Darkened Software

Here is often what happens when you submit your resume online to a company.  It gets forwarded to all the hiring managers / leads and since it comes in off a specific email address it gets a rule applied and forwarded into a special folder as these guys can get 100′s of emails a day and do not want that in their inbox.

At this point it is up to the lead to go through all the emails and pick out which ones they are interested in contacting.  S0 now as a lead programmer I see a folder with 400 new resumes in it and this is what I see in the list of subject lines.

**************************************************************************************************
Subject                                                                            *   Date *
**************************************************************************************************
Job
Job Listing
Job Posting
Resume
Resume & Cover
Employment Opportunities
Resume email
7 Years Senior Programmer
Senior AI Programmer Position
*************************************************************************************************

If I am looking for a mid level programmer which one am I going to look at first? Most likely the last two and if I find what I am looking for I might never go back and open all 400 others that only say job or resume.  Why would I spend several hours digging through all those other email / resumes only to find out that they producers / artist / designers and not what I am looking for?

Rule # 1 Put something useful in the title, either what you are or what your applying for, its best to put both!!!

ie.   Senior Programmer applying for AI programming position

Next do not make me go digging for all your information.

• Do not zip your web site up and make my unpack it and fight with broken links just to find your resume.
• Do not make me install anything of yours just to read your resume, last thing I want to be is responsible for putting viruses on the company network.
• Do not make me download special plugins for my browser just to view your work.
• Make sure your resume is not in the latest beta version of word that only you and 3 others can view.

Rule #2 The perfect programmer submission would be.

• Put basically a Mini summary of the attached cover letter in the body of email (  I believe I can help you guys, here is why you should read my cover letter and resume ).
• Attached YourName_CoverLetter.doc
• Attached YourName_Resume.doc
• Attached YourName_CodeSamples.zip if requested in the job rec
• Can put info about how they found out about the job, ie reference or listing.
• Link to web site or sources of more information about you.

This will allow a lead / hiring manager to quickly figure out if they should be talking to you.  You do not want to end up in the email grave yard of 1000′s of people that made it to difficult to find out if they were the right person and were passed over.