I worked as a recruiter for 5 years before I career changed to become a software developer. I’ve seen a hell of a lot of CV’s over the years and want to share what I’ve learnt and suggest a template for someone looking for their first developer job after career changing.
What ‘s a recruiter looking for?
The specifics of what the recruiter is looking for will be on the job description. Generally though, I’d say most will be interested in:
- What do you like to work on — Front end, back end, or full stack? Even if you apply for a back end role, if all your projects are front end then I’m going to assume you’re really looking for a front end role.
- How did you learn to develop? Bootcamp? Online courses? Side projects? Books?
- What transferable skills/experience do you have? Broken projects down into tasks? Collaborated with a team to deliver work against a common goal? Communicated with customers/stakeholders? Fleshed out requirements of an upcoming project? etc..
- What languages/technologies do you have experience with? Sometimes specific languages are important, e.g. if a lot of people apply for the job then it might be used as a way to filter down CV’s, but it’s the easiest thing for a newcomer to learn. Generally though, it’s important to see what type of programming you’re doing — Object oriented? Functional? Experience with Databases? CI/CD? Testing? The reviewer will infer a lot from the languages/technologies you mention.
- Are you motivated and likely to work hard to succeed? Whether you like it or not, recruiters will make judgements around this on your CV. Got a medical degree? I’ll assume you work hard and are self driven. Spent 3 years in a renowned company with a promotion half way through? I’ll assume you’re able to deliver work against deadlines and are intelligent. Completed a complicated app without going to a bootcamp? I’m going to assume you’re hard working and motivated.
A few more that are more hiring manager than recruiter, but can still be the difference between being shortlisted and rejected:
- How well do you code? If you can show a project or tech test that you’ve completed that shows you can code well then you will stand out. No doubt. If I need to choose 5 people to interview out of the 50 that applied then seeing your code makes me more confident I’m not wasting our time.
- How much do you know about developing web apps? Coding is a part of making web apps, but only a part. If you can show projects where you’ve built a web app with some more complicated functionality then I’ll infer how much you’d need to learn before you could start delivering work on a real app.
- What do you think makes good software? Have you heard of SOLID? Do you follow Sandi Metz? Do you write tests?
Read your CV and answer each of the questions above based only on the information in the CV. Do you feel it’s a good reflection of you and your experience?
Template
Here’s what I’d suggest in terms of structure. Here’s a link to download it.
FAQS
Can I go over 1 page?
Yep that’s fine imo. No more than 2 pages and ask yourself if what you’re keeping is actually needed. If you can trim it, do.
Why do you only have bullet points under 2 previous jobs?
This is my biggest pet peeve, including too much information about irrelevant experience. It makes the reviewer blind to your relevant experience because they have to wade through a sea of words to find it.
I’ll add more answers here if anyone asks more questions, so please feel free to comment!
