RussellMc wrote: > That's an interesting addition. > Apparently he, by your standards (which are high), was deemed to be > good at what he did, but his resume was a disaster. He was originally just another software guy. As people learned he could ge= t things done, he started becoming responsible for some of the system admin tasks, network sleuthing, router babysitting, and the like. This was a small shop and nobody was formally in charge of that stuff, so he ended up falling into that role unofficially. I had to interact with him a few times in his sys admin and network master role, and he seemed to know what he was doing. The software he was responsible for writing as his official job was part of a larger system, so it was less easily proven he knew what he was doing. However, things seeme= d to get done on time and none of his fellow software engineers grumbled abou= t him (as they did in other cases). The occasional interaction I had with hi= m as a software engineer told me he knew what he was doing, although it wasn'= t totally clear he really understood everything versus poking at it until it worked. I didn't think about that last part until later as a result of the resume incident. > It's not at all unknown for people to be highly competent experts in a > specialist area but unable to perform at all well in others. True, but a consistent trait I have seen from all really good engineers is attention to detail. That may be completely the wrong trait for someone like a salesman or a job where quick decisions that are 90% correct is more important than carefully thought out decisions a day later that are 99% correct. There certainly are such jobs. The text-only resume formatted to oblivion made me think of him quite differently for several reasons. First, it rather pissed me off that he dumped such a mess on me when I was trying to do him a favor. I'm sure he didn't understand the no-win position that put me in. I'm guessing his thought was "This is just for Olin, he already knows me" without thinking i= t all the way thru. That in itself is of course a important insight into his character. Second, it illuminated a side of his character that I wasn't aware of, or more accurately as I thought about it later, that my subconcious had glossed over. I guess I hadn't thought about it much (this guy didn't work for me) since he generally got things done as expected. After getting the resume it put some things I had noticed earlier in a different context, and him in a very different light as a result. Upon reflection, the signs were there before, but had been covered up by his apparent productivity. I never saw any code he wrote, or anything else he wrote for that matter, but in hindsight I bet it is much more of a mess than I imagined at the time. Looking back, I think he got things done because he got relatively small and well defined tasks. I think letting this guy architect and then implement a large system would have been a disaster. In the end I am somewhat relieved I didn't burn up my reputation giving him the recommendation I was intending. Now if he'd only taken a extra couple hours and made his resume presentable, none of this would have happened. O= n the other hand, if he had done that he would have had a different personality, and it would have been OK to pass the resume on. I think you can only learn this stuff to some extent. Character traits, like the attention to detail so essential for good engineers, is something you're born with. > Sometimes > this is a complete disqualifier for a role. In other cases Old-Joe in > the backroom lab may be unable to tie his shoelaces and may always > have coffee stains on his short, BUT be the secret weapon that gives > the company its edge. That's a very different kind of person than this guy was. > Who gets to judge the merit of such things may be important. He who pays the bills, of course. ******************************************************************** Embed Inc, Littleton Massachusetts, http://www.embedinc.com/products (978) 742-9014. Gold level PIC consultants since 2000. --=20 http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist .