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by Natsu 4131 days ago
> My resume is a disaster because I'm bad at writing them.

Make it one page. Stick to things they actually care about. Yes, this means tailoring it to each opportunity. This also means leaving things out... that's okay, I remember in my last resume leaving off some ancient Java experience from college that didn't seem relevant at the time. It became a pleasant surprise for them when they discovered that I knew more than was on the page and we started discussing the usage of JAD.

Your goal is no typos, no informal/slang language and one, neatly written page. It should look neat, clean and uniform.

You should imagine that they have a spreadsheet or checklist (they do) that matches the ad. You want to help them check off as many boxes as possible as easily as possible. Then help them do the same thing in the interview.

When you don't know, discuss what you'd do to find out. Show them what you've learned in the past and how you've figured out problems before that look like problems they're having now.

In my last interview, they started asking me what I knew about REST and I started describing the last RESTful interface I'd made. Things went very well from there.

I hope this helps.

2 comments

Strong recommendation from a frequent hirer: for each job, you should state what you accomplished, especially if that can be quantified. Supply the quantities! A list of what your responsibilities are is useless: did you actually do that stuff successfully?
For coding type jobs, I have found that relevant personal projects can also help. In the last interview I did a couple years ago, we spent most of the time discussing a relevant one and that was a good thing. When they ask a question like "What do you know about X?" and you can answer "I made an X and this is how it worked" it puts you in a good place.
Absolutely! I really appreciate that.