Re[2]: Want Ads

Subject: Re[2]: Want Ads
From: Bonni_Graham_at_Enfin-SD -at- PROTEON -dot- COM
Date: Wed, 2 Mar 1994 10:22:00 EST

Marcia Whitmore notes:
"I myself have avoided using a street address or a name in an ad in the
past to avoid lots and lots of phone calls or visits from salesy
headhunter types. Have others done the same?"

When I had to replace myself at my last company, I listed our phone number
and address hoping I'd get lots of phone calls. I figured I'd rather save
applicant's postage and my reading time for those I felt were most
qualified based on a phone screening interview. It didn't work. I got
almost no calls, and a hundred million resumes, most of which showed that
they had not actually read the ad. It was amazing to me how many people
(some of them saying they were professional writers) who would send an
ugly, badly written resume to an employer asking for writing and design
skills. Your resume should reflect your skills. Granted, it's a
restricted format (most of the time -- I use a brochure rather than a flat
resume so I can display my design skills), but it's still possible to
create one that isn't actively unattractive.

BTW, on my earlier post about red flags and reference letters being one of
them, I should mention that the place in question was a temporary agency,
and that the only other times I've been asked for written references
before the interview was for secretarial or receptionist work.

My well-designed (hopefully) and well written resume display my
professional skills -- my references contribute to "corporate fit" as I
see it (and as most of the people with whom I've interviewed see it). I
don't know that I want to work for a company that sees "fit" as being more
important than competence, and that's what asking for references first
says to me.

This is an interesting thread -- in an ideal world, what would you like to see
want ads for technical writers look like? I'd like to see the insistence on
knowing a particular piece of word processing or desktop publishing software go
away for everything except temporary positions (where you really do have to be
able to be up and running fast). OTOH, employers are justified in asking a
programmer to know a particular programming language -- is it parallel? What do
the rest of you think?

Bonni Graham |
Technical Writer | Most software is run by
Easel Corporation, ENFIN Technology Lab | confused users acting on
Bonni_Graham_at_Enfin-SD -at- relay -dot- proteon -dot- com | incorrect and incomplete
President, San Diego STC | information, doing things
| the designer never expected.
NOTE: apparently my email address needs |
to be typed exactly as it appears here, | --Paul Heckel, quoted
punctuation and all, or the system gets | by William Horton
upset. |


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