github. And unnecessarily jam multiple classes into one file. That
was a bad sign.

All but a handful of recruiters will not because they simply don't understand
any of that. They don't understand whats on the resume or job description.
Better ones will take note of those things and pass them along to the hiring
manager, who should take a look. But it's best if you link them in your
resume.

Here's my comprehensive write-up on resumes, I think this is what you are
looking for:

[http://www.madeupname.com/optimize-developer-
career/resume-t...](http://www.madeupname.com/optimize-developer-
career/resume-tips-developers/)

~~~
mrits
If I have side project I have to do in Java, you bet I'm going to have a lot
of static inner class abuse. Perhaps you just don't understand the tradeoffs.

~~~
liquidcool
First, this didn't stop me from inviting the applicant to discuss her
work/knowledge relevant to the job. She did not respond.

Second, it's totally possible I misunderstood something. I do run the largest
JUG in SoCal, so I'm not a complete Java noob. But in truth the last few years
have been Groovy, and I'm not close to being a FT coder. I don't claim to be a
Java expert.

However :-) You are assuming these were static inner classes, and they weren't
inner/nested at all. These were multiple _top level_ classes in one file. I
can see how _maybe_ you'd do that for composition, and I did it once to get
around a wrinkle in Grails, but this really seemed unnecessary. They weren't
short classes. This person was a masters candidate and had little production
experience, and the whole thing came off as rushed and sloppy. Frankly, seeing
all those ~ files because there was no gitignore bothered me more.

------
jlgaddis
I'm pretty sure most of them don't.

My resume is either still out there on some "jobs" web site somewhere or it's
been sold/shared between recruiting firms as I still get one or two "cold"
e-mails a week from a recruiter; I haven't been "looking" for 5+ years.

In mine, near the beginning, it says something to the effect of "If the
responsibilities for your position include the words 'Microsoft' or 'Windows'
anywhere, I am not interested in the position. Please do not contact me."

The last recruiter e-mail I received, two days ago, says:

> _Your profile came up in my database as a possible candidate that might be
> qualified for a new Windows Systems Admin I received in my office this
> morning. My client is with the Department of Defense and is looking for
> someone with a MSCA_ [sic] _or MCSE or higher for this role._

I believe the overwhelming majority of them don't look at them at all. They
punch a keyword or two into their database, then, like spammers, blast the
same form e-mail out to anyone whose name comes up.

~~~
justin66
> "If the responsibilities for your position include the words 'Microsoft' or
> 'Windows' anywhere, I am not interested in the position. Please do not
> contact me."

You're going to hold off the recruiters who conscientiously scan resumes and
take such requests seriously at the expense of triggering automated scans for
those keywords. I doubt if it's a net win.

~~~
lojack
Additionally, as someone who isn't a recruiter and doesn't work with any
Microsoft products, this might actually come off as a bit of a red flag. The
intention may be to stave off recruiters that blindly fire off job postings,
but it comes off as egotistical.

------
dsk139
I do. I look at your repos and what you contributed to as well. The recruiters
who have built a business on high match rates look at any/all info you
provide. For example, a recruiting firm I partner with in NYC boasts a 89%
offer to job acceptance rate.

For recruiters who are purely matching using LinkedIn recruiter filters a lot
of the matching is done with your skills section and the descriptions under
each job.

It's helpful to add industries you want to work with and
languages/technologies w/ context. e.g. worked as a javascript developer for X
company that did Y, a leader in the Z industry. built end-to-end messaging
system using javascript and socket.io that had an engagement with 30k users.

This will help you get more relevant matches. Granted you'll get some spam-
but there are some quick tricks like asking for e-mails to include certain
information on your LinkedIn description so you can easily filter out.

As a software eng. who's getting to see both sides of the market it's always
best to get a referral to a really good agency in your location. A good
recruiter is worth a lot of time/money especially for such an important
decision like where you're going to be spending 1/4~ of your week at.

------
beckler
I'm not a recruiter, but I am a developer that helps with interviews.

Whenever we interview a candidate, we actually try to learn as much about
people based on what they have online.

Before we set up an interview, we usually check out their personal site, their
Github/Bitbucket/etc, any sites related to those repos, their Linkedin,
Twitter, etc, etc...

We try not to be too creepy, but we just really want to be somewhat familiar
with their work before they come in.

------
ttrzeng
Check out [http://leafii.com](http://leafii.com)

It's a website with of people that has personal websites.

------
SerLava
I use Google Analytics to find out! It's pretty easy to set up.

So far there's a 1:1 correlation between viewing my website and sending me a
non-automated LinkedIn message.

------
selmat
From my experience most recruiters ever contacted me were just buzzwords
detectives. When i put in my linkedin profile how can i help, what are
benefits of my work, what can i bring to the table, almost no one reach me
with specific job offer. Just one message during month or two.

Another sad thing is that job description is very often the same bullshit as
most linkedin CV's. They put in every buzzword, but reality is somewhere else.
Your day-to-day tasks are far away from original requirements and very often
also from whole job description. Same is it with candidates. Matching between
buzzwords and real candidate value is very difficult. And only real HR
professional can do it.

Outsourced hiring process make this gap and misleading even bigger. They play
just keyword matching game (good opportunity to automate them).

I think that something like HN's karma should be implemented in linkedin.
Current situation is facebook style (more friends more reputation). At least
this could help filter HR pros from spammers.

------
probinso
I've had recruiters contact me from information that can only be found from my
website. A good way to track is to extend your e-mail with the '+' notation
for different sources.

for 'username@website.com' you can add arbitrary messages after a '+' sign and
before the '@' sign.

username+res@website.com

username+site@website.com

username+card@website.com

username+linkedin@website.com

You can now track how someone got ahold of you, by looking at your e-mail
header.

------
tmaly
From a hiring manager perspective, I look at github accounts and personal
websites.

------
drakonka
Not sure if the HR person checked out my site, but I know at least one of the
interviewers did as he asked me about a personal project I was blogging
heavily about during the interview.

~~~
abricot
You were blogging heavily during the interview? I can understand that he
asked...

~~~
drakonka
I like to think they appreciated my ability to multitask under pressure.

~~~
pvorb
I had a laugh. :)

