We shouldn't be writing résumés. We should be writing academic- or engineering-style six pagers where the target audience consists of your peers (and not anyone under the org's HR umbrella).
This is why I think cover letters are maligned. They just shouldn't be mandatory. The best résumé is just a supercharged cover letter written by someone who actually gives a shit about what they're writing.
My 5-person team got almost 1000 applications for a job opening recently. We'd need AI summaries to have even a chance of sifting through all those 6-pagers, in which case we're better off if candidates just submitted a resume that was loosely targeted at our job opening.
I agree... But the reality is that what you suggest requires a significant shift in thinking and practice from a meaningful proportion of the very people you suggest we shouldn't be targeting. And they, in my experience, aren't exactly the kinds of people that are about challenging the status quo, rocking the boat, or moving beyond the received wisdom of their profession.
I think writing is a great idea, it was something I did earlier in my career. It showcased some interesting experiences of mine (matching algorithms deployed in the real world, porting neural nets to coreml in 2017, making advanced SSD configurations on kubernetes, etc)... these all gave me a lot of visibility and really only limited insight into my experience. Still, they enabled quite a bit career wise and plenty of conversation.
The best platform turned out to be Clubhouse... where I could talk the talk with like minded individuals... discussing preemptible VM hacking with Kelsey Hightower was memorable. But that platform sadly dies a slow death.
I think the cover letter is where experienced individuals have a chance to write the no-bs, all-out, explanation of why they are fit for the job. We choose not to offer this as a feature.
The resume is an anchor for interview conversations, and filtering in recruiting. I agree that it is all unideal actually but regardless is a part of the process. It can be a barrier for job seekers, and we wanted to break that barrier down.
I think AI is set to make the job seeking and hiring experiences better fwiw.
Comments
We shouldn't be writing résumés. We should be writing academic- or engineering-style six pagers where the target audience consists of your peers (and not anyone under the org's HR umbrella).
This is why I think cover letters are maligned. They just shouldn't be mandatory. The best résumé is just a supercharged cover letter written by someone who actually gives a shit about what they're writing.
My 5-person team got almost 1000 applications for a job opening recently. We'd need AI summaries to have even a chance of sifting through all those 6-pagers, in which case we're better off if candidates just submitted a resume that was loosely targeted at our job opening.
You're already not looking at 1000 résumés.
I agree... But the reality is that what you suggest requires a significant shift in thinking and practice from a meaningful proportion of the very people you suggest we shouldn't be targeting. And they, in my experience, aren't exactly the kinds of people that are about challenging the status quo, rocking the boat, or moving beyond the received wisdom of their profession.
interesting idea, could you say more?
I think writing is a great idea, it was something I did earlier in my career. It showcased some interesting experiences of mine (matching algorithms deployed in the real world, porting neural nets to coreml in 2017, making advanced SSD configurations on kubernetes, etc)... these all gave me a lot of visibility and really only limited insight into my experience. Still, they enabled quite a bit career wise and plenty of conversation.
The best platform turned out to be Clubhouse... where I could talk the talk with like minded individuals... discussing preemptible VM hacking with Kelsey Hightower was memorable. But that platform sadly dies a slow death.
I think the cover letter is where experienced individuals have a chance to write the no-bs, all-out, explanation of why they are fit for the job. We choose not to offer this as a feature.
The resume is an anchor for interview conversations, and filtering in recruiting. I agree that it is all unideal actually but regardless is a part of the process. It can be a barrier for job seekers, and we wanted to break that barrier down.
I think AI is set to make the job seeking and hiring experiences better fwiw.