6 ms·
As a college student, 1. is the one that worries the most. Automatic filtering is scary, and there's no way to test how these ATS systems are viewing my resume.
by MisterSandman 5y ago
As a college student, 1. is the one that worries the most. Automatic filtering is scary, and there's no way to test how these ATS systems are viewing my resume.
- dntrkv 5y agoDon't worry about it. This post is a load of horse shit. If you're a competent dev, move to a place with a good tech scene and you'll do fine.
- MisterSandman 5y agoDifficult when you're an immigrant. I moved to Canada for this reason, and though the tech scene is great here (Toronto at least), it sucks how everyone here talks about how "terrible" the tech scene is wants to move to SF instead. Feels like a never ending cycle.
- MisterSandman 5y agoI realize that this comment makes me sound ungrateful - I'm not! But just something I wanted to mention lol.
- dntrkv 5y agoPeople will always find things to complain about. Toronto isn't SF when it comes to tech (nowhere is), but it still has plenty of opportunity. Don't listen to the complainers. Just focus on becoming a good SWE for now, then worry about maximizing your earnings.
- yosito 5y agoAutomatic filtering is annoying, but there are plenty of tools that will scan your resume and tell you what keywords they find. I once spent weeks crafting a catchy looking resume with a fixed width font and ascii art. It didn't get any responses, and I didn't understand why until I put it through one of these scanners and realized that the program I had used to save the PDF had strangely encoded all of the text in reverse, so I wasn't passing any of the automatic filters. The takeaway: test your resume with a scanner!
- tomc1985 5y agoIt sounds like you could have just opened the PDF that was generated to double-check it too. Sending off a derivative file without proofing seems like a big YOLO move to me
- yosito 5y agoVisually the PDF was fine. But machines were reading it backwards. Not sure why.
- srswtf123 5y agoCould you recommend a scanner?
- speeder 5y agoLinks to these scanners? Right now whenever I send one of my PDF resumes I get zero replies.
- MisterSandman 5y agoA lot of these scanners went down a few months ago when one of the API services (not sure which) stopped working, but if you have a newer link please do send!
- JMTQp8lwXL 5y agoThere is software out there for optimizing resumes to ATS. It basically is keyword matching. One tool will allow you to paste the Job Description and your Resume. You can give it a URL, and they'll detect ATS type, and give you further recommendations for file formats and things. In any case, it's like an arm race for SEO. What was once a useful measure will lose meaning as everyone adopts these tools.
- julienb_sea 5y agoIf you're a college student, you should be single minded on having at least one (and ideally two, since the first will be lower caliber) internships under your belt. This will get you past every single new grad filter screen. If you can do this and handle junior dev algorithm questions, you will have plenty of new grad offers. Also, if you are even vaguely talking to a recruiter (e.g. via career fair) then they are not going to screen you using an automated system.
- karmasimida 5y agoTake it easy. You are still quite young, it doesn't hurt to take 1-2 years to build your experience in this industry before going to top companies. And believe, they are not that picky. When you are a college student, it is really hard to distinguish yourself from your peers, unless you are truly outstanding, otherwise most resumes look likes clones to each other.