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The Stack Overflow Developer Story: A New Technical Resume

175 points by sklivvz1971 10y ago

minimaxir 10y ago
Weren't GitHub profiles the new technical resume? How well did that work in practice, and how would this Stack Overflow approach be different? I was under the impression (from reading HN/Reddit) that while engineers do read GitHub profiles if explicitly linked in a resume, nontechnical recruiters do not. And they are the gatekeeper to said engineers.
- Dzugaru 10y ago
  Not every programmer likes to share his side-project code on public places like GitHub - for many reasons. Or pullrequest to some opensource mess. Code you write and problems you solve at work usually can't be shown on GitHub either. So, this "show me your GitHub" thing for me is no different from "show me your Facebook, wait what, no FB account??" experience with non-technical HRs ;) Conventional resume is totally OK for a first step in recruitment, I don't understand the need for extra fanfare.
  - sqeaky 10y ago
    Resumes are extremely easy to exaggerate or fabricate. I haven't seen fake github profiles yet (and I suspect they would be more trouble than they are worth). I am often brought in on the hiring process to vet peoples technical skills. I used to just try to ask questions in the hour or two I got with the person, this seemed no better than flipping a coin. Even if the person was honest and we were both talking about the same skill, but how do I know that their experience with that skill is applicable? Now I insist on seeing a portfolio of some kind for coders. A Github, Bitbucket, Sourceforge or any other publicly viewable body of source will do. 15 minutes with someones code is a much better predictor of skill than even several hours of discussion. It costs a lot less too.
    - throwawayosiu1 10y ago
      Very recently, a close friend was looking for a job (as a junior dev - focused on web). After applying and getting rejected, we decided to try a different approach - he basically gave up and decided to the following: 1) added buzz keywords in his resume 2) hosted an instance of gitlab and took various open source projects (stuff that was not popular, but had enough polish), modified them and uploaded them. After a week, he was able to land multiple interviews. While he did get called out once, almost all engineers/non-tech hr didn't bother calling his bluff. I am not suggesting that you should lie on your resume or steal open source projects, just that depending on one factor (like github, or resume, or white boards) is futile and that tech hiring in general is broken.
      - user5994461 10y ago
        > While he did get called out once, almost all engineers/non-tech hr didn't bother calling his bluff. I see plenty of GitHub profiles that are filled with forked/starred projects from other people, and nothing of substance. I don't bring it to the candidate because it is worthless and there are more interesting things to talk about. But that doesn't mean I didn't see it ;) Actually I have never once in my life see a good github profile.
        amorphid 10y ago
        I don't like this notion of having a "good" GitHub profile. GitHub started off as an easy place for me to dump code, no matter how crappy. Dumb ideas, samples from learning, incomplete experiments, whatevs. Then I noticed that I had started censoring my code krapola. I was sepf conscious about the code I was making visible, as I didn't want to be judged. Then I decided that lame. Now I shamelessly put garbage on GitHub, too. Coding poorly & having fun trumps curating a collection fancy schmancy artisinal repos. And I've also learned that my good code often lives at work, and never makes it to GitHub.
        burger_moon 10y ago
        I'm the same way. I removed a lot of old stuff from my early days because I was afraid I was going to be judged on it. Now I don't care. GitHub is my dumping ground for everything. I start a new project almost every time I want to learn a specific thing so I have lots of incomplete projects on there simply because I move on once I learned the goal task. Unfortunately like most people all the clean and polished code lives in private work repos. All those things I learned from the unfinished repos is being used in work code. Oh well.
  - InclinedPlane 10y ago
    I have years and years of experience in software, I have a half dozen or more non-work projects I've contributed to or solely developed, some involving hundreds of hours of dev work, most of them on github. None of those projects are public though. And I suspect a lot of other developers are in similar situations. Public contributions on github usually fall into one of two categories: contributions to big open source projects (rare) or pet projects of little substance (common). These are just some of the reasons why using github as a resume is extremely fraught with difficulty. If you're lucky then it works well, but chances are you won't be lucky.
- vog 10y ago
  The difference between GitHub and StackOverflow/StackExchange ist that the latter is explicitly targeting the job market. They have done so since the early days, if I remember correctly: https://business.stackoverflow.com/careers/ https://business.stackoverflow.com/careers/
- user5994461 10y ago
  They don't look at github, no matter how much they talk about it. Just put a random link to github, you're fine. Source: Me sending my resume to recruiters + watching the view statistics on github.
- Mc_Big_G 10y ago
  I wish employers cared about your github profile in lieu of puzzles, but they don't.
- viraptor 10y ago
  There are company/country combinations where publishing your own work done in your free time is possible -> but it takes weeks/months of stupid bureaucracy to be officially accepted. At some point it's just not worth it. So while it's an interesting data point when someone does have the GH profile, it doesn't really mean much if they don't.
jofer 10y ago
I was skeptical of this when they first launched the earlier versions, but I actually quite like the way they've done it in the final version. My favorite resume of all time is Matt Hall's stratigraphic column resume: https://static.squarespace.com/static/549dcda5e4b0a47d0ae1db1e/54a06d6ee4b0d158ed95f696/54a06d6fe4b0d158ed95fff5/1292595536033/Strat_column_2011.pdf https://static.squarespace.com/static/549dcda5e4b0a47d0ae1db... (His blog post about it is here: http://www.agilegeoscience.com/blog/2010/12/17/resume-20.html http://www.agilegeoscience.com/blog/2010/12/17/resume-20.htm...) I'm a geologist, so I'm rather fond of the puns, etc that he's made here, but the point is that a straigraphic column is a great way to lay out a resume. It gives a vertical visual depiction of what the person has been doing from most recent to longest ago. That's exactly what the developer story is. I really like that they've used that visual layout. It's a very effective way to convey activities and employment history.
JustSomeNobody 10y ago
Is it really now? That sucks as I don't really engage with SO that often; Hardly ever really. Sure, if I Google for something SO results come up, but normally I search YouTube for a talk/tutorial or search Github for snippets of code. I guess I'm screwed...
- thecolorblue 10y ago
  That is why this is a good move on stack overflow's part. They wand developers to feel like they have to use SO.
  - minimaxir 10y ago
    In terms of vertical integration, this technical resume aligns more with SO's robust job platform than with the Q/A platform.
