Resume Feedback
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This table is just enormous. I'm with @IRJ that you need to remove the tiering and make this a tight, small list.
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I think that with some good effort you are reasonably looking at being able to condense this to a single page. between removing the top, and cutting the space used for the top table and the bottom list in half, it's only a matter of reducing the large, sprawling bullet points from the job histories.
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Thanks for the feedback everyone. I'm going to look at making revisions when I get home later this evening. At that point I'll try to get an updated PDF posted for further critique.
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See if you can get down to a single page. It's a big effort, but often well worth it. It forces you to squeeze out any extra stuff. Extra words, lines, whatever. Distil, distil, distil.
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@scottalanmiller said in Resume Feedback:
See if you can get down to a single page. It's a big effort, but often well worth it. It forces you to squeeze out any extra stuff. Extra words, lines, whatever. Distil, distil, distil.
I'm thinking simplification of the table by removing the tiers of familiarity and dropping bullet points will help with that. I'll cut down the heading, drop the recruiting position, and chop the education section as suggested. Hopefully those changes paired with a different font/combination of fonts will accomplish that.
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I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
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@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
You can and put it as anticipated.
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@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Are you months or years away from it? If you are in year 1 of 4 then it really doesn't say much, but if you are 6 months away from graduating that says a different story.
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@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Keep in mind that (serious) development requires years of experience and analytical skills. Mention that, but don't put it above everything else.
It's like writing a book: Most people can write, but writing a good book is a whole different story.
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@IRJ said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Are you months or years away from it? If you are in year 1 of 4 then it really doesn't say much, but if you are 6 months away from graduating that says a different story.
I pretty much always put it if I am working on it. If there is like a set date or proposed one, you know.
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@thwr said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Keep in mind that (serious) development requires years of experience and analytical skills. Mention that, but don't put it above everything else.
It's like writing a book: Most people can write, but writing a good book is a whole different story.
Yes, and my goal for pursuing this degree specifically is to eventually transition into a Development Operations role of some sort.
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@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
@thwr said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Keep in mind that (serious) development requires years of experience and analytical skills. Mention that, but don't put it above everything else.
It's like writing a book: Most people can write, but writing a good book is a whole different story.
Yes, and my goal for pursuing this degree specifically is to eventually transition into a Development Operations role of some sort.
I'll just throw out there that to get into development you can do that much faster without going down the degree path. One year of self study should be able to get your farther than a four year degree.
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@scottalanmiller said in Resume Feedback:
@IRJ said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Are you months or years away from it? If you are in year 1 of 4 then it really doesn't say much, but if you are 6 months away from graduating that says a different story.
I pretty much always put it if I am working on it. If there is like a set date or proposed one, you know.
Realistically, with my current workload at work, I'm right about a year out from finishing. The major courses I have left to tackle will take a bit of serious time investment, but nothing too horrible. (Java 8 SE OCA and OCP certifications as well as Technical Writing)
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If the degree is the goal, then nothing will replace that. If career advancement or change is the goal, there are normally far more effective options. Software development is actually the one field that I know of that is more dramatically in favour of skipping the formal education path than IT is.
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@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
@scottalanmiller said in Resume Feedback:
@IRJ said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Are you months or years away from it? If you are in year 1 of 4 then it really doesn't say much, but if you are 6 months away from graduating that says a different story.
I pretty much always put it if I am working on it. If there is like a set date or proposed one, you know.
Realistically, with my current workload at work, I'm right about a year out from finishing. The major courses I have left to tackle will take a bit of serious time investment, but nothing too horrible. (Java 8 SE OCA and OCP certifications as well as Technical Writing)
Oh okay, you are pretty close then. Definitely put it on.
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@scottalanmiller said in Resume Feedback:
If the degree is the goal, then nothing will replace that. If career advancement or change is the goal, there are normally far more effective options. Software development is actually the one field that I know of that is more dramatically in favour of skipping the formal education path than IT is.
