The Google Resume (5 page)

When Things Get Ugly: What to Watch Out For

While professional recruiters can be enormously helpful, they can also be a waste of time or actually detrimental.

Divya discovered this firsthand when her current manager stumbled across her résumé, sent to her by her own headhunter. “I was considering moving to a smaller company, so I signed up with a recruiting agency. I figured this would be a good way to save myself some time, while increasing the number of opportunities. A week later, my manager called me to his office and passed me a print-out of an e-mail. It had a short note from my own recruiter saying, ‘Here’s a candidate you should check out,’ and my résumé was attached. He didn’t know that I was looking for a new job, and this was not how I wanted him to find out.” Divya was able to smooth things over with her manager, but things were never quite the same once he knew she was on the way out.

Katy Haddix from VonChurch advises candidates to “beware of any recruiter who won’t tell you the name of the company. It’s a sign that your résumé will be fired off at random.” You should always maintain complete control of where your résumé goes.

Additional Avenues

If you go to a small school in Oklahoma, you may not have the connections—or the job fairs—to give you a helping hand. Hope isn’t lost, though. You can still get someone to pick up your résumé, but you may have to work a bit smarter, or harder.

Start Elsewhere

“How do you get into Google? Work for Microsoft,” Jason, a Microsoft program manager, jokes. As much as this comment may have been said in jest, it has some truth to it. The best way into a company or role may be an indirect path.

In addition to joining one company so that you can eventually transfer to another, you may want to consider joining your dream company in a less-than-dream job. Technical recruiter Barry Kwok points out that a role like an office manager at a start-up can be an easier avenue into the tech world for those who lack specific qualifications. “At a start-up, office managers do everything under the sun,” Kwok explains. “As the company grows, you can begin to specialize in an area like HR. Couple that with an additional night course or two in HR, and all of a sudden you’re the perfect candidate for a full-time HR position.”

Contract Roles

Companies like Microsoft hire hordes of contractors every year to do everything from testing to development to, yes, even program management. If you’re having trouble proving that you have what it takes to earn a full-time position, a larger company might be willing to hire you on a contract basis. Because they can terminate you much easier, there’s much less risk for the company.

So what’s the catch? The catch is that you’re treated as a second-class citizen. No employee stock purchase plan. No health club membership. You don’t even get invited to the morale events. And at Microsoft and some other companies, you can only work there nine months per year. Even if the lack of perks doesn’t hurt you, the unfortunate attitude of your so-called teammates might. You’re not a “real” Microsoftie, you see. (Yes, it stinks!)

In fairness to these companies, it’s not their fault that they have this attitude. Believe it or not, they’re legally obligated to treat you differently. Microsoft lost a lawsuit years ago because they treated their contractors too much like regular employees, and no company wants to repeat that experience. So that’s life.

That said, a contract role can be a wonderful way to have flexibility in your life (nine months on, three months of vacation!) or to experience a company sans commitment. Many contractors who perform well in their jobs do make the transition to full-time employee (FTE). To do so, you need to perform well, build connections, discover open positions, and, yes, interview just like anyone else off the street.

Get Creative

While most candidates wouldn’t get much crazier than colored paper to print their résumés, some candidates go a bit further. One candidate applied to Google by affixing his résumé to a giant bouncy ball. Another candidate applied to Twitter by printing his résumé on a cake. It won’t help them get the offer, but you can bet someone reviewed their résumés.

These nonconventional applications not only show a bit of creativity, but they also show passion. And in some cases, they can show that you “get” (or don’t get) the company or its culture.

As a recruiter for the document-sharing application Scribd, Kwok saw two applicants who used Scribd itself to submit their résumés. Both were interviewed, and one became the company’s first engineering hire.

Still want that Google recruiter to notice your résumé? What if you imported your résumé to Google Docs and shared it with her (along with a nice cover letter in the share invitation)? It might not work—but it just might! What have you got to lose?

But be warned: these quirky résumé submissions may turn off the wrong company or recruiter. I would not expect a stuffy
Office Space
-esque environment to be amused by such antics.

Official Groups

In an attempt to reach out to new candidates, many of the biggest firms have created groups on Facebook, LinkedIn, and other web sites. Getting involved in the pages—by both stating your interest as well as helping out other candidates—is a great way to show your interest, as well as your communication skills and personality.

Networking

Some people think of networkers like they think of pick-up artists: sleazy, selfish, and full of cheap relationships. And they’re right—many networkers are like that. But those are the bad networkers.

Good networkers understand that quality matters much more than quantity, and that they must cultivate deep relationships by forgetting about the fact that they’re “just” networking.

Quality, Not Quantity: How to Build a Network that Works

Networking is not a thing you do when you need it. If you need to connect with a new job, you don’t just flip a switch and say, “OK, it’s time to network!” By the time you need to build a network, it’s usually too late—at least to fulfill that one need.

Networking is an all day, all year sort of thing. You build new connections by being open and interested in other people, and you deepen your connections by focusing on the value that you add to other people’s lives. Networking is about what you do when you don’t need a network.

Be Giving

Cameron, a former Microsoft program manager, wants more than anything to be a successful entrepreneur. He values building a strong network because he knows how important it is, but he’s constantly stretched for time and money. When someone asked him for help reaching out to a former teammate of his at Microsoft, he delayed responding for a week and then said that he wasn’t sure he had the time to do that. Later, someone else asked him for help with some technology decisions over coffee. He was very busy that day and said he would get back to them; he never did. While there’s no anger or hostility toward him, neither feel especially inclined to go out of their way for him. Unfortunately, neither does anyone else.

