In the previous post, Joe asks the excellent question on creative resumes and cover letters.  My answer, in short, is no, I haven’t seen any effective, creative resumes and cover letters. 

The most effective resumes and cover letters, to me, quickly answer the question “Why would I want to hire this person?”  We have a job description with a list of duties and requirements.  Tell me quickly how you feel you meet those requirements, and how you will fulfill your duties.  Respect my time, don’t make me search for the information.  Also, show results.  What have you accomplished?  How did it make an impact on your employer or customer?  Why should I care?

You can answer the above questions a number of ways.  List experience, with actions and results.  List skills and abilities, in various categories.  Statements such as “effective problem solver” are meaningless, and are better if expressed through the actions in the resume.  Personally, I like bulleted lists in the cover letter and on the resume, but not everyone likes those.  But clearly review your qualifications for the position.

In academia, resumes or curriculum vitas tend to be ego boosters, not job applications.  We get long lists of papers, books, grants, and other writings, little of which is of much interest for the actual position qualifications.  Several resumes I’ve seen were in excess of 50 pages. 

The short of it is to remember your audience.  You are selling yourself.  If they sold Coke by saying “Buy Coca-Cola so we can keep our workers employed and our President in a Mercedes,”  you probably wouldn’t be moved to buy it.  But that is how many people, including students approach their resume.  What would you do for the employer, and why should they care?  The benefit to you will come if the employer is convinced of the benefit to them.

I’ve been on two search committees this year, one for a faculty member in our department, and another for an Associate Vice President on campus.  I hope to show a few mistakes I’ve seen people make in applying for jobs, in hopes of guiding students in the right direction.

Mistake #1  Not addressing the job requirements.

Almost every job posting has a list of requirements, what skills, abilities, and background the person who fills this job must have.  These things need to be addressed, and shown directly in your cover letter and your resume.  Yes, that means a rewrite.  Don’t lie, but make sure you clearly show that you meet the requirements.   For example, if the job requires a Bachelors degree in Marketing, make sure that is shown clearly on your resume.  If not on top, your past experience should infer the proper education, so the hiring manager will stick with your resume to the point that you list your eduction. 

In other words, if the requirement is for a Bachelors degree in Marketing, and you list jobs first, your jobs should be marketing jobs.  If the first thing the hiring manager sees on your resume is a job digging ditches, you’ll end up in the round file, even if you meet all of the requirements.  Your cover letter and resume should be convincing the reader that you are perfectly qualified, and it should do this quickly.

If you don’t meet one of the requirements for the job, be open about this, and try to show how you have skills in that area, if not direct experience.  They may throw you out.  But they also may not get someone with everything they want.  If you are a known quantity, you have a resonable chance at the job. 

Sorry for no posts for awhile.  The semester just ended, and I’ve had several irons in the fire here.  Some of them I might tell you about.

As part of Senior Design, I lead discussions on ethics, and have the students write essays on the topics. Some students don’t take this very seriously, or don’t put much thought into it. The most recent essay is a good example. I gave them a case study on honesty, one that has been covered by the National Society of Professional Engineers Ethics Review Board. The case study can be found here. Given that the case study is on the web, complete with analysis, (and yes, the book does reference the case number and the society), I imagined that students would at least look it up to read the opinion of the Ethics Review Board. The opinion is written in such a way that it would stand out as copied if they simply copied it and turned it in, so I’m not so worried abot that. Exactly the opposite happened, with some students not even bothering to read the book. 

The students who did take it seriously had various answers to the issue. The case involves an engineer who works for one attorney on a court case. The engineer’s report does not help the attorney’s case, so the contract with that attorney is ended. The opposing attorney in the case then hears about this, and approaches the engineer to write a report for his side of the case, since the second attorney feels comfortable that the results will favor him. Several students focused on the issue of discovery, and pointed out that through discovery, the second attorney is allowed to obtain the original report, so there is nothing wrong with the engineer working for the second attorney. However, this is a false issue. Discovery is up to the judge and attorneys in the case. It is not the engineers responsibility to enact discovery on his own, and, in fact, the engineer can get in serious trouble if he takes it on himself to share information he feels is “discoverable.”

The issues as I see it:

• The engineer has had access to the first attorney’s documents and opinions.
• What the engineer did for the first attorney falls under privileged attorney-client communication.
• The facts of the case as it relates to this engineers field of work help the other side more than the first attorney’s case.

