twocents.lifehacker.com: While you’re perfecting your résumé and cover letter with the hiring manager of your dream company in mind, you may be interested to know that they may never even read your application, because a robot will have discarded it before they had a chance.
5 comments:
It’s always good to keep in mind that many companies filter out applicants with key words. In a way it’s saddening that my resume may not even get looked at by a human but on the flip side, it means that as long as I include the keywords from the job listing, my resume will have bigger chance of getting through the system. In general I agree with everything on the article, except for this sentence: “You might also consider sending in your résumé in rich text format rather than as a PDF, because the software might not be able to fully comprehend the PDF.” Unless someone scanned a really old hand written or hand drawn document from ages ago, PDF files can clearly display texts in a way that software programs should have no problem reading them. Also, if the text cannot be easily read by anyone or any program, the problem is in the wording or phrasing, not in the file formatting.
I feel as though I should not be surprised that nowadays, there is no way big companies truly spend labour hours on reading every resume. Having a robot read them, although disconcerting, is logical to me. However I feel that this should become widespread knowledge; often I have seen extravagant resumes that now I look back on and know that they would never be legible to a robot. I am unsure as to if I should feel relief, that my resume can be simple and I don't have to worry about all its aesthetic qualities other than having a logical order and easy to read, or if I should feel upset that so many hard working people who write shitty resumes aren’t getting jobs. Already however, before this algorithm existed people judge the visual qualities of a resume greatly. I understand that it can show that you care about getting to work somewhere and that someone put time into applying, but it seems so trivial and there are much more important things to worry about. Often some of the hardest working people have time to “perfect” their resume because it seems like such a waste of time to sit for a few hours making something look a little prettier using a program you've never used before. I am excited for the time when resumes are less important visually, and all your work is together in a uniform way so that someone's presentation is not more important than their quality of work.
I excell most in face to face interactions when i’m in a situation where im trying to leave a good impression. The world doesn’t always adhere to that, so reading “How to Impress the robot reading your resume”, is extremely useful. Alicia Adamczyk gave great clear, straightforward information, perfect way to teach how to impress a robot. Gained useful knowledge I'll definitely apply when writing my next resume: I will look into important keywords to help express jobs and skills I have, to help express them. ; I will make sure to use acronyms and full words (not or) when saying something that is referenced as both, for we don’t know which on is going to be picked up on by a robot. She also expressed the importance of simplicity, as something i need to work on I needed to reinforce my need to improve on that. As someone who often resorts to the behavior of being overly wordy and redundant, it's important for me to know not only what I need to say but what is really not important that I do so. Even though my initial motive is so make sure I can express things more clearly, being more wordy can often accomplish the opposite, distracting my audience from the most important point.
Even though I should still keep up my face to face interaction skills, I still have room to improve on my robot impressing skills.
When applying for jobs, and polishing my resume I’ve always heard tips such as “use the tittle they are looking for”, “use keywords related to your profession”, “use the same language they use in their posting”, etc. But it never crossed my mind that my application could be filtered and discarded by a software. Nowadays, when technology simplifies all the mundane tasks in an office, it’s expected that weeding out bad applications will be one of those simplified tasks. However, it’s a bit disheartening knowing that your application can be discarded just because you don’t fit in an algorithm. A person reading a resume might find something interesting, and give the applicant the interview just because their resume hinted something special, and turns out that person was perfect for the job. While a system is more black and white, and will only take people who fill in specific boxes. It makes me think of all the talent that can be wasted because it wasn’t seen with human eyes.
I thought this article was an interesting look at how the job search process has changed along with technology over the years. A few years ago when I was looking for my first summer job, I had a grandparent tell me that “it’s easy to get a job! Just dress up nice, go in the place, and ask for an interview” because that’s how he got his job as a journalist at a major newspaper. I had to explain that modern job applications don’t really work that way anymore, and that companies will require you to apply online to even be considered. The internet allows people access to many more opportunities than they might have had otherwise, but that also means that there are more people competing for each available job. In this way it makes sense for companies to screen their applicants using robots to determine which applicants are actually qualified. Once someone knows that this is happening, they can optimize their resume using the strategies listed here, such as including the key words and simplifying the formatting. It will be interesting to see how this process continues to evolve, and how job searching strategies will evolve with it.
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