[thelist] site review (portfolio)

[martin.p.burns at uk.pwcglobal.com]

Memo from Martin P Burns of PricewaterhouseCoopers

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To:   thelist at lists.evolt.org
Subject:  Re: [thelist] site review (portfolio)

>Whenever a person who has gained industry-wide recognition (such as
yourself
>to some extent Peter) submits a resume to any of the numerous companies I
>have worked for - the hiring authorities or managers tend to shy away from
>them.
>Well, in many cases, it is because the management is/was incompetant, and
>felt threatened by someone with some recognition and confidence.

That's an interesting point, Don. And it raises the question for Peter: Who
do you want to work for? Do you want to work:
* Freelance?
* Directly for the company whose site it is?
* For an agency/consultancy?

For each of those, you'll face the concern Don raises, although probably in
decreasing order of the options above. Certainly in the last one, much of
that fear will have already been handled by others before you get near the
client.

>Naturally, my gut reaction to this is to say, "All you need to do is talk
to
>me in the interview to realize what a great humble guy I am (I'm the most
>humble guy in the world!)." However, these people never even get to the
>interview stages.

Absolutely - what's the job of the resume? It's not to get you the job;
it's to
get you the interview.

>I almost feel that as I get more speaking engagements, teach some ASP.NET
>courses, and write more articles, I may put those in the background on my
>portfolio.

Yes - I think there's a critical mass of being a speaker/author where you
get
hired *because* you're known. This is the Nielsen Event Horizon ;-) It's
the
point at which clients say "We need some of that IA voodoo, but we don't
know any IA companies" at which point one of their staffers will pop up
with
the name of a guru who has passed over the NEH. But at that point, you're
probably too expensive, and you really need to have written one of the
standard books on the subject to get there (an O'Reilly or similar).

Cheers
Martin


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