The degree in and of itself is definitely a goal. I'm at a point where I am financially stable and debt free and I'm able to pay for it out of pocket without any major impact on my finances. However, I'm really invested in learning the material as well, and have enjoyed OOP so far and I'm looking forward to advancing toward the OCP certification. At first I wasn't all that excited to become an expert in Java, but the concepts all translate to other OOP languages quite easily. And this specific program has a heavy focus on requiring a good foundation in IT/IS before pursuing the programming focus; it is really quite ideal for DevOps. Personally I think they could completely drop their A+ cert requirement and replace it with Linux+ and/or some of the newer AWS certification, but overall I think there is a lot of value.
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@RamblingBiped I saw this being someone doing the same thing. I'm just very acute in knowing that it's a degree for the degree's sake and it is at the cost of my career, not to its benefit.
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@scottalanmiller said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped I saw this being someone doing the same thing. I'm just very acute in knowing that it's a degree for the degree's sake and it is at the cost of my career, not to its benefit.
Yeah, if I had not found this specific degree program I was looking at enrolling for a degree in Business Management. If I had gone that route I feel like I would already be done... lol
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@scottalanmiller said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
@thwr said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Keep in mind that (serious) development requires years of experience and analytical skills. Mention that, but don't put it above everything else.
It's like writing a book: Most people can write, but writing a good book is a whole different story.
Yes, and my goal for pursuing this degree specifically is to eventually transition into a Development Operations role of some sort.
I'll just throw out there that to get into development you can do that much faster without going down the degree path. One year of self study should be able to get your farther than a four year degree.
Good point.
@RamblingBiped : If you really want to get into development, do something useful. Either start your own project, not something you will never use but something that is useful and fun to do. Get a Raspberry, Orange Pi, Banana Pi for example and do whatever you want. Maybe a cloud-enabled toaster or a home alarm system?
Another way could be to contribute to a small open source project. Maybe a mod for Minecraft? One of our students is doing exactly this with great success and learned a lot from this.
Either way, you will probably learn much more.
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@thwr said in Resume Feedback:
@scottalanmiller said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
@thwr said in Resume Feedback:
@RamblingBiped said in Resume Feedback:
I'm currently working on a degree in Software Development, should I put the unfinished degree on my resume as well?
Keep in mind that (serious) development requires years of experience and analytical skills. Mention that, but don't put it above everything else.
It's like writing a book: Most people can write, but writing a good book is a whole different story.
Yes, and my goal for pursuing this degree specifically is to eventually transition into a Development Operations role of some sort.
I'll just throw out there that to get into development you can do that much faster without going down the degree path. One year of self study should be able to get your farther than a four year degree.
Good point.
@RamblingBiped : If you really want to get into development, do something useful. Either start your own project, not something you will never use but something that is useful and fun to do. Get a Raspberry, Orange Pi, Banana Pi for example and do whatever you want. Maybe a cloud-enabled toaster or a home alarm system?
Another way could be to contribute to a small open source project. Maybe a mod for Minecraft (one of my students is doing exactly this with great success and learned a lot from this)?
Either way, you will learn much more.
I do regularly work on things that are outside of the scope of my work, as well as outside of the scope of my studies. One of the reasons I am considering using Bootstrap to create an online version of my resume is to familiarize myself with it for future use.
I'm also going to be working in C soon to write some software that functions as a notification system for our fire alarm at work. Our entire alarm and door entry system was designed by a couple of our software engineers. I'm going to be tying the fire alarm system into it all and then making it work with our PBX to automate notifications of a tripped alarm via phone/text/email. If I'm lucky it will also qualify as the project for finishing up my degree.
I've had that suggestion of creating a Minecraft mod from others as well, I just don't have enough time to devote to Minecraft at this point to work on a mod... lol
Can you think of any specific open source projects that I could benefit from contributing to/monitoring? I'm keen on anything to do with Python or Java at the moment.