- drivingmenuts 10y ago
  I barely even look at SO. It's pretty much like Quora, as far as I'm concerned.
  - dasil003 10y ago
    Yes it is like Quora, just with domain specificity. I guess you see this as a bad thing, but both sites are tremendous fonts of information. What is preferable to you? Academic papers? Books? Conference Talks? Random Blog Posts? Man pages?
    - TillE 10y ago
      Whenever Quora pops up in my search results, it's generally garbage. You get opinion pieces that a bunch of other people happen to agree with. Stack Overflow is certainly better. Probably 90% of the time you can dig up the correct answer somewhere on the page. But it's incredible how much of the world's knowledge is still locked away in books. The internet is ok for computer programmers, but for basically everything else it feels like we're still decades away from the "information superhighway" dream.
tenpoundhammer 10y ago
I have seen numerous versions of the "New Resume" in the last ten years or so. It's really hard to replace something universal that everyone understands, even if it's antiquated. I doubt this will fair much better.
- chipperyman573 10y ago
  The difference is that this is aimed at one market, whereas other "New Resumes" try to be a catch-all.
draw_down 10y ago
Ugh.
mratzloff 10y ago
The traditional resume works because it's easy to scan visually quickly. It's easy to print out and share. This is not.
- nicolewhite 10y ago
  There is a 'print to pdf' option that saves it as the traditional view.
pmiller2 10y ago
I don't see anything on here that I couldn't do with my LinkedIn profile, TBH. I do kinda wish I knew the secrets of how to get 2-3 recruiting emails a day though. Unless it's "have 5 more years of experience," I think my profile could use some help.
- user5994461 10y ago
  Live in a tech hub and fill your linkedin profile. It doesn't guarantee 2-3 per emails per day, but a few per week is certainly achievable. You do need a few years of experience + some buzzwords.
  - pmiller2 10y ago
    > Live in a tech hub and fill in your linkedin profile. Done and done. > You do need a few years of experience + some buzzwords. 3.5 years. What buzzwords do I need? I just want to be able to find a job in a few weeks the next time I am looking. I don't think that's too much to ask. Edit: I misspoke; by "find a job in a few weeks," I meant "start getting interviews within a week or two." No amount of LinkedIn profile magic will help me get a job directly, obviously.
    - user5994461 10y ago
      I was about to say you won't find a job with linkedin. At best, it just an indication of some potential companies in the area. Keep the list somewhere in your mind, you never know what could happen to your current job. ... and while I was writing this, I just received a message from a startup that raised 200M and want me to join one of their team of 3 known ex googlers on some hard industry problem. [How crazy. I applied there last year and they never replied] Well nevermind, linkedin is awesome. Now that I think about it, I left my last job because of a lead from it. :D If it doesn't work for you. You are not in a tech hub or you don't have a profile rare enough. What's your city? and link to your profile?
      - pmiller2 10y ago
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kafkaesq 10y ago
_ is the new resume Oh please - not again.
- fancy_pantser 10y ago
  My first thought too. "What fresh hell is this?"
ben_jones 10y ago
Wait so hiring managers who didn't have more then 60 seconds to parse my resume now have the time to go through years of my stackoverflow activity? Sweet!
- asciihacker 10y ago
  The SO story will allow them to scan the highlights quicker IMHO.
  - omouse 10y ago
    It will become even more important to include visuals such as popular company logos or hip cool images. This is the only reason I created a logo for my open source project, so that it sticks out whenever someone posts about it.
user5994461 10y ago
Obviously this is marketing fake from stack overflow. There is nothing more unreadable than a Stack Overflow resume. Well... except a project on github that doesn't have a readme.
asciihacker 10y ago
I like the use of 2 columns.
dhd415 10y ago
It's an interesting idea, but I prefer to take my experience and tell a story that specifically targets the role for which I am applying. From that perspective, having a single "story" out there for all potential employers isn't optimal for me.
- gentleteblor 10y ago
  I agree. I really like the move towards a better source of truth for our careers but I think it should be private. Let me customize it easily (e.g. for a role or job) and present that customized view to different audiences.
- bduerst 10y ago
  They should let you tag items on the timeline for different roles, so that you can quickly filter it for employers and send out.
  - initram 10y ago
    That's an awesome idea! You should suggest it on meta.stackoverflow.com.
superfluid 10y ago
This is authored by a Jay Hanlon, "VP of Community Growth". Apparently, the role includes publishing clickbait. He squeezes in a humblebrag: "...if you're like me, and still just a little proud that you got off the waitlist and eked your way into a school above your intellectual weight class..." And he uses scarcity to scare devs into creating a profile: "It only takes a few minutes, and you do NOT want some other joker snapping up the good URLs."
- pgt 10y ago
  Yeah I also felt the scarcity quip was in bad taste.
gentleteblor 10y ago
I like where this is going (i've built something similar, if private [1]). Resumes in their current form don't work well as a source of truth about anyone's career. The main issue being that we put summarized/editorialized information in instead of details. It's like discarding the data you used to generate a chart and then updating the chart directly going forward. [1] https://jobrudder.com https://jobrudder.com
gentleteblor 10y ago
It's not the new resume by a long shot. But it does point to some large flaws resumes have. Resumes in their current form don't work well as a source of truth about anyone's career. The main issue being that we put summarized/editorialized information in instead of details. It's like discarding the data you used to generate a chart and then updating the chart directly going forward. You also can't manage the things you put on a resume. You can't easily search, tag, sort, view by company, position etc. You're doing all that in your head and then putting the result on paper. There should be tools to help with this stuff (I built one [1]) and those tools should put the resume in it's proper place, as an output of some other more comprehensive source of truth. [1] https://jobrudder.com https://jobrudder.com
pcsanwald 10y ago
A lot of negativity here, but I really liked my profile on stackoverflow careers, and I really like this. I felt like it was pretty different from linkedin, here are some things I like/liked: - easy to list my favorite technologies and books. - easy to link to github to show projects, easy to link to stackexchange. - UI gave good guidance on how to write a better description As someone who's hired hundreds of software engineers over the past 15 years, it did the best job generating the kind of resumes I like to see.
gamedna 10y ago
