I have worn the hiring manager hat for numerous roles - leaving an endless trail of scrunched-up résumés in my wake.
The hiring process can be likened to dating on Tinder - before setting up a date to test compatibility, a hiring manager is going to swipe left on the vast majority of profiles after just a few seconds of evaluation.
I have identified 6 principles that will turn your CV from an instant swipe-left into a long-lasting, gainful relationship.
Introducing…
The D.E.N.N.I.S. System
The D.E.N.N.I.S. System was originally devised by Dennis Reynolds of It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, which detailed his repeatable, reliable, and somewhat psychotic approach to seduction.
I have repurposed the system to help you seduce hiring managers, and ensure they’re lined up in your inbox, begging to give you a job.
D - Drive Initiatives
E - Embrace LaTeX
N - Name Recognition
N - No More Lists
I - Impact is King
S - Short Stints are Dangerous
D: Drive Initiatives
Here’s one of my favourite interview questions:
In your last company, what wouldn’t have happened without you?
As a senior, you should be proactive, not reactive, and this question quickly gets to the heart of whether you can get shit done.
While senior engineers are individual contributors; the best engineers’ best work is rarely code. Some real-world examples I have seen of top-tier initiative driving include:
Drove the adoption of an RFC process that’s now used for all new system designs and changes to public interfaces
Introduced security check-ins into our releases to ensure our application was up-to-date with OWASP best practices
Set up our first platform team - focused on developing and maintaining internal libraries, SDKs, and build processes
E: Embrace LaTeX
LaTeX is a document preparation system that is mostly used for scientific papers - sort of like HTML for PDFs.
Using LaTeX for your résumé sends a subtle but clear message: you love software engineering so much that you've coded your CV.
This can unconsciously sway more technical hiring managers like me from “looking for reasons to reject you” to “looking for reasons to book you into a call”.
A neat shortcut to avoid learning all the syntax - CV templates from Github as a starting point and Overleaf to actually do the editing works pretty well.
Stuck looking for a starting point?
Feel free to use my Résumé as a template!
N: Name Recognition
I’ll surprise you here: hiring managers are humans.
And like most humans, we have a strong tendency towards familiarity bias - that means we overvalue options that we already know.
Therefore, seeing a name we’ve heard on your résumé is going to immediately put us in our comfort zone, and give a great first impression before they even meet you.
Admittedly, this is more strategic than tactical - but a stint at a well-known and reputable company generally does more for one’s CV than a more senior title at a no-name firm. Big-name companies surely have a high hiring bar, and so you must be a credible candidate.
If you aren’t fortunate enough to have a big name on your work experience, don’t despair - you could, for instance, contribute to popular open-source libraries and point us to that.
Another cognitive bias you could capitalise on is social proof - it will generate a positive impression with the hiring manager if you have lots of Github stars, a high StackOverflow reputation, or, of course…