What I learned from Reading 1000+ CVs
Written by @Roxane Jurkovskaja on August 31, 2018
I’m a co-founder of a tech startup working to help athletes develop themselves further through video recognition and analysis. We have two teams: one in Egypt and one in Germany. Since our company has grown throughout the last year I have read a lot of CVs. Just one job announcement may trigger up to 700–800 received CVs, and me having to think how on earth to spot the right talent through the bulk of emails.
A thing about startups that you may know already: We are very dynamic and under constant change. Unless you are a unicorn like Airbnb, Facebook or Uber, most likely you will have a lack of formal organizational structure, a high turnover, be growing, learning and failing forward, and have a constant hunger to find new and right team members, and, if you are a startup that works with new technology, most likely also in need of talent with expertise in areas that are relatively new.
So, based on my experience so far, here are three main points I learned from going through all these CVs — I will make some specific examples related to the Egyptian market, but overall keep this global as I also have gone through CVs in other countries:
1. If you can’t be bothered. Neither can I.
Spelling. I really don’t get it
By now there are so many spelling tools available yet still I receive CVs with spelling mistakes that would horrify any English teacher. I am not a native English speaker myself, so I totally get it if you misspell “conscience”.
If you are in tech, though, you should know how to use a spell checker. But if you’re stating you are “detlai orinted” — I really doubt you are.
Please for the sake of all of us — show it to your friend/ spouse/ Google doc. I know that pride can get in the way and you most likely are the best candidate in the world, but all your masters and PhDs seem very unserious if your CV is littered with spelling mistakes.
Fill out your profile
Please fill out your Wuzzuf, Bayt, LinkedIn, whatever database you use to find a new job profile: Why? Because, all these platforms use keywords and algorithms to match potential candidates with great jobs.
The less keywords you use — the less your chances are of being found by me (or some other employer). And the higher the chances are that I won’t even bother unlocking your profile.
Format
Let’s be honest — even though you believe that everything you did was massively important — reality is that for the majority of external readers — it isn’t. I barely read more than one page, maybe two.
If you’re unable to highlight essential aspects of/key learnings from your past experiences — then I am also unable to do so, and giving me 10–15 pages of rambling will not really help the situation.
If you’re applying for a job within tech, please highlight what you worked with and how this experience helped you progress further. Having fancy titles in your CV means little, if anything, in the startup world, as we all have fancy titles, and we are all used to fluff words.
I have seen many CVs with people having titles such as “Product Owner”, “Lead Developer” etc., with little, if any, actual practical experience behind. Try to keep your CV as clean and straightforward as possible. Remove fluff.
- If you’re not sure how your CV should look like — then use Google 🙂
- ..and, if you’re a designer and deliver me a CV in multiple fonts and colors made in word — then I most likely will doubt your design skills.
Don’t say you can, when you can’t
Why make it awkward for all of us? If you don’t speak Russian — don’t write that you do.
A candidate once wrote that she/he spoke fluent Russian. I switched to Russian. Didn’t work out.
If you are a true follower of Nietzsche, then don’t be surprised if you are asked about your perspective on Nihilism.
This actually happened for me in an interview where the candidate talked at length about his love for Nietzsche and how he combines this within his art. I asked him to give me some examples and referred to his tenet that God was dead.
The candidate had no idea what I was talking about and had, it turned out, never actually read anything by the philosopher.
If you love “material design” but are unable to name any application applying it, you might want to keep this love unmentioned.
- Basically, avoid all falsehood. If you worked somewhere in a junior position, do not write that you worked as a senior member and implemented grand projects.
It takes one phone call or email to get a recommendation or to verify your CV, and if we consider interviewing you, we will make that call or send that email.
I’m not a “Sir”
Literally. All. Emails. I receive start with “Dear Sir..”, “Hi Sir”….I’m not sure whether it is because it is completely impossible to imagine that a cofounder and business owner can be a woman. But. Please. Stop. If in doubt, use Dear Sir/Madam.
2. I need specific skills. You don’t have them, so what can you offer instead?
I receive a lot of candidates that do not meet the necessary requirements. Sometimes it’s fine. Like, maybe we are advertising a position for a Node.JS developer with two to three years of experience.
Let’s say you have had one year of experience or even less, but are a super quick learner — that’s cool. We even had developers joining that learned Kotlin very fast with no prior experience — at the end it is all about how willing you are to learn a new language in this case.
If you do not meet the necessary requirements — then do not try to oversell yourself.