People quickly learn when working with Cameron that it’s all about
his
needs and
his
desires. It’s not that he’s trying to be selfish; he’s just shortsighted and incredibly focused. People like Cameron never build a network that is of any use to them.

Those who focus on giving—without worrying when they’ll get repaid—wind up with hordes of people in their gratitude.

Be Open

Cameron has a second problem with networking: he’s too focused. Networking, for him, is about what he’ll get out of it. He wants to meet other entrepreneurs, so he focused on meeting other entrepreneurs. If you’re an accountant, lawyer, or architect, he doesn’t want to have anything to do with you.

The problem with this is twofold. First, you might just need a lawyer or accountant one day. Diversity is good. Second, lawyers and accountants tend to know people outside of their profession.

He’s wound up with a tiny, shallow network of like-minded people—not exactly a path to success.

Be the Connector

Medhi is everything that Cameron isn’t. He’s not only a
giver;
he’s a connector. Sure, he’ll be happy to chat with you about an idea or make some phone calls for you. But he’ll also be happy to share his network with you.

Need to reach out to someone at Company X? Want to talk to someone who does Y? Mehdi knows just the guy—or at least knows how to track him down.

Not only do people feel like they owe him, but they want to help him. And how do you help Mehdi? You introduce him to people. And everyone wants to know Medhi, because he knows
everyone.

People with friends attract friends. That’s how the game is played.

Where to Network

Your network is an outgrowth of your friend circle, your professional circle, and also your online identity. To expand your network, you should be actively cultivating those relationships. Get to know people. Talk to them about what they do and what they’re interested in. And find ways that you can add value to their lives.

There are countless places you can network—alumni clubs, sports teams, even bars! But here are some of the most productive.

Immerse Yourself in Start-ups

In many cities, the start-up community is one of the most active and engaging and—lucky for you—often centers around technology. And because many of these people are or wish to be entrepreneurs, they want to build a relationship with you.

Immerse yourself in this community. Go to happy hours, meetups, and lunches. Listen to tech talks by local start-ups. If you’re an engineer, attend hackathons. Simply by showing your face regularly and talking to people about their jobs, you’ll start to build an identity in the community—and a network.

And remember, Kwok says, “If you’re working so much that you can’t network, you better make sure that your work is really good.” You’ll need it to push your way ahead of all the candidates who
can
network their way into a job.

Social Networking

Though many people lump Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn into the same general category of “networking tools,” they serve substantially different functions.

Facebook and LinkedIn help you maintain existing relationships. Generally speaking, you don’t start conversations with strangers on Facebook—and if you do, you probably don’t expect such connections to develop into professional contacts.

Twitter, however, can help you communicate with existing friends, but it’s also extremely effective as a tool to expand your network.

Here’s how to make the most of these connections.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn can be used to connect with both friends and professional contacts. One venture capitalist encourages his entrepreneurs to “add everyone they meet with—and add them immediately.”

To get additional value out of LinkedIn, encourage your connections to write recommendations for you by writing recommendations for them.

Finally, you should search out groups that are relevant to your interests and get involved in the discussions. Recruiters sure do love to hang out in them!

Facebook

Because Facebook is so good at truly “social” networking, many people overlook its professional value. In reality, Facebook’s value to professional networking is expressly
because
it’s a social service.

Virtually all of my Facebook contacts are people with whom I have some sort of social relationship, ranging from childhood friends to coworkers with whom I was friendly at work, to friends of friends I’ve seen on occasion. By and large, all of these people like me (or so I hope).

When I need advice or someone to help me, the first and often only place I turn is Facebook. A single status message is usually all it takes. Now
that
is the value of a social network.

Twitter

If you’re willing to put in the effort, Twitter can be an extremely effective tool to connect with people or join in on conversations. Most people fail to use Twitter successfully because they can’t expend the sustained, daily effort.

If you think you can do this, I would encourage you to set up a Twitter account and start tweeting relevant thoughts and interesting articles. If you don’t have an engineering background, tweeting about technology news (and your reaction to it) can be a great way to demonstrate your interest, as well as to learn more.

If you can maintain a steady flow of posts, then it’s time to start building up your “following.” Follow interesting and relevant people—they may follow you back. Put a link to your Twitter profile on your e-mail signature, on Facebook, and on LinkedIn. And start connecting with the people you most want to meet by responding to their tweets with your own opinions.

Contributing Online

To truly establish your online profile, you’ll want to go beyond the basic social networking tools and become an
online contributor:

• Create a web site,
  with at least basic information about you. Include your résumé, a picture of yourself, and a list of projects.
  
• Start a blog
  about technology, or whatever you’re interested in. Create a web site, and include your résumé and examples of your work.
  
• Write guest blog posts.
  Many bloggers are happy to let people write a guest post—less work for them! Guest blog posts are still written under your name and will allow you to link back to your own web site.
  
• Answer questions.
  When you come across questions on forums (especially field-specific ones) that you know the answer to, respond! Recruiters actually look through people’s profiles.
  
• Get involved with GitHub,
  if you’re an engineer. Download interesting software and tools, and see if you can improve them or customize them. If you find bugs, report them back to the original developer.
  

Taking these actions will allow you to demonstrate your skills even before a recruiter talks to you. Many recruiters source candidates based on their online profile. This is a great way to make a recruiter chase
you
.