My recent job search lead me to the idea that the traditional resume is broken. Temporal view only gives recruiters and hiring managers the bullet points to qualify you in whatever bucket that they need. Instead of a traditional CV/Resume, I went with a single page narrative approach with a link to the temporal view on my LinkedIn profile. Initially there was some pushback as the recruiters were bellyaching over the fact that they needed to actually read my essay, but as time progressed I discovered that this format became a tool. By forcing the hiring manager/recruiter to actually read and understand your background, inbound leads were much higher quality and the initial phone screen was extremely easy. Out of 100+ job applications, i got 20 or so responses, and of those 20 responses, 10 offers. Out of the 20 responses, 19 were good fits and had good hiring managers with a company that had a decent culture. I am definitely using the narrative approach again for my next job hunt.
- gentleteblor 10y ago
  I'm always excited when alternatives to the resume work. Glad it did for you. Did you happen to post about this anywhere (on a blog maybe?). I'd love to see the narrative version and hopefully learn a thing or two.
  - gamedna 10y ago
    My email is listed in my profile, drop me an email and I am happy to shoot you a slightly redacted copy of what I wrote up.
- sotojuan 10y ago
  I haven't sent a resume in a while. Usually I just give a "cover letter" of sorts that says a) why I'm interested in the job b) what I can offer/why they "need" me, c) why I think so (usually just talk about experience). I have a website that lists my workplaces and my main projects and of course my GitHub, both of which I link. I guess that's my "resume".
  - user5994461 10y ago
    Didn't send a cover letter in a while. I am surprised this practise still exists.
orliesaurus 10y ago
This would probably not be the most proud feature shipped to date (if I worked at SO). - It looks just average and does make use of the white space - It has this section where you "DISLIKE" technology? wtf really? - Who cares what you recommend as a book to read? This is a resume right, not your blog. - I somehow feel this is too leaderboard-y and not something i would use for a resume - but sure, it IS a cool thing to have if you're into StackOverflow (like a LOT), just not a resume..
ge96 10y ago
I'm trying to get hired as a junior front end developer. Suck at writing resumes. This is my worst one so far. Also I've been applying but no responses, I have a defeatist mentality and also I think I do accept that I don't meet the requirements. http://m.imgur.com/a/oCdvU http://m.imgur.com/a/oCdvU I have changed the format some as the bullets as titles doesn't make sense. Still I have to condense and overall my "achievements" are pretty basic. Probably will have to find another menial job. Oh well
- alain94040 10y ago
  That is a terrible resume :-( Why would you start with negative sentences about your projects? "not complete". "at best what I have...". "decided to abandon". The second page is much more promising. Instead of story-telling and editorializing "This was a basic job, and quick", focus on what techniques you used: - started from a broken Bootstrap prototype - rewrote email sending using package xyz etc. Show me that you know how to use a variety of technologies, packages and tools. Then I can judge whether I have a job for you.
  - ge96 10y ago
    Right unfortunately I haven't used many tools. This one site was built with bootstrap and since I don't use/know bootstrap I wrote it from scratch the scrolling, menu, animations, etc... Yeah it is a work in progress.
- Nimitz14 10y ago
  In case you're not trolling, google for "example resumes".
  - ge96 10y ago
    I did look at some. My previous resume see below: https://m.imgur.com/7FU3bew https://m.imgur.com/7FU3bew I was told lacked content so I gathered all my projects.
- awad 10y ago
  Hey, we've all been there! I'm more than happy to help you polish this up. Feel free to shoot me an email hn@awadsayeed.com
steven777400 10y ago
I've had success with the "T style" where I list the stated requirements verbatim from the job posting on one side and how specifically I meet those requirements on the other side. Combined with some narrative about relevant experience, it's way better than just a chronology.
mikestew 10y ago
I thought the "new resume" was Stack Overflow Careers, which I spent USD$29 for back in the day. To SO's credit at the time, they offered a full refund if one was ever not satisfied. I never took them up on it, though I should have considering that it was a waste of $29 for all the value I got out of it. I spent a fair bit of time sprucing up that profile, got very few hits, and the quality of the leads was no better or worse than what I'd get off LinkedIn. IOW, random recruiters spamming. So when the recent email hit my inbox, it was with a healthy dose of skepticism that I just immediately deleted it.
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omouse 10y ago
StackOverflow as a company may have grown a little too quickly; I wonder how much $$ they make from this and whether they should just focus on their core which is community and maintaining a decent community rather than these marketing-led stunts.
- aalear 10y ago
  These aren't mutually exclusive goals. We have people dedicated to growing and maintaining the community (on Stack Overflow, as well as the other sites in the Stack Exchange network), people who work on large feature areas (e.g. Documentation), yet more people who are focused on the Jobs and hiring/recruiting experience for developers, etc.
  - omouse 10y ago
    I'm more curious to know how these affect the profits of StackOverflow and what gets more bang for the buck or if random ideas are being tried out seeing which one sticks.
dkarapetyan 10y ago
Why does everything need to be a stream? Is my resume a twitter feed now?
- eyelidlessness 10y ago
  The length of a tweet would be a fantastic constraint on most resumes.
  - dkarapetyan 10y ago
    I agree. Sounds like a fun new product to disrupt the resume industry: Tweesume.
brightball 10y ago
I see some other comments about preferring other ways to tailor your application or have specific approaches when you apply for particular jobs and I definitely agree with both: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12687415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12687415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12686741 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12686741 But I don't think this is really aimed at supplanting that. It's really just trying to put a better face on the "passive" approach to things and I like it for that.
eterm 10y ago
Does anyone have a security@ contact address for stackoverflow that they know is monitored? Unfortunately there is no way to opt out of this service right now. (edit: I don't want to email security to ask for an opt-out, it would just be nice to opt out until they fix the actual security issue.) Edit: Found a web form they use on security.stackexchange.
- aalear 10y ago
  Not sure what issue you're referring to, but you can reach us through the contact form linked at the bottom of every page on our Q&A sites (like the one you found) or by email to team@. Mentioning something like "security vulnerability" in the subject or the body will help get it looked at faster. Edit: checked internally, and this specific issue is being fixed as we speak.
  - eterm 10y ago
    Thanks, I've done that now, hopefully you can find my submission I did put 'security vulnerability' as the top line in the body. If that doesn't narrow it down search for 1635976 also in the body. It's an either an information disclosure issue or an authorization issue (depending on your point of view), I won't say more on here.
