Ask HN: Best resume format for auto-fill online job apps?

50 points by JHof 9 years ago | 33 comments

Numerous online application systems have you first upload a resume in .docx, .pdf, .txt, from which an attempt is then made to pre-fill out much of the online application. This doesn't work very well and basically requires one to complete the entire app. Anyone out there have experience creating these programs? How do they work and what's the best way to format a resume so that they work properly?

BinaryIdiot 9 years ago |

I would skip the entire step of sending in a resume that has to auto fill that type of information (if possible; not sure what industry you're in).

Almost every single time I've submitted a resume through whatever process a company has to do so (which almost always includes one of these systems) I RARELY hear back in any decent amount of time (if at all; the amount of technology companies that have never sent any type of response to me at all is absolutely staggering).

However, if you can find the recruiter's email address, the email address for the head of a group you want to work for or even a hiring post (like HN's Who's Hiring) where they give you a direct email address to send to, those are almost ALWAYS the best.

I'll never forget applying to one company a while back where I submitted through their online process then, later that day, saw their email address in the Who's Hiring on HN and directly emailed them. I went through two interviews as a result of my direct email then almost a month later got a call from whoever received my first application. The crazy thing is that one was FAST and actually responded to me; most are super slow or never respond to me.

ThrustVectoring 9 years ago | |

Direct email works wonders, especially if you have some kind of in. The first software development job I got was from a friend suggesting I email their CTO (after they had done particularly well in an interview). I hadn't heard anything back in a week through the standard process, got a reply to the direct email trying to schedule an on-site within fifteen minutes.

stingraycharles 9 years ago | | |

I indeed have hired people that approached me this way. Some other sources land directly into my inbox (such as StackOverflow or some niche job sites), but generally it's best to take as short a route as possible. Not many people do that, so it's not something I would hold against a candidate.

SmellTheGlove 9 years ago | |

Excellent advice. I've noticed that it's pretty common for in-house recruiters to be very open to connect on LinkedIn. Reaching out to them first would be my suggestion if you don't have any other connection in the company.

vtange 9 years ago |

Don't spend too much time worrying about this. There's a reason why companies use ATS and that's to filter out a large volume of applicants.

Even if you formatted well, you'll need to have enough keywords, etc. to win against the crowd.

Your time is better spent working on networking. My current job came from a friend's referral and honestly, I'm sure many companies will take a referred candidate over a candidate whose resume got the green-light from a machine.

vonmoltke 9 years ago | |

That only really works for companies local to you. Plus, it ignores that at many large companies a referral just means an extra tag in the ATS that might or might not help you bubble up.

SmellTheGlove 9 years ago | | |

I think by referral the poster meant a contact within the company passing a resume directly to the hiring manager. I'll have someone put me down as the referrer when they apply online, but I also ask them to send me a resume and I make sure it goes to the hiring manager.

runlevel1 9 years ago |

If I were building a tool that parses resumes, my tests would probably begin with resumes based on the default Microsoft Word templates.

I usually layout my resume in something like InDesign and render it as a PDF. Anecdotally, those parsers perform terribly on them.

For instance, a couple years ago Jobvite had a problem parsing tables in PDFs rendered with Adobe Quartz PDF print driver. They wouldn't allow you continue until the parser succeeded.

Their recommendation was that I rewrite my resume in Word.

libria 9 years ago |

We really need someone to convince all these ATS's to use a standardized format (i.e., hResume). I would think Linkedin would have both the clout and interest in pushing their one of their own design.

akeating 9 years ago |

If I read this correctly, you're interested in formatting your resume in a way that (hopefully) gets the right data into the right place in the target systems. Many of the systems you reference use third-party software such as http://www.sovren.com/ that attempt to fill the void. You will end up optimizing your resume to fit certain categories. Implicit in all this is that the end user may only utilize a subset of all the possible categories of resume information. You might consider playing around with the Sovren api, or use a fairly well known format, such as the LinkedIn profile pdf.

kowdermeister 9 years ago |

I wouldn't send anything but PDF. The only way that it will look the same you intended to.

Parsers are based on millions of CV-s as inputs and they are looking for patterns. I'd guess that layout is much more important than format.

JustSomeNobody 9 years ago |

Food for thought:

If your resume is treated this way, how will you be?

superuser2 9 years ago | |

Quite possibly better. The primary function of putting hoops in front of candidates off the street is to reduce the proportion of existing engineer time spent giving technical interviews that result in a "no hire." Unless you really like interviewing, you may well have a better time as an employee at a company that makes things harder for applicants.