Two of these speak to not working for the second attorney. The third isn’t an ethical issue if you consider that both attorneys have access to qualified engineers who are experts in the needed specialties. It is a false dilemma to imagine that you are the only expert that can offer an opinion on this case. So in my mind, the engineer should not work for the opposing attorney after he has worked for the first attorney in the case, no matter what the case.

Some students brought up the “public safety” aspects of this. If the engineer discovered a public safety issue in his investigations, there are proper agencies to work through to alleviate this issue. If it is with transportation (airliners, bridges, etc.) the National Transportation Safety Board would be interested in hearing from him. If it is building construction, the local building inspectors or state authorities would probably like to talk to him, and further investigate.

It is up to the engineer to protect the confidential information of his client, even after the contract has ended. That protection I believe has some limits when public safety is involved, but there are proper channels for addressing public safety, beyond working both sides of a lawsuit.

Hi, I’m Nick Burns, Dr. Petzold’s graduate assistant. I’ll be answering the email that he can’t be bothered with. So here goes:

Doc p

im hving trble w my prgrm it wont cmplile caN u help???

Matt

Dear Bratt,

mby its bcse u can nly type in txt msg style??

Nick

Dear Dr. Petzold

This is Doug. I was wondering if you could set up an internship for me. I would really appreciate it. Get me a cool one like that one girl has.

Doug

Bug:

This is Nick. Your GPA is 1.9, you’re about to be kicked out of the program, and you still haven’t completed Dr. Petzold’s final from two semesters ago. I would suggest fast food, but I don’t think you’re up for it.

Nick

Dr. Petzold,

I really don’t think it is fair that you only gave the senior design groups 2 days to prepare for their progress reports. It isn’t enough time. We have lives as well.

By the way, I’m applying for Graduate School, and I need this reference form filled out and received by the Graduate Office at the U of W by Friday. Can you help?

Sam

Dear Lamb,

Sorry about the short notice. You’re right, it isn’t fair. Nothing like that happens anywhere else except in Dr. Petzold’s classes.

Dr. Petzold would be happy to hand deliver your application to Madison. He has nothing else to do in the next two days.

Nick

Mythbusters did their much awaited “Airplane on a Conveyer Belt” episode. The airplane took off normally.

Look folks, the airplane is propelled by the propeller or jet engines, not the wheels. The wheel speed has nothing to do with airspeed. If the wheels propelled the airplane, once the airplane was airborne, it would stop moving forward and drop from the sky. The wheels don’t drive the plane.

I’m sure that someone will find fault with what Mythbusters did. Get over it. You can’t create mythical conveyer belts or magic airplanes that drive their wheels on the ground and suddenly shift to being pulled by the propeller once airborne. One feature of this controversy on the web is that the rules seem to change.

And you can’t shorten the runway this way. The only way to put an airplane in the air quick is with a catapult. I don’t think I would fly commercial if they started doing that. Talk about airsickness.

The setup is simple. Put an airplane on a conveyer belt. Run the belt backwards as the airplane “drives” forwards. Does the airplane take off?

The question has caused a big controversy on some corners of the ‘net, and is now the subject of the upcoming Mythbusters episode. But it is the wrong question, and it is only because it is the wrong question that the controversy has erupted.

Why put an airplane on a conveyer? The only answer is to shorten the runway needed for takeoff. So on the face of it, the question sounds correct. However, the question doesn’t specify the length of the conveyer, or limit the conditions of takeoff. A better question would be “Does the airplane take off in a much shorter distance?” The answer is “NO.”

Airplanes need airspeed, not groundspeed (or wheel speed) for lift off. Therefore forward momentum is required. The conveyer would not give this forward momentum, but would in fact be attempting to prevent forward momentum..I say attempting to prevent, because it would not be successful. The “drive” on an airplane comes from the propeller or jet engines, which pull or push (as the case may be) the airframe forward. The wheels just allow the aircraft to move easily. Skis on snow or pontoons on water work almost as well as wheels on land. So while the conveyer ran backwards, the aircraft would actually move forwards, gain airspeed, and take off. Yes, it would leave the end of the conveyer if the conveyer were too short. But NO, the conveyer would not shorten the required take-off distance.