    - eric_h 10y ago
      I'm curious what you found - once they get it fixed, would you mind sharing in some form?
fecak 10y ago
As someone who reads and writes thousands of developer resumes a year, the major problem I see is that people have a difficult time separating what is important from what isn't, and separating day-to-day responsibilities (which are typically understood from a job title) from unique and novel achievements. I don't know if this kind of tool solves that problem. Much of my work with resume clients is extracting what they do from them and then putting it into efficient words. Many people struggle with just explaining what they do. The other problem is that you have to understand that your reader often isn't someone with a highly technical background (or even a recruiting background), so you have to define yourself quickly in order to prevent the reader from misinterpreting who you are. If a reader is looking for a "Python Developer", it's best to refer to yourself that way on the resume. For senior level people length is often the issue - it's a highlight reel - not a biography. Anyone can get to 1-2 pages max.
- gentleteblor 10y ago
  This is why the resume endures despite it's many flaws (talked about this in some other comments). There needs to be a summarized, editorialized version of your "history" and that's what the resume does in a (semi) standardized format. The big thing for me is that this summarized/editorialized version shouldn't be what you (the one with the career) manage on a regular basis. You should have a source of truth that is far more comprehensive (and manageable) and which allows you to create this summary version easily. On another note...I've been writing a lot of web copy lately and I've started seeing a lot of similarities between good web copy and good resume copy. Resumes are marketing tools, and don't you forget it.
  - fecak 10y ago
    It's all marketing really. Many of the devs who struggle the most have some difficulty giving themselves credit for things they've done - they're modest perhaps. I think when I write some of these resumes they are more accepting of them because it's me bragging about their accomplishments. Unfortunately in the resume writing game, there are lots of failed writers that were never involved in hiring. They are good writers but don't know the audience, so people end up paying substantial amounts for a nicely worded resume that doesn't result in interviews.
clifanatic 10y ago
That lady's resume is very impressive. Is she looking?
vangale 10y ago
At some point years ago I must have asked SO not to show me any questions with "soap" tag. Unfortunately my shiny new developer story now has "I dislike soap".
bootload 10y ago
"your Developer Story is the best way to share whatever it is that you take pride in. It’s your story; tell it your way." Are people still relying on third party companies marketing to both sides of the market, to attract employees? You don't really need them. The Internet and contributions to open source [0] is your developer story, use it. [1] reference: [0] I realise not everyone can/will want do this. [1] offer from google engineering (SRE) on basis of newsgroup questions and code.
greggman 10y ago
So I got the notice this morning that my info had been changed to this new developer story on SO. I go check, it's literally > 10 screens before a single useful piece of info appears. 70 or so open source projects I contributed to or run followed by my job experience > "your Developer Story is the best way to share whatever it is that you take pride in. It’s your story; tell it your way." Um, no, that's not my way. My way would be to list my professional accomplishments first and then list my open source projects just to show how much of a geek I am.
- initram 10y ago
  FWIW, there's a tab to switch to the old view which is probably what most recruiters will know to do. I hope they track what recruiters actually click on when checking your resume. I honestly don't know which they'd prefer. As someone who occasionally interviews people, I do tend to find the cookie cutter descriptions of jobs to be moderately unhelpful. I would be interested in seeing more "what you take pride in," in many cases.
- j4_james 10y ago
  This is a result of the fact that your projects most likely don't have dates assigned to them (not even sure that was an option in the old system) so they all end up crammed at the top of the timeline. Once you fill in an approximate launch date for each project (or whatever you feel is most appropriate), the timeline should start to look a little more sensible. That said, I'm still not a big fan of the new look. I also prefer the apps section at the end rather than mixed in with my employment history.
csabeer 10y ago
Surprisingly, not many people know just how to write a good developer resume. The Developer Story is a good approach but even that is missing the key element that makes a resume work _when you are looking for a job_. Imagine this scenario: - Farmer looking for horse to plough my fields and inspect my farm - Horse 1: "I am a stallion! My coat shines in the sun, my mane is dark and glossy, and the very earth trembles as I run. I have come from the stables of Arabia, have been in the armies of Alexander, the greeks, and the mighty Theseus! I have ploughed the fields of Asphodel, and won 'prettiest horse' in the Reading village fair" - Farmer: "Wow! You're...impressive" - Horse 2: "I enjoy ploughing fields and I'm pretty strong" - Farmer: "Great! I can offer you two apples, four sugar cubes, a nice warm barn..." To be effective, Resume's shouldn't be all about how great we are (unless we are _really_ someone standout). Rather they should be tailored to the job we want. The resume needs to get through the "hiring funnel". This means they must contain the keywords that the ATS and Recruiter need in addition to our technical accomplishments that the Hiring Manager and Interviewing Panel will want. This really is pretty simple but we get caught up looking inward and not paying attention to the actual audience of the resume. So most resume's end up hit or miss. For anyone interested, I've written a book on how to do this. The book's description on Amazon contains the entire process so you don't need to buy it unless you want to. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KVVY9OA https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KVVY9OA
- brazzledazzle 10y ago
  >The book's description on Amazon contains the entire process so you don't need to buy it unless you want to. Would you say this level of openness has an impact (positive or negative) on sales of your book? It's pretty refreshing but the cynic in me wonders if it hurts sales.
  - csabeer 10y ago
    I'm not sure - maybe it does but the idea itself is pretty simple so I want to get it out there. I see a lot of people spending time making their resume's "look good" instead of being more result-oriented. I figured if I could explain how to write a resume well it would help. The book itself has more detail and a step by step (chapter by chapter) process to get a great resume written out. So it's mostly helpful for the lazy ones! :-)
ryanSrich 10y ago
I've been a contributor and top 10-20% user on SO for the last 5 years or so, and I've never once received a single job offer, solicitation or point of contact. I'm doubtful this will change any of that.