There is a concern that drudgery weeds out the wrong people. However, "we want to hire people who have a strong desire to work here in particular" is a pretty common belief in SV and if you subscribe to it, then some putting the lowest-success-rate applicant pool (online resume drops) through some clerical annoyance makes perfect sense.

TheSmiddy 9 years ago | | |

I think the resume filtering practices end up filtering out way too high a percentage of people who are actually good at the job and just bad at writing resumes.

A better hoop to force applicants through would be one that demonstrates some aptitude for the job which, upon successful completion, gives them access to the job submission portal/email address.

For example in a customer service role have the applicant play a game that follows through a sample phone call where they have to choose the response they would give to a customers problem.

midnitewarrior 9 years ago |

I've read that .doc/.docx/Microsoft Word format is the most desired. I've had recruiters tell me this, and I've seen posts on reddit about this. It all comes down to metadata and formatting -- the automated resume parsers do a lot better with Microsoft Word, especially if you use the templates.

coolmitch 9 years ago | |

FWIW, I think word formats are most desired by recruiters because they can be easily edited to ie. remove your name and add skills the recruiter thinks will get it recognized. I'm pretty sure word formats are pretty unamenable to parsing, aren't they?

wtracy 9 years ago | | |

I agree 100 percent that recruiters prefer Word docs because they're easier to tamper with. (A recruiter once asked me over the phone if I had my resume in a format other than PDF, then said it was okay because he had a way to edit it anyway!)

That said,

> word formats are pretty unamenable to parsing

Compared to what? Almost all resumes show up in .doc or .pdf format. Maybe the occasional snowflake will submit an HTML file, a WordPerfect document, or a .swf file.

Candidates submitting raw text (or something like JSON) are going to be few and far between. (Although RTF is actually straight text under the hood, and I'm surprised I don't see it mentioned more often.)

vthallam 9 years ago |

Its tough to prepare a universal format for all ATS to parse and if there is one, they would have been promoting that format all along.

Some ATS keep first name, last name, email as the only mandatory fields and in that case a basic resume where you keep the name as the first thing on top would work. But most of the others ask for your visa status, ethnicity and various other things, so that has to be manual work again.

As far as i know most of the resumes made in simple LaTeX have had more chances of getting parsed.

PS : ATS refers to Applicant tracking systems which many companies use to post jobs and track applicants and manage the hiring process.

patio11 9 years ago | |

FWIW: it is extraordinarily unlikely you will be asked your ethnicity during the job application process at any US employer. Universities, sure, all the time, because they intend to racially discriminate against disfavored groups. Employers who do that lose large lawsuits.

citizens 9 years ago | | |

In my experience a lot of US job applications ask you to volunteer your ethnicity.

One example: Stripe asks if you're Hispanic/Latino: https://stripe.com/jobs/positions/engineer/apply .

dragonwriter 9 years ago | | |

> it is extraordinarily unlikely you will be asked your ethnicity during the job application process at any US employer.

Untrue.

> Employers who do that lose large lawsuits.

Employers who ask it during the application process usually do it in a manner which allows the data to be tracked in aggregate but separated from the application through the hiring decision process, and retain clear documentation of this process and its execution so as to be able to defend themselves against any charges of inappropriate use of the information in hiring decisions.

Many employers are required to report this information in aggregate, but I'm not sure that they are the only ones who track it for their own information.

noer 9 years ago | | |

Employers in the United States over a certain size (I think it's 50 employees, but i could be wrong) are required to report demographics of their applicants to the Federal Government. The responses must be voluntary and they cannot be tied to any specific applicant (so, they can't see that applicant A listed themselves as White and applicant B listed themselves as African-American).

namelezz 9 years ago | | |

> It is extraordinarily unlikely you will be asked your ethnicity during the job application process at any US employer.

That's a big lie there.

pknerd 9 years ago |

_Shameless Plug_

A while back I wrote a Python script automating Job applying procedure for Glassdoor. It worked for a guy who got the job. If one finds it interesting, contact me at kadnan at gmail.com. Both trial and paid version available

softawre 9 years ago | |

You have a paid version of a python script? Curious how that works.

`print('Paypal me 20 bucks please!')`

poikniok 9 years ago | | |

I agree it is weird, but I would guess he sends basic version of script for free to people, and then tells you what additional features the paid one has. However clearly one could just pay for the script and then post it online for everybody, not sure how he would prevent that.

pknerd 9 years ago | | |

yes, free in a way that it does not perform ALL things that paid does, for instance; apply ALL jobs return after search.

Speaking of decompiling, offcourse one can do it but not everyone is a techie. My script is used by non-techies and good people :)

gtk40 9 years ago |

I've found ones that pull from LinkedIn do best, but I treat that as more of a comprehensive CV that I would cut down to be a resume for a particular job.