Re: the unexpected challenges of applying for a job

["Mike O." <obie1121 -at- yahoo -dot- com>]

Erica Sullivan wrote:
> So, I see this great job.  It's nearby.  It's right up my alley in terms
of
> product and tools.  So, I'm off to apply.  Of course, when they "suggest"
> that I use their resume builder, I do

Resume wizards are evil. Either learn to adapt them for your purposes, or
avoid them altogether.

> Then they have these two block fields where that they call "skills" and
> "comments" where you can put anything you want.

So that's where you post your ASCII resume, the first line of which is the
URL for your *real* resume - "Download my formatted resume at [yourURL]."

Paste the URL for your real resume in every field that will accept it,
regardless of the stated purpose of the field. Whenever there is a dropdown
or picklist, pick "Other," because you are counting on the keywords in your
ASCII resume to attract the searchers.

The preview function is cool... because if you use their input fields
creatively (i.e, without regard to the 'instructions'), you can make the
final version look however you want.

> Good thing too because when I look at it, those two block fields have
> rolled each line into the previous.  No line breaks.  Just lots of
asterisks
> (can't use bullets just in case) Great.  Now, mind you I'm not being anal.
> It's not that I just want it to format it pretty.

Doesn't matter. They aren't going to read it - they are just going to grep
it. Probably nobody will ever view it on a page.

Mike O.