175 points by sklivvz1971 10y ago

Weren't GitHub profiles the new technical resume? How well did that work in practice, and how would this Stack Overflow approach be different? I was under the impression (from reading HN/Reddit) that while engineers do read GitHub profiles if explicitly linked in a resume, nontechnical recruiters do not. And they are the gatekeeper to said engineers.

Dzugaru 10y ago
Not every programmer likes to share his side-project code on public places like GitHub - for many reasons. Or pullrequest to some opensource mess. Code you write and problems you solve at work usually can't be shown on GitHub either. So, this "show me your GitHub" thing for me is no different from "show me your Facebook, wait what, no FB account??" experience with non-technical HRs ;) Conventional resume is totally OK for a first step in recruitment, I don't understand the need for extra fanfare.
- sqeaky 10y ago
  Resumes are extremely easy to exaggerate or fabricate. I haven't seen fake github profiles yet (and I suspect they would be more trouble than they are worth). I am often brought in on the hiring process to vet peoples technical skills. I used to just try to ask questions in the hour or two I got with the person, this seemed no better than flipping a coin. Even if the person was honest and we were both talking about the same skill, but how do I know that their experience with that skill is applicable? Now I insist on seeing a portfolio of some kind for coders. A Github, Bitbucket, Sourceforge or any other publicly viewable body of source will do. 15 minutes with someones code is a much better predictor of skill than even several hours of discussion. It costs a lot less too.
  - throwawayosiu1 10y ago
    Very recently, a close friend was looking for a job (as a junior dev - focused on web). After applying and getting rejected, we decided to try a different approach - he basically gave up and decided to the following: 1) added buzz keywords in his resume 2) hosted an instance of gitlab and took various open source projects (stuff that was not popular, but had enough polish), modified them and uploaded them. After a week, he was able to land multiple interviews. While he did get called out once, almost all engineers/non-tech hr didn't bother calling his bluff. I am not suggesting that you should lie on your resume or steal open source projects, just that depending on one factor (like github, or resume, or white boards) is futile and that tech hiring in general is broken.
    - user5994461 10y ago
      > While he did get called out once, almost all engineers/non-tech hr didn't bother calling his bluff. I see plenty of GitHub profiles that are filled with forked/starred projects from other people, and nothing of substance. I don't bring it to the candidate because it is worthless and there are more interesting things to talk about. But that doesn't mean I didn't see it ;) Actually I have never once in my life see a good github profile.
      - amorphid 10y ago
        I don't like this notion of having a "good" GitHub profile. GitHub started off as an easy place for me to dump code, no matter how crappy. Dumb ideas, samples from learning, incomplete experiments, whatevs. Then I noticed that I had started censoring my code krapola. I was sepf conscious about the code I was making visible, as I didn't want to be judged. Then I decided that lame. Now I shamelessly put garbage on GitHub, too. Coding poorly & having fun trumps curating a collection fancy schmancy artisinal repos. And I've also learned that my good code often lives at work, and never makes it to GitHub.
        burger_moon 10y ago
        I'm the same way. I removed a lot of old stuff from my early days because I was afraid I was going to be judged on it. Now I don't care. GitHub is my dumping ground for everything. I start a new project almost every time I want to learn a specific thing so I have lots of incomplete projects on there simply because I move on once I learned the goal task. Unfortunately like most people all the clean and polished code lives in private work repos. All those things I learned from the unfinished repos is being used in work code. Oh well.
- InclinedPlane 10y ago
  I have years and years of experience in software, I have a half dozen or more non-work projects I've contributed to or solely developed, some involving hundreds of hours of dev work, most of them on github. None of those projects are public though. And I suspect a lot of other developers are in similar situations. Public contributions on github usually fall into one of two categories: contributions to big open source projects (rare) or pet projects of little substance (common). These are just some of the reasons why using github as a resume is extremely fraught with difficulty. If you're lucky then it works well, but chances are you won't be lucky.
vog 10y ago
The difference between GitHub and StackOverflow/StackExchange ist that the latter is explicitly targeting the job market. They have done so since the early days, if I remember correctly: https://business.stackoverflow.com/careers/ https://business.stackoverflow.com/careers/
user5994461 10y ago
They don't look at github, no matter how much they talk about it. Just put a random link to github, you're fine. Source: Me sending my resume to recruiters + watching the view statistics on github.
Mc_Big_G 10y ago
I wish employers cared about your github profile in lieu of puzzles, but they don't.
viraptor 10y ago
There are company/country combinations where publishing your own work done in your free time is possible -> but it takes weeks/months of stupid bureaucracy to be officially accepted. At some point it's just not worth it. So while it's an interesting data point when someone does have the GH profile, it doesn't really mean much if they don't.

jofer 10y ago

I was skeptical of this when they first launched the earlier versions, but I actually quite like the way they've done it in the final version. My favorite resume of all time is Matt Hall's stratigraphic column resume: https://static.squarespace.com/static/549dcda5e4b0a47d0ae1db1e/54a06d6ee4b0d158ed95f696/54a06d6fe4b0d158ed95fff5/1292595536033/Strat_column_2011.pdf https://static.squarespace.com/static/549dcda5e4b0a47d0ae1db... (His blog post about it is here: http://www.agilegeoscience.com/blog/2010/12/17/resume-20.html http://www.agilegeoscience.com/blog/2010/12/17/resume-20.htm...) I'm a geologist, so I'm rather fond of the puns, etc that he's made here, but the point is that a straigraphic column is a great way to lay out a resume. It gives a vertical visual depiction of what the person has been doing from most recent to longest ago. That's exactly what the developer story is. I really like that they've used that visual layout. It's a very effective way to convey activities and employment history.

