March 19, 2016 at 12:17 am
Comments posted to this topic are about the item The New Men of IT
Best wishes,
Phil Factor
March 19, 2016 at 8:43 am
The article uses the acronym CV without first defining what it stands for.
Suggestion: Instead of using an acronym like CV which hardly anybody has ever heard of, perhaps the better understood term resume could be used.
March 19, 2016 at 9:25 am
Great article Phil. The core ability that all IT professionals share is what I call systems thinking. We understand the features and capabilities of the system. The key activity that we all perform is pushing business processes into the system. A better way to describe us all might be systems integrators.
March 19, 2016 at 9:28 am
well, people on the US side of the pond might not know it...
March 19, 2016 at 9:31 am
CV is a common business term and it is used extensively in academia. I prefer qualifications brief .
March 19, 2016 at 12:42 pm
GeorgeCopeland (3/19/2016)
CV is a common business term and it is used extensively in academia. I prefer qualifications brief .
Heh... I refer to both a "CV" (Curricula Vitae) and a "Resume" as a "Walter Mitty" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Mitty).
@Phil Factor,
Outstanding article but let's not be sexist. The "ladies" that I've interviewed in the last week are just as bad as the male liars, posers, and fakers. People are still failing the "GETDATE" question that I originally intended as an easy "warm up" question and the answers to other simple/basic SQL 101 questions that I get are stranger than anything I could actually make up.
I just had one young lady that claimed 6 years of "intensive work with T-SQL" and "Extensive knowledge of T-SQL stored procedures, views, functions, and triggers" tell me that a table with a "#" sign as the first character was a system table, that Temp Tables were views with no definition, that "FOR" was the necessary keyword to do a loop in T-SQL, and that you would use the "GetMonth" function to get the month number. I can't help but think that her supposed Masters degree in CIS is totally bogus, as well.
I certainly do understand the drive for "work/life balance" in the lives of people but for crying out load, at least learn something about your job people! I'd say that this is getting to be ridiculous but this has been going on for the last 10 years of interviews!
Maybe I should start asking manhole cover questions instead of simple questions about the skills they claim.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
March 19, 2016 at 12:42 pm
Not the US side of the pond.... just the US.
It's well understood and used all through latinoamericana.
However... CV had to do more with formal training and resume with experience, IMHO
March 19, 2016 at 12:59 pm
CV is not a common business term. I have NEVER been asked for a "CV" in the past 40 years, but I have been asked for a "resume" dozens of times.
March 19, 2016 at 9:05 pm
As a manager for a database development team, I get falsified resumes and CVs all the time. I had to tech-screen over 30 people to fill three positions less than a year ago. Had to screen another five to fill one more a few months ago.
I get dozens of people with "10 years SQL experience", who turn out to have spent the whole time managing simple SSIS packages.
Worse than that, I get people with degrees, certs, and years of experience, who can write any query I want, so long as I never ask them to actually do any analytical thinking.
I've got a really, seriously good team at this time. But it took a lot of work. A LOT of chaff had to be sorted out of the wheat.
Their resumes aren't any better than dozens of others I've screened. Their educations are impossible to tell apart. But the screening process got the right people.
The point is, it's absolutely necessary to screen. Don't trust the words on the page. Talk to the person.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread
"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
March 19, 2016 at 9:57 pm
I've only been in a position to interview candidates for the past few years or so, but in that short time I've been amazed at how many people I've seen with brilliant resumes (or CVs) with 10+ years of SQL experience, but then fail to restore a database for me on a technical interview test.
And also how many people sound like they know their stuff on a phone interview, but then totally bomb an in person interview.
The Redneck DBA
March 20, 2016 at 7:58 am
TheRedneckDBA (3/19/2016)
I've only been in a position to interview candidates for the past few years or so, but in that short time I've been amazed at how many people I've seen with brilliant resumes (or CVs) with 10+ years of SQL experience, but then fail to restore a database for me on a technical interview test.And also how many people sound like they know their stuff on a phone interview, but then totally bomb an in person interview.
