Sigh...

[hollyking]

I noticed that Rentrak is hiring again. I interviewed there in 2003 and fell in love with the company. I think I would fit in well with the office environment and working with the sharp folks there would rocket my Perl skills to 11.

Rentrak, or at least those who handle the hiring, don't have the same love for me. After my interview they never returned my calls and I've never received any response when I've sent my name in for other openings. I really wish I could find out their thoughts. Was it something I can fix such as a lack of skills or knowledge? Were there better applicants who had the skills they wanted? Heck, did I have some personality defect? I know I can go overboard when trying to appear confident and come off as arrogant. No matter what the reason I would rather know. That way I can either study and work hard to overcome the lack of skills and knowledge or just let it go if it's something I can't fix.

I'm approaching 6 years since I've worked a job where I wrote code for a living. For me this is hard because that's my bliss. It's something I enjoy doing, I'm good at it and I could do it forever. I don't want to be a manager and I'm not sure I would ever want to be a software architect. Working in an environment like I saw at Rentrak would be my ideal job.

The big problem is I'm not even sure how to restart my career and get back to coding. Sure, I get lots of calls for a job but thanks to the time I spent writing QA tools as McAfee everyone wants to hire me as a QA tester or validation engineer. They never actually read past the keywords they find on my resume (Word doc) to find out what my skills and strengths might be. In Kansas City this wouldn't be a problem because I have the connections to get a job without going through HR. Here I just feel like I've stalled and have gotten so off track I can't see my way back.

Any ideas or suggestions would be most welcome.

Comments

[davidlevine]

They never actually read past the keywords they find on my resume to find out what my skills and strengths might be.

I haven't read your resume, but this sounds to me as though rewriting it might help. If you think that certain keywords are getting in your way, don't use them. Instead of "Maintained bug tracking tool for QA department", for example, say "Coded extensions to web-based database used by developers at three sites." Focus your resume on the job you want, not the jobs you've had.

Hope this helps.

[hollyking.livejournal.com]

Thanks! That's a good idea.

[loree.livejournal.com]

You can usually ask the HR department of the company you're interviewing with for interview feedback.

[popfiend.livejournal.com]

Also, find some recruiters, and highlight what you want to do. Some of them are snakeoil salesmen/women, but some are quite good.

And rewriting the resume is a good idea. You might need a few with varying types of focus.

And what's wrong with IT Management says the Business Analyst/Project Manager?

[hollyking.livejournal.com]

There's nothing wrong management. I just know I wouldn't enjoy it and I would be very bad at it.

[dustin-00.livejournal.com]

HR turn over can be pretty high. The people from 2003 may not have liked you, but that doesn't mean they said anything bad in any file about you. They may have just found somebody they believed was better. Not responding at all to phone calls is highly unprofessional, so odds are they're not very good with their records anyway. I'd say give 'em an interview and see if they excite you now as much as they did back then.

Too get back into coding, do a couple of quick projects. Things that go over all the basics -- memory management, simple algorythms to practice syntax with. The same stuff you'd do in a college class.

Good luck!

[hollyking.livejournal.com]

I'm going to rewrite my resume using David's suggestions and then I'll do just that. What can it hurt?