The Best Skills to List on a Tech Resume

lbj. said:
As an upcoming 4th year student in undergrad mechanical engineering, I'm scared as f about finding jobs after all this thread..... (not that I wasn't before, but this didn't help) :(
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Me too... I hope I chose the right major... (computer engineering)
 
I think many people don't understand that college degrees, while becoming less and less relevant in American society, are also not the credentials hiring managers look for first when it comes to applicants. Experience is by far the king of salary.

The last thing we want to hire for our team, besides someone who is lazy and is completely incompatible with us, is some fresh college kid who was taught all the wrong things and has to be re-taught how real world systems work. We have an intern right now, and he's very smart and quick to learn, but we had to have him toss a lot of what he's learned so far out the window, like 'classful networking'. Who teaches that shit anymore?

Sit down, work on some code, put a network lab together, play with virtualization, get some certifications; the college degree is going the way of the dinosaur, especially in the tech field. Academia is too slow to keep up with advances, and tuition is prohibitively expensive. I will not suggest college to my children if they cost this much and give this little in return in the next two decades.
 
Dark Shade said:
I think many people don't understand that college degrees, while becoming less and less relevant in American society, are also not the credentials hiring managers look for first when it comes to applicants. Experience is by far the king of salary.

The last thing we want to hire for our team, besides someone who is lazy and is completely incompatible with us, is some fresh college kid who was taught all the wrong things and has to be re-taught how real world systems work. We have an intern right now, and he's very smart and quick to learn, but we had to have him toss a lot of what he's learned so far out the window, like 'classful networking'. Who teaches that shit anymore?

Sit down, work on some code, put a network lab together, play with virtualization, get some certifications; the college degree is going the way of the dinosaur, especially in the tech field. Academia is too slow to keep up with advances, and tuition is prohibitively expensive. I will not suggest college to my children if they cost this much and give this little in return in the next two decades.
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I dont fully agree with this at all. It may be true from a lesser known school, but my experience out of college 6 years ago and now hiring for large firm in NYC, college degrees from a good school matter. We will hire recent grads from a ivy league. A recent grad from a lesser known school will definitely not be given that consideration. If you have 10+ years experience it doesnt matter much, but 'foot in the door' its huge.

Not my policy :)
 
Youn said:
That one stood out as "wth" to me as well.

Maybe they meant "node.js" which is kinda like a ".NET" thing... sorta... I know MS and some other big companies started using it, as it's a pretty new and exciting thing.
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js.node, doing things with javascript that the language was never meant to do.
 
Breath_of_the_Dying said:
"Who you know" helping you is a statistical truth, referrals have a higher chance of being hired. It's not fair, but that is life. Its just as unfair for people to be super intelligent and have a perfect memory of any concept or term they read.
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There isn't anything "unfair" about getting a referral. Referrals work very well for companies because they are usually a good, hardworking employee referring someone they know who would make a good, hardworking employee. It doesn't always work out that way, but if it does it's way easier for a company then taking an unknown quantity from off the street. I've been the hiring manager enough, who hired someone who didn't work out as intended, that one of my employees recommending someone they know who could do the job would be my first choice. They still have to get through the interviewing process and have the right skills, but if nothing else a referral should always be a good "foot in the door".

I was hired into my current position because my buddy worked for the company and was very well liked. On top of that, I found out later from the team lead who hired me that I was easily the most qualified candidate. I like to think I'm doing a very good job for my company and that they're happy with the selection they made... ;)
 
collegeboy69us said:
Maybe I notice these things because I'm the only one in the department with a degree (A&M - Economics - whoop!)
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You think there is a reason for that?

One of two possibilities: You may be the 'test bed' of whether they can get real work out of the new arrogance crowd phenomena, or you may just the substitute for not finding a real worker as a result of the company not being able to find anyone with experience.

Either way, you might do better to just be happy you actually have a job and try to minimize the vocalization of your self valuated 'superiority'.
 