JustSomeNobody 10y ago

Is it really now? That sucks as I don't really engage with SO that often; Hardly ever really. Sure, if I Google for something SO results come up, but normally I search YouTube for a talk/tutorial or search Github for snippets of code. I guess I'm screwed...

thecolorblue 10y ago
That is why this is a good move on stack overflow's part. They wand developers to feel like they have to use SO.
- minimaxir 10y ago
  In terms of vertical integration, this technical resume aligns more with SO's robust job platform than with the Q/A platform.
drivingmenuts 10y ago
I barely even look at SO. It's pretty much like Quora, as far as I'm concerned.
- dasil003 10y ago
  Yes it is like Quora, just with domain specificity. I guess you see this as a bad thing, but both sites are tremendous fonts of information. What is preferable to you? Academic papers? Books? Conference Talks? Random Blog Posts? Man pages?
  - TillE 10y ago
    Whenever Quora pops up in my search results, it's generally garbage. You get opinion pieces that a bunch of other people happen to agree with. Stack Overflow is certainly better. Probably 90% of the time you can dig up the correct answer somewhere on the page. But it's incredible how much of the world's knowledge is still locked away in books. The internet is ok for computer programmers, but for basically everything else it feels like we're still decades away from the "information superhighway" dream.

tenpoundhammer 10y ago

I have seen numerous versions of the "New Resume" in the last ten years or so. It's really hard to replace something universal that everyone understands, even if it's antiquated. I doubt this will fair much better.

chipperyman573 10y ago
The difference is that this is aimed at one market, whereas other "New Resumes" try to be a catch-all.

draw_down 10y ago

Ugh.

mratzloff 10y ago

The traditional resume works because it's easy to scan visually quickly. It's easy to print out and share. This is not.

nicolewhite 10y ago
There is a 'print to pdf' option that saves it as the traditional view.

pmiller2 10y ago

I don't see anything on here that I couldn't do with my LinkedIn profile, TBH. I do kinda wish I knew the secrets of how to get 2-3 recruiting emails a day though. Unless it's "have 5 more years of experience," I think my profile could use some help.

user5994461 10y ago
Live in a tech hub and fill your linkedin profile. It doesn't guarantee 2-3 per emails per day, but a few per week is certainly achievable. You do need a few years of experience + some buzzwords.
- pmiller2 10y ago
  > Live in a tech hub and fill in your linkedin profile. Done and done. > You do need a few years of experience + some buzzwords. 3.5 years. What buzzwords do I need? I just want to be able to find a job in a few weeks the next time I am looking. I don't think that's too much to ask. Edit: I misspoke; by "find a job in a few weeks," I meant "start getting interviews within a week or two." No amount of LinkedIn profile magic will help me get a job directly, obviously.
  - user5994461 10y ago
    I was about to say you won't find a job with linkedin. At best, it just an indication of some potential companies in the area. Keep the list somewhere in your mind, you never know what could happen to your current job. ... and while I was writing this, I just received a message from a startup that raised 200M and want me to join one of their team of 3 known ex googlers on some hard industry problem. [How crazy. I applied there last year and they never replied] Well nevermind, linkedin is awesome. Now that I think about it, I left my last job because of a lead from it. :D If it doesn't work for you. You are not in a tech hub or you don't have a profile rare enough. What's your city? and link to your profile?
    - pmiller2 10y ago

deleted 10y ago

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kafkaesq 10y ago

_ is the new resume Oh please - not again.

fancy_pantser 10y ago
My first thought too. "What fresh hell is this?"

ben_jones 10y ago

Wait so hiring managers who didn't have more then 60 seconds to parse my resume now have the time to go through years of my stackoverflow activity? Sweet!

asciihacker 10y ago
The SO story will allow them to scan the highlights quicker IMHO.
- omouse 10y ago
  It will become even more important to include visuals such as popular company logos or hip cool images. This is the only reason I created a logo for my open source project, so that it sticks out whenever someone posts about it.

user5994461 10y ago

Obviously this is marketing fake from stack overflow. There is nothing more unreadable than a Stack Overflow resume. Well... except a project on github that doesn't have a readme.

asciihacker 10y ago

I like the use of 2 columns.

dhd415 10y ago

It's an interesting idea, but I prefer to take my experience and tell a story that specifically targets the role for which I am applying. From that perspective, having a single "story" out there for all potential employers isn't optimal for me.

gentleteblor 10y ago
I agree. I really like the move towards a better source of truth for our careers but I think it should be private. Let me customize it easily (e.g. for a role or job) and present that customized view to different audiences.
bduerst 10y ago
They should let you tag items on the timeline for different roles, so that you can quickly filter it for employers and send out.
- initram 10y ago
  That's an awesome idea! You should suggest it on meta.stackoverflow.com.

superfluid 10y ago

This is authored by a Jay Hanlon, "VP of Community Growth". Apparently, the role includes publishing clickbait. He squeezes in a humblebrag: "...if you're like me, and still just a little proud that you got off the waitlist and eked your way into a school above your intellectual weight class..." And he uses scarcity to scare devs into creating a profile: "It only takes a few minutes, and you do NOT want some other joker snapping up the good URLs."

pgt 10y ago
Yeah I also felt the scarcity quip was in bad taste.

gentleteblor 10y ago

I like where this is going (i've built something similar, if private [1]). Resumes in their current form don't work well as a source of truth about anyone's career. The main issue being that we put summarized/editorialized information in instead of details. It's like discarding the data you used to generate a chart and then updating the chart directly going forward. [1] https://jobrudder.com https://jobrudder.com

gentleteblor 10y ago

It's not the new resume by a long shot. But it does point to some large flaws resumes have. Resumes in their current form don't work well as a source of truth about anyone's career. The main issue being that we put summarized/editorialized information in instead of details. It's like discarding the data you used to generate a chart and then updating the chart directly going forward. You also can't manage the things you put on a resume. You can't easily search, tag, sort, view by company, position etc. You're doing all that in your head and then putting the result on paper. There should be tools to help with this stuff (I built one [1]) and those tools should put the resume in it's proper place, as an output of some other more comprehensive source of truth. [1] https://jobrudder.com https://jobrudder.com

pcsanwald 10y ago

A lot of negativity here, but I really liked my profile on stackoverflow careers, and I really like this. I felt like it was pretty different from linkedin, here are some things I like/liked: - easy to list my favorite technologies and books. - easy to link to github to show projects, easy to link to stackexchange. - UI gave good guidance on how to write a better description As someone who's hired hundreds of software engineers over the past 15 years, it did the best job generating the kind of resumes I like to see.

