This is becoming less and less true.
> You need to ignore the form and talk to a person.
Unless you're lucky, this is no longer going to happen. Getting a job is now becoming much more about luck, circumstances, and who you already know, much like getting your first starring role in a movie -- not about your abilities.
So the goal is to figure out how to get in touch with that hiring manager as the first step. Even if the form or HR "rejects" you, this person can step in say, "that's silly, I want to work with them. Send them through"
I think this charade of sending in resumes to forms is causing people so much pain. It feels like rejection and is not moving them closer to a job.
Just wait... some time-pressed startup is going to find a killer LLM prompt that filters in exactly the people they want, and then post something on the benefits of "vibe hiring". Complete with large, well-spaced text, colored with one accent color, and several graphs of hiring spending vs. income or something.
You heard it here first!
Incompetent hiring will kill you, and hiring people that you and your team don't personally gel with is incompetent hiring.
So I see that as a self-solving problem.
That's not a new thing. It's how it's always been.
Getting a starring role in a movie has a lot to do with abilities, not just luck and who you know.
Many companies are looking for strong mission alignment, because when it's a buyer's job market, why not select someone who has intrinsic motivation for what you are doing? Are you passionate about the problem? That is a lot like auditioning for a starring role: do you understand the character you might be playing? Many jobs - especially desirable ones - use this sort of "mission alignment" as selection criterion.
The thing that's different in software is that because the equipment needed to demonstrate technical skills is so cheap (just a computer) and trust in representations of technical experience is so low, they can test for technical skills in a way that other industries can't.
I don't think that anyone asks a civil engineer to design a bridge or a surgeon to remove an appendix to get a job.
My first job in the industry was in a startup that went belly down. Most of us didn't get much opportunity to network.
Thankfully, I happened to contribute to two open-source projects. One of them was a (then) obscure language called Rust and another one was Firefox. Both contributions eventually turned into career-defining moments for which I'm still reaping benefits 15 years later.
Had I contributed to Vlang and Camino instead, my career would probably have been much less satisfying.
