The resume has been met with a great deal of scrutiny over the past few years. We’ll spare you the gory details in this post, but we encourage you to take a look at another one we shared a few weeks ago about how important the resume is to the hiring process, especially when assessing programmer and developer skills.
It’s not the resume that’s to blame, but our way of looking at it. The average person draws conclusions about a person within 7 seconds of meeting. Humans are too complex for those assessments to be accurate yet most companies allow the hiring process to be heavily reliant on first impressions. The resume brings a level of balance to that process, introducing the facts of a candidate’s experience in a more anonymous way.
The document, no matter its layout, will give information on previous employers, skills, training, etc. It allows those skilled employees who struggle with the first impression to prove their potential. The point is to put applicants on a more even playing field while presenting hiring teams with evidence of why or why not a candidate should be hired.
Though resumes present such important information, most recruiters only spend an average of 6 seconds looking one over in the first few rounds of screening. And we’re right back to making big hiring decisions on small first impressions, even if the facts are more clear.
Beyond Typical Resumes
Resumes have some pretty key information to help recruiters and hiring managers make smart hiring decisions, but they are often only given brief attention. In fact, they aren’t always placed in the hands of humans, but are instead left at the mercy of machines that run solely off of keywords that humans provide. Sometimes the person supplying the keywords understands the job they’re hiring for and sometimes they don’t, meaning naming conventions might stand in the way of connecting with a talented professional. Meanwhile, some of the most talented candidates rely on the idea that their resume and its contents will be viewed by those who work within their industry.
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All in all, a typical resume doesn’t build the strongest bridge between candidate and recruiter. Recruiters need something that will save them time and speak at the level they can confidently understand. Candidates need the chance to explain their skill level and expertise to its fullest capacity without overcompensating with keywords and formatting.
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Computers and Humans are Better Together
In 1940, Edgar Dale, a professor and educator, coined his famous Cone of Experience in which he claimed humans only remember 10% of what we read, 20% of what we hear and 30% of what we see. While the theory hasn’t been proven or debunked, there’s no one really denying that a machine, built to store data, can obtain and retain information at a faster rate with more accuracy than a person.
When it comes to reviewing a resume, those faults are magnified. For one, humans are incapable of remembering all the words of the resumes they read and if it’s only being reviewed for 6 seconds, their comprehension has to be minimal. Additionally, people are incapable of reading those words without injecting some of their own biases and opinions. One recruiter might see their job titles and think, “solid candidate” while another sees previous employers and think, “bad fit.”
A computer, on the other hand, has no biases. It considers data and draws conclusions based on algorithms. Names are merely a way to access files. Humans need that mechanical leg to keep the hiring process ethical and machines need people to keep the process warm and, well, human.
The Winning Combination
There is a way to make hiring more streamlined without losing human touch. Built for tech hiring, Pomato looks beyond words on a page. The technology reads developer and programmer resumes to understand the actual skill level of talent. Using the resume, Pomato can analyze keywords and the context of those keywords to determine the individual’s proficiencies in various aspects of tech work. Instead of focusing on job titles, it determines candidate capabilities from actual responsibilities they’ve held and places that data into easy to digest graphs and graphics.
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Often, a lack of standardization in technical job positions and workers can cause confusion for recruiters and hiring managers. With Pomato, recruiters and hiring managers are given clarity to the real potential and experience a candidate has, no matter what level they believe they have reached. Even more, Pomato allows users to see a breakdown of the candidate’s previous positions in a way that explains what type of job they thrive within. For example, one candidate may have held a web development position for 5 years that was evenly balanced between designing and developing with some project management. However, the candidate only averaged 6 months to a year when working in positions that focused only on development. Chances are that candidate is suited for a job that provides variety in work.
The world of tech recruiting can be cutthroat. Losing top tech talent to human error or a small resume flaw is too big a price to pay. In 2016, 78% of tech developers were actively looking or interested in a new opportunity. Don’t miss your chance to connect with them.
Want a smarter way to recruit tech talent? Download our printable, 7 Must Try Tips for Smarter Tech Recruitment, and start hiring candidates more efficiently.
