October 1998 Column

RESUME SEARCH EXTRAVAGANZA

 Search the Internet

For this month most of the work will fall on your shoulders. We have compiled a listing of what we believe to be a fairly comprehensive listing of career/resume oriented internet sites for you to visit and review. Some are pay and some are free. In previous articles we have discussed the cost/value issues for some of these sites. Do not let a small monthly fee come between you and your next placement. These sites have been compiled from many sources. Not all sites have been personally checked. Do not be surprised if you run into a few dead-ends.  

A note on Boolean Searches. 

There are many excellent discussions of Boolean logic on the various search engine web sites. Take time to read the rules carefully to understand what search terms each web site will accept. The best search starts with a carefully written job order that details what you are looking for. The order should include terminology that would only be used by an expert in the subject you are searching for. These key terms are the optimum search material.  For example, if you find someone discussing object oriented 2-phase commits in an n-tiered architecture adhering to the A.C.I.D. standard, then you can have some confidence that you have found a middleware architect, most likely with M3 experience. 

Try out your Boolean search string with a variety of changes until you are confident that the results reflect your intentions.  As a rule of thumb, if the query returns more than 100 hits, refine the query to be more specific.  This will save you time and increase your focus on finding the perfect candidate.

 OR 

Search the newsgroups.

 Below are a few which offer resumes. There are never any dues or fees either for posting to or downloading from a newsgroup. You do need specialized software – a newsreader. If you have Internet Explorer or Netscape, you probably have a newsgroup reader already. All you have to do is set up your reader for your ISP. Usually it is something like news.ispname.net. Although newsgroups are free, they are not very organized and you can waste a lot of time viewing one message after another. Check out a filter or newsgroup search engine like Dejanews (see above) and your life will be a lot easier.  

 A note on newsgroup etiquette.

When you first learn about newsgroups and listserve (mailing lists), it is so tempting to place messages in the forum to solicit candidates. The excitement is understandable. These forums are some of the most targeted concentrations of technical professionals available in the world today. Unfortunately, an inexperienced recruiter’s initial foray into a newsgroup often will result in a flame (angry response) from one or more members of the discussion or from the moderator of a mailing list.  Put yourself in their shoes – the purpose of a technical newsgroup is for technical people to meet and discuss technical issues. If they find it difficult to do so because their forum is cluttered with recruiting messages, then they have a right to be frustrated. The most upsetting recruiting messages are those with subject lines that are disguised as technical questions. While many web services will post job openings onto selected web sites, even they tend to avoid posting to technical discussion forums or mailing lists.  Web services also make it clear in their postings that they are recruiting messages in order to avoid confusion. I initially attacked newsgroup recruiting by having a newsgroup reader download the entire daily contents of selected newsgroups and then I entered the data into a database.  This takes hours for downloading and data entry. The best solution is to stay out of the newsgroups and simply mine them for information using a search tool like Dejanews or Hotbot. These tools allow you to search recent content for information that you need and save it in your database in a fraction of the time that you would spend with a newsreader.  After you download the data you want, you can send a personal email to recruit to solicit prospects privately, without cluttering up the newsgroup.  My philosophy is that a recruiter should be invisible on technical discussion newsgroups.  This is called lurking.  You lurk to get the information you need and then use it outside the group to do your recruiting job.  A good Dejanews session could yield hundreds of possible candidates in a few hours. You can send solicitation emails as you gather the possible candidates or, you can search quickly and then send them all a message at the same time.  The advantage of gathering all the candidates at once is that search engines like Dejanews only hold data for you for a few minutes.  If you take time to send a message as you find each prospect, you may find that your search has to be re-started because the busy Dejanews server has released the data it was holding in memory for you in order to free up space for someone else’s search.  If you choose to gather all the data quickly and then search, a good tool for mass mailing without spamming (appearing to send junk mail) is:

 Ariel Campaign –

http://www.arialsoftware.com/download.htm).

Another tool is NetMailer –

http://secure.webfiler.com/cgi-bin/agent.exe?cmd=log&usr=guest&htmok=neworder.usr;orders-guest\Online_Orders

OR 

Find your own sites.  

There are undoubtedly many more than listed above. Go to the search engine of your choice, enter RESUMES, EMPLOYMENT or something similar as a keyword, click the SEARCH button and be prepared to wade many sites that may or may not be relevant. Somewhat time consuming but you potentially find the diamond in the rough (a new board offering good potential but still reasonably priced). These search engines are also good places to locate the boards offering free trials. Try these engines:

 www.altavista.digital.com

www.excite.com

www.yahoo.com

www.lycos.com

 Also, we know the list is incomplete. Please email us any of your favorites and we can add to this list and re-publish periodically.

PS – Following up on an idea from a reader, the article for next month will include examples of introductory letters used by experienced Internet recruiters. If you have a favorite intro. letter you use to “reel them in”, please email to us and we will review for submission in this article. Thanks in advance for taking the time.