The future of resumes?

[rhosk]

http://213.186.36.10/~al/alstudio/cv/en.htm

or not :wow

Entertaining though.

[TJ_Tigger]

I guess that is one way to do it. . .

[Desmond]

I think that's great! Provided employers would be convinced to visit the website and view the flash . . . it'd certainly be a way to have your image stick in HR's head.

It's like the westjet resume delivered on a label of a wine bottle.

[Ted Sullivan]

Actually, it's worth waiting through it all, just to hear him humming at the end. That's why I love the French. On the balance, they truly are the happiest people on earth.

[Desmond]

Desmond wonders how quickly he would have been hired at IR if he could sing like a French man.

Evidently, Desmond wonders if his employment will continue whilst he speaks in the third person. :p

[Mark]

If you get the chance, check out the French version of the flash animation, it rhymes far better and makes a bit more sense.

Either way an interesting approach. If people start forwarding this around, it will probably be for more exposure then he would have gotten otherwise, not serious exposure mind you, but exposure.

[Intrigued]

I like Flash a lot (almost as much as AMS) but, I believe I will hold [off] on this sort of activity (in this fashion at least).

;)

[eric_darling]

For some time now, I have been convinced that, relationally speaking, the French have, simultaneously and collectively, the deepest knowledge and most esoteric handle on software development. This dude fits right in, in my book. :cool

[Ted Sullivan]

And they make good wine. Kudos!

[Corey]

Ted, how about eskimos? Happiest people on earth bar none. Truly without a single care in the world and completely untouched by any form of materialism. :)

As for the resume. Here's the bottom line for me. The Flash animation work itself is poor quality, that leads me to conclude a couple things.

1. He has no problem providing and displaying shoddy work, i.e. no reliable internal quality control mechanism.
2. There is a discrepancy between his claimed experience and that which is indicated in quality of his Flash.
3. He's got a lot of spare time, and is having trouble getting hired.

I definitely wouldn't interview him based purely on the fact that his Flash work is too low quality for me to provide to clients. Tons of audio glitches, horrendous load time, poorly chosen/implemented graphic design elements, etc. Look at the load screen for heaven's sake. That looks *terrible* and it just hangs there for soooooo long. I would be mortified to hand that to an Indigo Rose client and say, "There you go, here's your new promotional Flash movie" happy trails...

Now as to "whether it's a good idea", I say sure, but you *must* make sure that:

1. You have the skills *first*.
2. The Flash movie shows those skills.

Here's the bottom line. If you are the best at what you do, just show people, don't tell them. Don't tell them you make 3D movies, show them one. Don't tell them you program C++, just give them a few sample apps. Don't tell them you studied graphic design, just design a presentation which screams "QUALITY" and you will not have to tell them a single thing, *they will tell you*. Anyhow that's my take on it. I wouldn't reccomend this technique to someone unless they have some solid Flash skills, and in those cases I would strongly reccomend it. He has a good idea but it has been poorly implemented.

I'd probably go for a beer with the guy though. :yes

[eric_darling]

Yeah, he's definitely more a programmer than a graphic artist. But kudos to him for trying so hard to have a sense of humor about getting a job. I don't think he's going to experience much success in that vein at any design firms or high-end multimedia shops. But someone's going to like his relatively wide skill set (despite the apparent lack of style) and sense of humor, even if we don't.

As bad as the effort really is, there are lots of employers, even in today's less boomy economy, who will settle for mediocrity in trade for breadth.

[Corey]

I respectfully disagree, unless he is an exceptional programmer. The market has a gigantic glut of people with a wide range of cursory/ambiguous skills, there's no full time IT jobs for them anywhere. However if he has exceptional programming skills then he could get a job anywhere, probably in a single day of job interviews. This resume indicates an individual who likely expects to be paid as a professional, although I may be wrong. I think once employers separate the novelty from the substance they will flag this guy as fun but not neceesarily a prospective employee.

In general people who are still developing design skills will have better luck with a resume which offers a handful of high quality actual samples and says simply:

"Objective : I am seeking a niche within a professional design environment in which to improve and apply my technical skills."

I think the key is to subtly indicate to the employer that you aknowledge the skill level you are at and a willingness to start at the bottom in exchange for the opportunity to develop yourself professionally. I didn't get that feeling form this resume. This resume made me feel that the author views his skills as already well developed despite the lack of any useful portfolio. I think it's also useful to display an ability to cut to the chase, especially in critical scenarios such as a resume, i.e. "all-substance, no-fluff" and this kind of defeats that.

I also didn't like the part where he says, "They liked me and wanted to keep me but the company closed and they let my program down."

Here he has a few tiny moments in which to educate me, the prospective employer, about him, but instead he chooses to sing to me about some company closing down. And in a semi-negative light at that. Bad marketing. Tell me you worked for Infogrames or whatever, and show me a sample, that's all I need. Don't start feeding me a bit about how much they wanted you just before they closed, and especially don't tell me what Infogrames was thinking, if that's important just give me a phone number of your old boss and I'll get the scoop straight from the horse's mouth. :)

Bottom line, his boss at Infogrames (or wherever) went somewhere else, the whole team did. Why wasn't he asked to join them? He said they wanted more of his code... I mean if he is going to plant the chain of thought in people then they are going to take it to the next step, right? :o

Anyhow don't get the wrong idea behind what I'm saying. He seems like a nice guy, I'd go skateboarding at his house if he had a ramp. I'm only addressing the efficacy of this resume in the purest sense here. I like his idea, and I like his spirit. I just don't care for the substance of his output today vis-a-vis what I would like to see IR clients receive tomorrow.