Dark Shade said:
I think many people don't understand that college degrees, while becoming less and less relevant in American society, are also not the credentials hiring managers look for first when it comes to applicants. Experience is by far the king of salary.
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It goes both ways. Companies know they need a mix of fresh blood and experience. The reason college degrees are needed for youth is because that is the only way to differentiate achievers. It has nothing to do with intelligence once you are at a certain capability level. Companies hire grads so they can train them to actually be useful down the road and they begrudgingly deal with the interns lack of maturity and under deserved yet artificially inflated level of self esteem.

In short, you better have relevant experience if older or a degree if younger. One thing is certain: Experience always wins in the pay scale.

That being said, the only real thing a college degree proves is a person knows how to spend 4+ years partying.
 
BBA said:
That being said, the only real thing a college degree proves is a person knows how to spend 4+ years partying.
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I beg to differ. Sure, college is 4+ years of playing around. But because it's so easy, why on earth would you hire someone who's too lazy to go? It's basically the bare minimum these days, rather it's needed or not. Do you want to hire someone who's not going to put forth the effort to reach the minimum?

If I were going to hire someone without experience, I'd look at it like this:

Tier 1: Folks who built a business instead of (or in association with) going to college. Of course, why would he work for me? He's self-employed.
Tier 2: Folks who went to college, and didn't goof off in their free time. They've got their names in open-source projects, academic papers, and at least a year of experience as an intern. Self-motivated, hard workers.
Tier 3: Folks who went to college, and did no more than the average. They had enough motivation to go to school and finish, but not enough to excel. Average worker.
Tier 4: Folks who didn't go to college, and worked minimum wage jobs. They're the ones you'd have to constantly supervise because they'd do crappy jobs.
Tier 5: Folks who sponged off their parents and whined about how "hard it is" to find a job. If they even bothered to show up for work, you know they wouldn't get anything done.

And of course, experience trumps all else.
 
Cali3350 said:
I dont fully agree with this at all. It may be true from a lesser known school, but my experience out of college 6 years ago and now hiring for large firm in NYC, college degrees from a good school matter. We will hire recent grads from a ivy league. A recent grad from a lesser known school will definitely not be given that consideration. If you have 10+ years experience it doesnt matter much, but 'foot in the door' its huge.

Not my policy :)
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For someone who works for a Fotune 100 company. Let me tell you he is right. College degree's in todays society mean nothing any more. It's experience that counts and that is what employeers look for today. I have had to retrain people right out of college because they were doing things wrong. They would mess up way more than people that had just experience. I look for expereince now, and not college degrees. If both are there, then thats great.
 
I mean there are plenty of people who put the time and money into collage but put little effort into it and their degrees is worthless because they didn't learn anything other than how to lazily push through to make themselves look better for employers. It's deceptive and shows a lack of real honest effort. I'm not sure the percentage but it seems to me like the majority of people that go through collage have this attitude. Either that or they are just depressed because there aren't a lot of jobs, or they just don't know what they want to do in their lives. In any case, it's understandable, but it just goes to show you shouldn't make assumptions about a person because you could be dead wrong about their true nature.
 
BBA said:
In short, you better have relevant experience if older or a degree if younger. One thing is certain: Experience always wins in the pay scale.
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Try working in the government space without a degree...you will not get paid well even if you have experience.
 
Youn said:
I mean there are plenty of people who put the time and money into collage but put little effort into it and their degrees is worthless because they didn't learn anything other than how to lazily push through to make themselves look better for employers. It's deceptive and shows a lack of real honest effort. I'm not sure the percentage but it seems to me like the majority of people that go through collage have this attitude. Either that or they are just depressed because there aren't a lot of jobs, or they just don't know what they want to do in their lives. In any case, it's understandable, but it just goes to show you shouldn't make assumptions about a person because you could be dead wrong about their true nature.
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Tier 2 vs. Tier 3 ;)
 
well, don't forget the self-taught, hard workers... they are plentiful especially in newer technology related fields.
 
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