gamedna 10y ago

My recent job search lead me to the idea that the traditional resume is broken. Temporal view only gives recruiters and hiring managers the bullet points to qualify you in whatever bucket that they need. Instead of a traditional CV/Resume, I went with a single page narrative approach with a link to the temporal view on my LinkedIn profile. Initially there was some pushback as the recruiters were bellyaching over the fact that they needed to actually read my essay, but as time progressed I discovered that this format became a tool. By forcing the hiring manager/recruiter to actually read and understand your background, inbound leads were much higher quality and the initial phone screen was extremely easy. Out of 100+ job applications, i got 20 or so responses, and of those 20 responses, 10 offers. Out of the 20 responses, 19 were good fits and had good hiring managers with a company that had a decent culture. I am definitely using the narrative approach again for my next job hunt.

gentleteblor 10y ago
I'm always excited when alternatives to the resume work. Glad it did for you. Did you happen to post about this anywhere (on a blog maybe?). I'd love to see the narrative version and hopefully learn a thing or two.
- gamedna 10y ago
  My email is listed in my profile, drop me an email and I am happy to shoot you a slightly redacted copy of what I wrote up.
sotojuan 10y ago
I haven't sent a resume in a while. Usually I just give a "cover letter" of sorts that says a) why I'm interested in the job b) what I can offer/why they "need" me, c) why I think so (usually just talk about experience). I have a website that lists my workplaces and my main projects and of course my GitHub, both of which I link. I guess that's my "resume".
- user5994461 10y ago
  Didn't send a cover letter in a while. I am surprised this practise still exists.

orliesaurus 10y ago

This would probably not be the most proud feature shipped to date (if I worked at SO). - It looks just average and does make use of the white space - It has this section where you "DISLIKE" technology? wtf really? - Who cares what you recommend as a book to read? This is a resume right, not your blog. - I somehow feel this is too leaderboard-y and not something i would use for a resume - but sure, it IS a cool thing to have if you're into StackOverflow (like a LOT), just not a resume..

ge96 10y ago

I'm trying to get hired as a junior front end developer. Suck at writing resumes. This is my worst one so far. Also I've been applying but no responses, I have a defeatist mentality and also I think I do accept that I don't meet the requirements. http://m.imgur.com/a/oCdvU http://m.imgur.com/a/oCdvU I have changed the format some as the bullets as titles doesn't make sense. Still I have to condense and overall my "achievements" are pretty basic. Probably will have to find another menial job. Oh well

alain94040 10y ago
That is a terrible resume :-( Why would you start with negative sentences about your projects? "not complete". "at best what I have...". "decided to abandon". The second page is much more promising. Instead of story-telling and editorializing "This was a basic job, and quick", focus on what techniques you used: - started from a broken Bootstrap prototype - rewrote email sending using package xyz etc. Show me that you know how to use a variety of technologies, packages and tools. Then I can judge whether I have a job for you.
- ge96 10y ago
  Right unfortunately I haven't used many tools. This one site was built with bootstrap and since I don't use/know bootstrap I wrote it from scratch the scrolling, menu, animations, etc... Yeah it is a work in progress.
Nimitz14 10y ago
In case you're not trolling, google for "example resumes".
- ge96 10y ago
  I did look at some. My previous resume see below: https://m.imgur.com/7FU3bew https://m.imgur.com/7FU3bew I was told lacked content so I gathered all my projects.
awad 10y ago
Hey, we've all been there! I'm more than happy to help you polish this up. Feel free to shoot me an email hn@awadsayeed.com

steven777400 10y ago

I've had success with the "T style" where I list the stated requirements verbatim from the job posting on one side and how specifically I meet those requirements on the other side. Combined with some narrative about relevant experience, it's way better than just a chronology.

mikestew 10y ago

I thought the "new resume" was Stack Overflow Careers, which I spent USD$29 for back in the day. To SO's credit at the time, they offered a full refund if one was ever not satisfied. I never took them up on it, though I should have considering that it was a waste of $29 for all the value I got out of it. I spent a fair bit of time sprucing up that profile, got very few hits, and the quality of the leads was no better or worse than what I'd get off LinkedIn. IOW, random recruiters spamming. So when the recent email hit my inbox, it was with a healthy dose of skepticism that I just immediately deleted it.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

omouse 10y ago

StackOverflow as a company may have grown a little too quickly; I wonder how much $$ they make from this and whether they should just focus on their core which is community and maintaining a decent community rather than these marketing-led stunts.

aalear 10y ago
These aren't mutually exclusive goals. We have people dedicated to growing and maintaining the community (on Stack Overflow, as well as the other sites in the Stack Exchange network), people who work on large feature areas (e.g. Documentation), yet more people who are focused on the Jobs and hiring/recruiting experience for developers, etc.
- omouse 10y ago
  I'm more curious to know how these affect the profits of StackOverflow and what gets more bang for the buck or if random ideas are being tried out seeing which one sticks.

dkarapetyan 10y ago

Why does everything need to be a stream? Is my resume a twitter feed now?

eyelidlessness 10y ago
The length of a tweet would be a fantastic constraint on most resumes.
- dkarapetyan 10y ago
  I agree. Sounds like a fun new product to disrupt the resume industry: Tweesume.

brightball 10y ago

I see some other comments about preferring other ways to tailor your application or have specific approaches when you apply for particular jobs and I definitely agree with both: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12687415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12687415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12686741 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12686741 But I don't think this is really aimed at supplanting that. It's really just trying to put a better face on the "passive" approach to things and I like it for that.

eterm 10y ago

Does anyone have a security@ contact address for stackoverflow that they know is monitored? Unfortunately there is no way to opt out of this service right now. (edit: I don't want to email security to ask for an opt-out, it would just be nice to opt out until they fix the actual security issue.) Edit: Found a web form they use on security.stackexchange.

