[AccessD] On resumes and cover letters

[Bill Benson]

Arthur, the solution for your MAIN problem is simple. Leave off dates of
graduation, and only show the last 10 years of work you have done and for
whom. You include all the technologies you know in the Experience section,
that ticks enough boxes for AI to get your resume matched to jobs.

No one can legally ask your age or when you graduated or started uour
career. In fact with many application processes they don’t even want you to
give them dates because then they can get audited by EEOC and he shown to
have rejected more older people than younger, as a percent of age strata,
so you are doing the employer and yourself to nix that sh-  er, shenanigans.

But do list the projects where you came on the scene, saved the day, worked
well with teams, brought projects across the goal line.

And don’t say things like “30 years later my solution is still in place”,
for obvious reasons.

And I totally agree with Susan, lose the preemptive scorn!

On Fri, Apr 22, 2022 at 5:12 PM Arthur Fuller <fuller.artful at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Premisses:
> a) I am 74 years old and all too aware of the ageism that rules our
> industry.
> b) I am also aware of the severe shortage of programmers who can actually
> program, and the desperation in the industry to find and hire such persons.
> c) Certain skills slowly evolve, to keep pace with their underlying
> languages. SQL is a case in point. Newish features  have been added to the
> core SQL definition, some of which are vendor-specific -- which violates
> the pure abstraction that SQL initially offered. Big Data Clusters are one
> example, an attempt (IMO) to stave off the onslaughts presented by other
> offerings. More importantly, the shift to document storage kicked the knees
> out of the traditional SQL religion. Documents, by definition, do not
> conform to neat rows and columns, and are more easily described and
> expressed in HTML and similar formats. This shift led to a gradual
> rethinking of the domain formerly understood as Database Management.
> d) It is not easy for a SQL developer to make this shift in domains. It is
>
> . All this can be taken in stride by a competent SQL programmer. And so the
> firm (whether large or small, or even indirect -- call them staffing
> agencies, lest I use a more insulting term) employs allegedly AI software
> to scan the submitted resumés.
> I digress. Now that I have managed to survive this many years, I really
> don't give a fork about how I am perceived by the headhunters and/or firms
> on whose behalf they toil. In fact, what I want to do is disrupt their
> algorithms completely. I don't care whether I am considered for an
> interview, much less hired or contracted. I can survive without them -- and
> that is a degree of freedom almost no one knows. It doesn't mean that I can
> thrive; that's another discussion; but it does  mean that I can pay the
> rent, feed my two cats and myself, pay the internet and cell providers, so
> to that extent I am free.
>
> So I want to craft a resumé that basically says, "I don't need you, but you
> need me, and I am willing to discuss terms and conditions, but your offer
> better be good or I shall just Walk On By and say Bye Bye."
>
> To put this all another way, I don't need the money. I don't need to be
> rich. Enough money to pay the rent and feed the cats and once in a while
> pay for a new laptop, that's enough. So money alone is insufficient
> incentive. A truly challenging problem, ideally one that could improve the
> world at large, now that is an incentive!
>
> So how do I write this up?
>
> --
> Arthur
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