In the last 12 years I have never got a job thanks to my CV
On Facebook, in groups dedicated to beginning programmers, I often see questions about how to improve one’s CV to increase the chances of being hired.
In my 12-year career, I went from the junior to the technology director and never got a job thanks to my CV. It’s not like I didn’t try. I just never got a job sending my CV.
I worked in four companies, and a couple of months ago I set up the fifth one by myself (Shuffle.dev).
I have to tell you my secret. This secret will give you a significant advantage over other candidates. The recruiters will hate me!
What is this secret?
My first job (2007–2009):
In 2007, during studies (finance and banking), I started to create a bot operating in the Gadu-Gadu network. At that time it was the largest Polish instant messenger. In 2007 Gadu-Gadu was bought by Naspers for $154 million.
My bot was a simple solution. It reacted to commands (e.g. weather), checked data in various services and returned them to the communicator. It was written in the TCL language.
This project interested Gadu-Gadu. I was invited to a meeting in Warsaw, quite good money (for a beginner) was offered for the project’s rights and I was offered a job.
Of course I agreed and earned my first money!
I found the first job (actually the job found me!) because someone saw potential in my project done in my free time and / or in me!
Nobody asked for the CV.
My second job (2009–2010):
In 2009, Facebook was becoming more and more popular in Poland. I began to wonder how to use their API, I did some tests and started to create the seed of the project that would use their API.
As I didn’t have experience in creating SaaS (I was 23 years old), I wrote to a person I knew was a specialist in creating Internet businesses (I knew it from blogs/articles/interviews). I wrote an e-mail to Rafał Agnieszczak, the CEO of Fotka.pl, at that time the largest social networking site in Poland, with a proposal for cooperation.
After one meeting, we agreed I would join his company as a programmer.
I found the second job thanks to the fact that I wrote to the right person with the right idea at the right time (Facebook has just started to acquire a significant number of users in Poland). There was no need to prepare a CV either.
My third job (2010–2017):
The project with Rafał did not work out. We had a lot of technological problems. I don’t remember why, but we forced the users to give us their passwords (!?) to social networking sites. Perhaps the Facebook API and other websites did not share all the data we wanted to collect. Unfortunately, it didn’t work well.
However, I didn’t give up interest in Facebook and its API.
I started to create a StreamPublish project. It was a tool that allowed posting on Facebook and the appropriate formatting of posts (today it is not possible anymore, but one day you could add various options in the post through the API).
In 2010, Rafał (the guy in whose company I worked) interviewed Łukasz Misiukanis (YouTube shows 2012 year, but it is re-upload). Łukasz told in that interview that he is setting up a Social Media agency and wants to get with it to the TOP 3 of this category in Poland (at the time of the interview he had only one co-worker, namely Agnieszka).
I decided to write to Łukasz if he would be interested in developing StreamPublish.
We met and so I found the third job. I was the third employee in Socializer (the company that Łukasz founded). Łukasz did not ask for my CV.
The company has grown to more than 200 people, was bought for $8 million by Dentsu Aegis Network, and after the acquisition for three years I was a technology director with a team of about 30 programmers.
Note: To help foreign readers understand (or simply younger ones, those who do not remember the times of GG / Fotka.pl) to which companies I managed to get into without a CV, I will use the cover of the book “E-vangelists. Learn from the best creators of the Polish internet.” (2012):
My fourth and fifth job (2017- …):
With experience from previous years, everything was easier. After Dentsu/Isobar, I joined my friends from Flying Bisons, where my task was to create a senior team of developers.
After a year at Flying Bisons, I decided to build my own company at full time and, of course, once again I got in without a CV;)
What can you learn from my story?
Start creating.
In the first three companies in which I worked I got a job because I created my own projects after hours. If it worked three times in a row, there must be something in it!
Find the topic that interests you and create something on your own. Not another search engine for movies on IMDB, nor a tic-tac-toe game in JavaScript, but something that solves the actual problem and is useful for you.
If you don’t have all the competencies (e.g. you only know the front-end) try to find someone who will have skills complementary to yours.
You will then stand out from dozens of candidates. You will prove that you are able to deliver projects. That you can deal with obstacles.
You will learn a lot!
It is impossible to lose on creating “after hours” projects. Thanks to the fact that I have always tried to do my own stuff, I have no problems with dealing with the front-end, back-end or infrastructure.
The competition on the market of beginner developers will get bigger and bigger.
Over the past few years, I have seen hundreds of CVs of novice programmers and few of them are doing something above the standard (the IMDB movie search engine mentioned above).
Good luck!
P.S. If you already create something “after hours”, share the link in the comment!
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