The thing is, it's not a resume-sorting problem at all. Most people aren't even qualified to be who they are.
In general, people aren't qualified to do their jobs. That doesn't mean they shouldn't be doing them, or be hired to do them. It means the qualification system is broken.
While I agree that this indeed sounds like a problem, and a genuine one at that, for the HN community this should also sound like an opportunity, to create a resume sorting systems that is much much better than the ones out there.
Are there startups already looking at this problem? If not, why not? And, who's up for a challenge?
They nearly always perform the initial sorting of resumes. People in charge of departments or groups (who are usually the ones hiring) are often too busy to sort through 400 resumes.
It's a capacity issue - you wouldn't 'find somebody who ticked all the boxes, but didn't have a degree' in the first place, because their resume would simply not make it into the interview pile. Now that may be shortsighted or suboptimal on the part of the hiring company, but it's a quick and dirty heuristic to reduce the pile of resumes to something more manageable.
While I think the problems discussed in the article need some resolution there is another issue that they do not discuss and which you allude to. Too many people are leading with their resumes and, more or less, blindly applying to jobs. Getting to know people in the industry you want to work in and the companies you would like to work at is a significantly better approach.
I agree that the whole process is flawed. In addition to the resume problem, job listings are ridiculous. They use inflated information about experience needed etc. and scare off people that might be a good fit.
The main problem with hiring/resumes isn't just volume. Volume has become a problem with the ease of sending the resume. We removed a barrier(fax, mail, drop off) and naturally the flood started. Businesses compensated by listing arbitrary values for hard skills/experience, which in turn applicants sent resumes to places they were even more unqualified for on paper.
The crux of the problem is that there isn't a way to directly quantify what is absolutely needed for a job position, and in turn, there isn't a way for an applicant to demonstrate they meet those qualifications, short of the person doing the job. The need for human interpretation is too ingrained in the current process, even with the filtering mechanisms in place
The problem is when resumes get filtered into trash because the computer determined that you don't fulfill the stated requirements (no matter how silly). Which is a common practice these days, especially in hiring agencies who are hired to do pre-screening of candidates for a company.
Add the outright dishonest recruiters ("Oh don't worry about that ultra short start date, I have only put that in there so that people apply faster!" - one 20something HR dude trying to rope me into a BS job ...) to the mix and then companies are wondering why they "can't find talent" and why skilled people have difficulties to find jobs.
From the point of view of someone who writes job requirements then receives resumes: no matter what you write in job requirements, you will receive a stack of resumes which don't even remotely match the job requirements. So many resumes that it is impossible to sift through them in any depth. In an attempt to get a stack of hundred (or more) resumes down to a pile you can read in any depth, you are forced to look at each one very briefly and put it in the "no" pile for missing, or even not clearly fulfilling, any requirements listed.
It ends up as a sort of "tragedy of the commons" situation. There might be a person in that stack, who does not literally meet the listed requirements, but who nonetheless would be a great hire. Their opportunity to be "discovered" is taken away by the large number of respondents polluting the resume stack for a job they clearly are not qualified for.
I think the fundamental problem exposed in the article is actually not the hiring criteria, but rather that resumes are usually screened by HR departments who have no clue about what a job entails. So the hiring managers have to provide hiring criteria that the HR resume screener can understand. The HR resume screener is not a programmer and has no way to judge the capabilities of programmers. The hiring manager may not be either.
As seen in a Slashdot sig some time ago, "Light travels faster than sound, which is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak." Unfortunately appearances win to those who cannot understand what is being said.
All else equal, people with resume gaps are going to get sorted to the bottom of the pile. Maybe at the high end of the market, the FAANG staff level, there aren't enough applicants so it's not a big deal, and they'll get to those applications eventually. At the lower end of the market however, there's more competition and more likelihood that someone else from the top of the pile will get hired before they get down to the bottom.
The issue my resume has is that it is being processed by morons who aren’t trying to do the right thing for their employer.
I know that for certain by the reactions to my resume from the handful of companies that actually reached out, and the reactions to my resume from the people who actually interviewed me, etc.
Replying here because the above comment is too many levels deep: this shows exactly what is wrong with hiring. Especially the HR manager who is so used to getting 100 resumes and trying desperately to find a reason to throw out 80 of them. Some of the best people I ever worked with didn't have CS degrees, and it's sad that HR still works this way at so many places.
(We are working to change it in our niche of Sales, but even there we have these same battle stories).
I'm a resume writer and former recruiter. As a recruiter I was required to 'judge' candidates based on their resume, and didn't spend much time with candidates who had resumes that didn't show what I was looking for.
As a resume writer, my job isn't to judge the candidate, but to make the candidate look as strong as possible on paper.
My work as a resume writer has led me to believe that much of the talk of worker shortages in skilled employment markets is directly related to poor resumes (and not a lack of qualified candidates).
I get a lot more personal satisfaction out of helping people write resumes and coaching them on job search strategy than I did as a recruiter. But my work has also convinced me that there are lots of people out there who are qualified for the jobs they seek, but simply aren't capable of expressing that qualification in writing.
Well I'm not the one who does resume sorting, so usually if it makes it to my desk I know there's a good chance they're qualified. If you give me (personally) two resumes, one with a master's degree from almost anywhere, and one with two years of experience doing /exactly/ what we do, I'll choose the latter first. At this point, master's degrees don't carry the weight they used to in my mind based on (1) people I've interviewed (2) my coworkers and (3) my friends and acquiantances.
In general, people aren't qualified to do their jobs. That doesn't mean they shouldn't be doing them, or be hired to do them. It means the qualification system is broken.
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