I have posted about Seth Godin often enough; discussing the Radiohead online album release last year, why developers need resumes, an amusing commercial, and Seth’s summer internship - which is only available for those close enough to NY to work.
The later, about summer internship, is related to the developer resume post. Seth wasn’t referring to developers in particular, but I found Seth’s post via another post specific to software developers. Seth’s post was much more generic: Anybody who is great, need not provide a resume, though they should provide an application before April 2 2008, in PDF format and not less than 4 pages. If you don’t need a resume why do you need a 4 page PDF document?
Brandon Laughridge contacted me earlier today about his application to be Seth Godin’s intern. Brandon is a 19 year old finance student at the University of Missouri, so he’ll have to travel to get to Seth’s new office. Brandon is currently working in the SEO and marketing field, so he used his grey matter and put together a blog. Day 1 on Brandon’s blog was March 13, the internship was announced on Seth’s blog on March 10.
It does seem a little extreme to purchase a domain name to get a job - but it’s only $20 I suppose. How would the other employees treat you, or would you end up in an environment where everybody does that? I guess that is Seth’s point, that you end up working with people that are willing to put in the effort that you are willing to put in… if you submit a resume, so did your co-workers. If you built a website showing the world why you deserve the job, then that’s about the people you work with did. That, or they didn’t need to.
A related post by CareerHub:Seth’s Half Right, put it well; it’s great if you have a project they can touch, a reputation that precedes you or a blog that will compel prospective employers to follow you up. But apart from Seth, most people want you to send in a resume, with more than a couple of references and a URL on it. You’d need more to fill 4 pages anyway. How about a video resume? Sounds fun anyway.
But back to Brandon, will he be able to create enough buzz to get his job of a lifetime? Which reminds me a lot of Patrick Moberg’s girl of his dreams… Though Patrick managed to get on the news, will the traditional media help the rest of us get what we want? Is this the way to get the job we want - or if we are that bloody good - why do we even want the job? I look forward to seeing the results of Brandon’s efforts and his competition.
Some of my earlier contributions to Seth’s technorati popularity:
- Summer Internship with Seth Godin on Squidoo
- Seth’s Blog: Before you buy your next ad…
- Radiohead slowly revolutinising the music industry
- Seth’s Blog: Why bother having a resume? vs Hedgehog - Why good developers don’t need a resume
Update: [27-Mar-2008] I’ve discovered that Brandon has another blog that he’s had up for almost a year. And that Seth has apparently commented on Brandon’s intern application blog - that would be a reasonable sign - visibility.
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4 Comments
Have Brandon complete a Video Career Profile at http://www.interviewondemand.com. It’s free. It will showcase his resume, short video interview clip and “why you should hire me” summary on one web page! Brandon can send the link to Seth. Good Luck Brandon!
It’s an interesting website… can you tell us more about it Peggy?
@Peggy, I’ll check out the site. I only have a week left so I don’t know if I have enough time but I’m going to look into it.
@James, thanks a lot for writing such a detailed profile about my site/cause. It was really exciting to see Seth comment on my blog this morning! I sent him an email to verify that it was him and sure enough it was. Exciting stuff.
My actual application is somewhat unique as well so hopefully I can get his attention. Thanks again for helping!
@Brandon, one month isn’t a very long time to put anything together, but who likes to wait to find out the outcome?