Most likely it is clear from your CV that you do not meet the requirements (let’s be honest — if you graduated in 2017 chances are pretty low that you can apply for a Senior Node.JS developer position).
Then highlight those things that are not clear. Did you work on other projects in your spare-time? Did you take courses that helped you learn more? Did you follow any trainings? Are you really good at learning new things? Highlight these and be proud of the extracurricular activities you did.
Today it seems as if the world has discovered “Artificial Intelligence”, and everyone wants to be a Data Scientist/ AI engineer/ ML Engineer etc.
As mentioned above, the startup world has a lot of fluffy good sound titles. We hire a lot of Machine Learning Engineers.
Overall we are searching for people with experience, or, people for junior positions (we even offer internships), with an ability to learn and develop themselves further.
Now, let’s be honest — if you did Andrew Ngs coursera course on deep learning — then most likely it does not qualify you to become a Senior Machine Learning Engineer. It doesn’t. However it does show recruiters that you are really interested in learning more within this field.
Another random fact — by now, just by seeing the project that you worked on at your university I can most likely tell where you studied/ graduated from (this is for the Egyptian readers) — because for some reason each university conducts very similar specific projects with their students (spoiler alert: you are not the only one who did signage posts recognition during your project!).
What does that mean for you? It means that you need to reflect upon what it is that makes you stand out from all these candidates that did similar projects and studied the same coursera course.
There are so many free resources available online that you don’t really have a valid excuse to not study further beyond your university studies (of course you do, there is more in life than studies, however, if you do want to become a new world master within Artificial Intelligence — then you need to work for it).
3. Ladies — where are you?
Going away from the entire topic of having more women in STEM etc — I have noticed a very interesting, sad, thing. We receive a somewhat ok amount of female applicants (according to my expectations).
However, majority, if not all, apply for positions below their expertise. I have received some very well qualified candidates applying for junior positions — while their colleagues from the opposite sex apply for senior positions way beyond their capacities. It somehow follows the famous statistical rule: Men apply for a job when they meet only 60% of the qualifications, but women apply only if they meet 100% of them.
It has been found in several studies that women do not see the hiring process as one where advocacy, relationships, or a creative approach to framing one’s expertise could overcome not having the skills and experiences outlined in the job qualifications — but where, well, where the required qualifications are, well required qualifications.
It really saddens me that the perspective is so different between us, and I really hope that more hiring managers will become aware of this, and that of course more ladies will look into this as well.
If you are a lady and reading this — we live in a really funny world.
You will be surprised by how often in corporate life, major decisions are made and resources are allocated based not on good data or thoughtful reflection, but often based on who has built the right relationships and the courage to propose big plans.
This often goes against what us girls have been taught in schools and the way that we have been brought up. I am not sure how we can change this — perhaps more job-search courses should be offered at universities, schools etc. Regardless I hope that you will consider these words when you apply for your next job!
SUMMA SUMMARUM.
I know that it is difficult to find something — especially something that one finds interesting, relevant and meaningful. Startups can be great places to find an opportunity to work on something new and have an impact / say on the place (if it is a young and growing startup).
However, of course, as with all places there are pros and cons to any position. Remember that a startup may have less structure than a well established corporation — something that some people may find appealing in theory, but less appealing in reality.
When I joined a company for the first time after my graduation I was told by the CEO of the company — “Welcome onboard. I hope you can swim — because else you will drown.”. A very harsh, but also a realistic onboarding. For some people this works — because they thrive in these kinds of environments, for others, this can be a very painful experience.
If you make it to an interview at a startup or any company, try to figure out whether this is a place where you would like to “swim”. And be honest with yourself. Often I hear candidates name “Google” as the best place to work and that this is why they are joining the startup world: to be more “Google”, and less “corporate”. Google is an awesome company. But Google is a well established company. Google is not a small, young, scaling startup.
If the startup is scaling then maybe all policies are not in place. Maybe then the corporate cultural rituals may have not been established yet, and, maybe they need people to wear different hats. Maybe they don’t have a pension plan, or maybe they don’t have answers to all questions and well established procedures for how to deal with them. Are you ready for that? Can you deal with this type of uncertainty? Would you like too? Working with less “corporate” and more “startup” can entail certain pros and cons that you need to reflect about.
Regardless, I wish everyone reading this, the best of luck when searching and applying for your next job. I hope you will be able to find a place that will make you happy and challenge you professionally!