[eric_darling]

I wouldn't imagine myself hiring him for any purpose, so I'm not speaking from a personal take on the guy, either. I'm just surmising that someone, somewhere, will weigh his moxy heavier than his lack of depth.

As you say, he's not a great candidate for any particular position as evidenced in his flash movie. But bad candidates get jobs all the time for a variety of seemingly inexplicable reasons. I'm just saying that I wouldn't rule out the possibility. I certainly don't condone taking his tack here, and I would agree that he hasn't really improved his chances.

[Corey]

Well I'd agree you, he could get *a* job. He's certainly not a rank beginner. But he seems like his head is a bit, "in the clouds" as they say. He'd be better off building a really clever demo app in C++ and then emailing the code to development teams. Anyhow the underlying idea was nifty if nothing else, and Ted's right about the humming... :yes

[Brett]

My impression was, here is a guy with personality and a sense of humor as well as some technical skills. The fact is a resumee or sample code means very little if you have someone who can do the techhie stuff but isn't fun to be around. He would definitely get a call for an interview if I were looking through a bunch of cookie-cutter resumees. I would say, "Finally, someone with some personality and imagination. Let's call him in and see how his technical skills are."

[Corey]

Interesting. That means he managed to leverage the same advantages as a TV ad, he motivated you to make an emotional decision without providing any actual value. There are no technical skills demonstrated here nor on his *terrible* web site.

http://www.alstudio.fr.st/

1. He has far below average design skills. His site crashed my browser several times, yet he mysteriously cites "web site design" as one of his skills in his PDF resume. You judge his site design skills for yourself. :)

2. Despite having zero code or portfolio on his site, he cites expertise at Photoshop and about 20 other programs in his pdf resume as well as about a half dozen programming languages. :)

3. His 3D movie samples are terrible. His 3D skills are below average for any entry level 3D student from say Sheridan or ACAD. Check out the lighting. :)

4. Nowhere on his site does he give any indication of programming skills or samples. Zero code. Also no samples to correlate with the design claims in his PDF.

5. Microsoft's MVS program in France is just a low-level certificate which you have to apply for. It doesn't indicate that "Microsoft likes you" anymore than your Blockbuster video card indicates that Blockbuster likes you.

6. Infogrames never "closed down", they expanded actually. They bought Atari, and then decided the Atari name was better brand value and switched the name. They never fired anyone according to reports, they've never been stronger : http://www.yabedo.com/news/id/10447 So I'm not sure what he's talking about in his Flash movie but it has no basis in fact.

6. He's 22, his pdf resume says he was working as an animator since 2000. Google contains no record of him ever working on any projects nor for any studios. In fact According to Google, this resume is the only thing he's done so far.

7. This resume was released in October. He claims to have had over 80 job offers from it yet he remains unemployed as of today...

So anyhow I'm very surprised at your answer Brett. His Flash technical skills are terrible. He gives no evidence of every having programmed anything. And his web site indicates he is not being forthright about his design and software experience. I'm not sure what you are anchoring to here. It's not like this resume exists in a void of competition, one would presumably be passing up on interviewing someone else to make time for him.

Suffice to say I agree that personality is vital but I think you'd get resumes from plently of likable people with more tangible skills and job experience in today's job market. I think they would be more realistic about your position and what you can provide them as an employer also.

I think it would take years to turn this guy into a profitable employee at best. I'm a bit alarmed by the disparity between his claims and his output too. Google contains zippo, and anyhow who knows as much as his pdf says he does would be *somewhere* on there for better or worse.

Anyhow it's a great example of marketing vs. substance. You don't need to provide value in order to succeed but you must maintain the marketing. He zooms by a ton of thumbnail images in the flash that it leaves you with the impression of substance yet when you to his site there is no image gallery or portfolio, but it doesn't matter because he has already won you over. This kid should get into sales, I'll have to give him an A+ for marketing results since he managed to secure a private audience with The Brett. :)

[Intrigued]

This year I either watched or read (sorry for the lack of the source just now)... about how a large portion of the job seekers out there fabricate their resume and some do it repeatedly, through several areas of their resume!

That's disgusting and very shortsighted on their part. What, they don't think they will have to own up to what their resume put forth at some time about their abilities? (Can I get a "Dahhh" on that one?)

And it's embarrasing I would think (we have had some high profile cases this past year or two in the media about this situation).

I like a sense of humor myself... but, it must never trump professional, honest, and reliability! To allow such... is to not take your company (and fellow employee's trust) serious in my opinion.

Here's one for you though that's personal. I was told a couple years ago (ready?) that, "I feel your to outgoing for this position" (ah? Houston, problem thing again).

I sarcastically laughed about that for a while (and cough up one now).

Crazy, crazy world we live in! ;-)

[Corey]

For me the interview swings entirely on the portfolio. I will gladly overlook a few exaggerations to interview a person with an amazing portfolio. But if your samples are not amazing, no amount of qualification, real or otherwise, would make a tadpole of difference. I would assess the personality only after the interview.

Quantity is irrelevant. A single really good sample would be enough to get someone an interview with me.

The single thing which would really prevent me from interviewing this particular guy is the fact that on his blog he says he's had "over 80 job proposals" but doesn't have a job yet.

[kpsmith]

Quite entertaining...

You don't normally see that level of creativity in most programmers. For that alone he would get my attention.

Of course it all depends on what type of person you looking for.

(No offense intended to any programmers out there)

[Adam]

If I were in the hiring biz (which I am not) I would give him a call. The sheer originality of his little demo would make me want to meet him. And I agree with Ted that the humming at the end is priceless.

Adam Kapilik