aalear 10y ago
Not sure what issue you're referring to, but you can reach us through the contact form linked at the bottom of every page on our Q&A sites (like the one you found) or by email to team@. Mentioning something like "security vulnerability" in the subject or the body will help get it looked at faster. Edit: checked internally, and this specific issue is being fixed as we speak.
- eterm 10y ago
  Thanks, I've done that now, hopefully you can find my submission I did put 'security vulnerability' as the top line in the body. If that doesn't narrow it down search for 1635976 also in the body. It's an either an information disclosure issue or an authorization issue (depending on your point of view), I won't say more on here.
  - eric_h 10y ago
    I'm curious what you found - once they get it fixed, would you mind sharing in some form?

fecak 10y ago

As someone who reads and writes thousands of developer resumes a year, the major problem I see is that people have a difficult time separating what is important from what isn't, and separating day-to-day responsibilities (which are typically understood from a job title) from unique and novel achievements. I don't know if this kind of tool solves that problem. Much of my work with resume clients is extracting what they do from them and then putting it into efficient words. Many people struggle with just explaining what they do. The other problem is that you have to understand that your reader often isn't someone with a highly technical background (or even a recruiting background), so you have to define yourself quickly in order to prevent the reader from misinterpreting who you are. If a reader is looking for a "Python Developer", it's best to refer to yourself that way on the resume. For senior level people length is often the issue - it's a highlight reel - not a biography. Anyone can get to 1-2 pages max.

gentleteblor 10y ago
This is why the resume endures despite it's many flaws (talked about this in some other comments). There needs to be a summarized, editorialized version of your "history" and that's what the resume does in a (semi) standardized format. The big thing for me is that this summarized/editorialized version shouldn't be what you (the one with the career) manage on a regular basis. You should have a source of truth that is far more comprehensive (and manageable) and which allows you to create this summary version easily. On another note...I've been writing a lot of web copy lately and I've started seeing a lot of similarities between good web copy and good resume copy. Resumes are marketing tools, and don't you forget it.
- fecak 10y ago
  It's all marketing really. Many of the devs who struggle the most have some difficulty giving themselves credit for things they've done - they're modest perhaps. I think when I write some of these resumes they are more accepting of them because it's me bragging about their accomplishments. Unfortunately in the resume writing game, there are lots of failed writers that were never involved in hiring. They are good writers but don't know the audience, so people end up paying substantial amounts for a nicely worded resume that doesn't result in interviews.

clifanatic 10y ago

That lady's resume is very impressive. Is she looking?

vangale 10y ago

At some point years ago I must have asked SO not to show me any questions with "soap" tag. Unfortunately my shiny new developer story now has "I dislike soap".

bootload 10y ago

"your Developer Story is the best way to share whatever it is that you take pride in. It’s your story; tell it your way." Are people still relying on third party companies marketing to both sides of the market, to attract employees? You don't really need them. The Internet and contributions to open source [0] is your developer story, use it. [1] reference: [0] I realise not everyone can/will want do this. [1] offer from google engineering (SRE) on basis of newsgroup questions and code.

greggman 10y ago

So I got the notice this morning that my info had been changed to this new developer story on SO. I go check, it's literally > 10 screens before a single useful piece of info appears. 70 or so open source projects I contributed to or run followed by my job experience > "your Developer Story is the best way to share whatever it is that you take pride in. It’s your story; tell it your way." Um, no, that's not my way. My way would be to list my professional accomplishments first and then list my open source projects just to show how much of a geek I am.

initram 10y ago
FWIW, there's a tab to switch to the old view which is probably what most recruiters will know to do. I hope they track what recruiters actually click on when checking your resume. I honestly don't know which they'd prefer. As someone who occasionally interviews people, I do tend to find the cookie cutter descriptions of jobs to be moderately unhelpful. I would be interested in seeing more "what you take pride in," in many cases.
j4_james 10y ago
This is a result of the fact that your projects most likely don't have dates assigned to them (not even sure that was an option in the old system) so they all end up crammed at the top of the timeline. Once you fill in an approximate launch date for each project (or whatever you feel is most appropriate), the timeline should start to look a little more sensible. That said, I'm still not a big fan of the new look. I also prefer the apps section at the end rather than mixed in with my employment history.

csabeer 10y ago

Surprisingly, not many people know just how to write a good developer resume. The Developer Story is a good approach but even that is missing the key element that makes a resume work _when you are looking for a job_. Imagine this scenario: - Farmer looking for horse to plough my fields and inspect my farm - Horse 1: "I am a stallion! My coat shines in the sun, my mane is dark and glossy, and the very earth trembles as I run. I have come from the stables of Arabia, have been in the armies of Alexander, the greeks, and the mighty Theseus! I have ploughed the fields of Asphodel, and won 'prettiest horse' in the Reading village fair" - Farmer: "Wow! You're...impressive" - Horse 2: "I enjoy ploughing fields and I'm pretty strong" - Farmer: "Great! I can offer you two apples, four sugar cubes, a nice warm barn..." To be effective, Resume's shouldn't be all about how great we are (unless we are _really_ someone standout). Rather they should be tailored to the job we want. The resume needs to get through the "hiring funnel". This means they must contain the keywords that the ATS and Recruiter need in addition to our technical accomplishments that the Hiring Manager and Interviewing Panel will want. This really is pretty simple but we get caught up looking inward and not paying attention to the actual audience of the resume. So most resume's end up hit or miss. For anyone interested, I've written a book on how to do this. The book's description on Amazon contains the entire process so you don't need to buy it unless you want to. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KVVY9OA https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KVVY9OA

brazzledazzle 10y ago
>The book's description on Amazon contains the entire process so you don't need to buy it unless you want to. Would you say this level of openness has an impact (positive or negative) on sales of your book? It's pretty refreshing but the cynic in me wonders if it hurts sales.
- csabeer 10y ago
  I'm not sure - maybe it does but the idea itself is pretty simple so I want to get it out there. I see a lot of people spending time making their resume's "look good" instead of being more result-oriented. I figured if I could explain how to write a resume well it would help. The book itself has more detail and a step by step (chapter by chapter) process to get a great resume written out. So it's mostly helpful for the lazy ones! :-)

ryanSrich 10y ago

I've been a contributor and top 10-20% user on SO for the last 5 years or so, and I've never once received a single job offer, solicitation or point of contact. I'm doubtful this will change any of that.