Ask the correct question, and you will get the correct answer. In this instance, I would guess that both sided of the argument would agree with me that the conveyer would not allow the aircraft to lift off in a shorter distance. But they are now engaged in a flame war, divided between a group who argues for my analysis above, and a group who insists that “ground speed is not airspeed.”

The idea is dumb. Let it go. Engineering is partly about defining the problem correctly. This problem has not been properly defined.

Don’t get me started on the “conveyer matches the wheel speed” argument.

ADDED:  I should note that I am not asking the question, or presenting the idea here.  I believe that if the question had been asked correctly, it would have been dispensed with quickly.  With the wrong question, it has flared into an internet war and had an episode of Mythbusters devoted to it.

On a treadmill in the gym, yes, you feel no wind in your face.  Your feet are providing the propulsion.  With an aircraft, the wheels provide no propulsion.  To imitate an aircraft on a treadmill, tie a rope to the wall, get on the treadmill, and then pull yourself forward with the rope.  You will pull yourself off the front of the treadmill. 

I’ve heard that I can increase my page views by mentioning Ron Paul.  Is that really true?  Maybe if I put up a presidential preference poll of some kind.  But that might be too much work.

I’ve just about had it with Windows.  In all fairness, I push it too hard.  I try programs, then delete them.  I scan for viruses and malware constantly.  I program.  I try different things, looking for the next big application.  But after so much of that, Windows implodes.

 It may not be Windows fault.  My office machine, a laptop with a wide screen, suddenly started to shut down.  It would just shut down in the middle of some task.  It would reboot fine, but then, after an hour or two, it shuts off.  I removed the hard drive, put in a non-booting hard drive, and removed the battery.  It has been running for 24 hours solid, with “A disk read error occurred.  Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart” on the screen.  I’m thinking it was the dead battery, but my test so far hasn’t ruled out a Windows fault.

I’ve got two Linux machines in my office, used to develop code for a Linux-based single board computer.  Fedora Core 7 is on them, and it runs like a champ. Easy on the hard drive space, and apparently solid.  I can access my Exchange based email.  I can surf the web.  I can create beautiful and professional documents, without the Microsoft look (you know the look a document gets when it has been through Word). But I can’t open Office 2007 documents, at least, not yet.  It also is a bit more involved from the user side.

Will I switch? I might. Fedora 8 is out. I’ve got Fedora 7 in a virtual machine on the Tablet PC, and I saw an image for Fedora 8 I could try.  Linux doesn’t have Tablet PC support just yet, so I could keep the Tablet at Windows with a virtual Linux image for portable development.

Linux has some bugs.  I’ve installed software, never to see it again (where does it put it?) It is not user friendly at times.  But the software is free, and there are lots of applications to try.  I can do everything I need without Microsoft.  So now, my question is, do I switch?

One of my students just posted her take on piracy, the RIAA and the MPAA. A couple of thoughts on her post:

• Intellectual property is still property. The fact that the RIAA and the MPAA are completely clueless about the internet and the profit potential doesn’t mean you can or should steal their property. There are stupid people throughout the business world. Treat them the way you would want to be treated.
• The movie, TV, and music industries have failed to comprehend the potential of the web. Their current model of selling to consumers depends on shelf space in Best Buy, theater seats, or time slots on a cable or broadcast network. The internet eliminates all of these constraints. Want to allow viewers to see reruns of Gilligan’s Island at 3:18 am? With the internet, you can, and sell advertising that is customer specific to pay for it.
• Itunes shows that people will buy music on a single-piece basis, rather than the entire album. This changes the music production process. Record the music as it is written and ready, and quit trying to fill an album, sometimes with inane and repetitive music. It should be a cheaper (less studio time, no CD runs) and more satisfying process in the long run.
• Since the major music producers, movie studios, and TV production studios haven’t grasp the web, the door is open for their demise. Independent producers and talent can jump in and make a dime, and possibly unseat traditional powers. Just as cable and satellite providers have allowed niche networks to flourish, the internet will open the door to even more producers to ply their trade.
• The movie, music, and TV production studios sell personalities. But the public doesn’t buy personalities, they buy entertainment. Ultimately, they will find their personalities worth very little, while amateurs gain followings by doing what they love, and actually providing entertainment, not ego.

In short, my advice is to not steal. Ignore the RIAA and MPAA members.  They are going the way of the buggy whip manufacturers.