I've actually had phone tech-screening that were (very obviously) with a different person than the in-person interview. I've been told by a few recruiters that this is actually a very big, very well-known problem.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread
"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
March 20, 2016 at 8:06 am
TheRedneckDBA (3/19/2016)
I've only been in a position to interview candidates for the past few years or so, but in that short time I've been amazed at how many people I've seen with brilliant resumes (or CVs) with 10+ years of SQL experience, but then fail to restore a database for me on a technical interview test.And also how many people sound like they know their stuff on a phone interview, but then totally bomb an in person interview.
On the phone interview thing, some people will actually have a ringer sit in for them. The way I've caught people doing that was just by making a few notes. This one fellow had a rather deep voice and, although he had an East Indian accent, spoke at a normal rate and was easy to understand. When we interviewed the candidate, he had a rather high voice, a very thick accent, and spoke at 900 miles per hour. To confirm, I asked some of the same questions I had asked on the phone interview (the answers we're actually pretty good) and the interviewee came up with some off the wall stuff that didn't match at all.
By the way to you people that do this kind of stuff... even if we don't figure out that you did this type of deception or you're a Google freak during the phone interview (gotta love the pauses and rhetorical lip to try to cover them on those), you still have to pass an in person interview where you'll find that your deception only gave you the opportunity to prove how stupid you actually are. You'll also find that some of us have gotten tired of fakers, posers, and liars and so, on the SQL side, I give a test with 3 simple non-trick problems on it that you have to handwrite some code for. If any of those are incorrect, I'll thank you for coming but I won't waste my time conducting an interview. Then, if you can't make it through the first 4 equally simple basic questions of the in person interview, the interview is over.
In that vein, I've seen a lot of posts about the "Top 6" or "Top 30" interview questions and seminars on "How to ace your next interview" or "The Secret Answer to Make Employers Beg You To Work For Them". Of course, a whole lot of the answers to any "SQL Server Interview Questions and Answers" are either grossly insufficient or flat out wrong. So here's the "true secret" to getting ANY IT job and how to make employers really want you. Ready?
[font="Arial Black"]ACTUALLY KNOW THE FREAKIN' JOB AND WHAT GOES WITH IT.
[/font]
It's that simple. No tricks. Just know what you're doing and be able to talk about it at length. What goes with it? A helpful, non-arrogant, pleasant mix of "works well without supervision" and "works well on a team" attitude. In other words, someone that acts like an adult and is interested in doing things right.
Ah... one more thing. As big as it is, it's a small world out there and word quickly gets around about you if you're deceptive. Not being able to live up to a "stellar" resume is considered to be written proof that you're a liar. No one in the IT worlds want a liar to work for them. Think about it before you put something on your resume. [font="Arial Black"]I might hire someone that needs a little work... I won't hire a liar[/font].
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
March 20, 2016 at 8:34 am
Once had a DBA that every one liked, he was busy taking care of all the users and in general highly regarded. After a little while I started to notice small naive errors and mistakes so one day I confronted him on those. Guess what, the guy admitted this was the first time he'd worked with SQL Server and in fact any RDBMS other than MS-Access. Cut the long story short, he's now a Senior DBA for another company, a job he got thanks to his previous "experience".
😎
March 20, 2016 at 11:46 am
Jeff,
Just wondering what you would say to an applicant that admitted up front that he may be underqualified, but asked you to help him figure out what he needed to learn first and how to go about it.
thanks,
Pieter
March 21, 2016 at 2:41 am
Nothing on a CV should be untrue. I have no problem with anybody highlighting the aspects that they want portrayed nor do I have a problem with someone choosing to omit some detail (e.g. it has been common for developers to avoid putting Crystal Reports on their CV to avoid "Crystal Reports" jobs).
The key factor for me is whether the CV remains true with the emphasis the author has given.
Gaz
-- Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen...they're everywhere!!!
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