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Comment by chiefalchemist | Hacker News Reader

It's not how many years, it a matter of how marketable the skills and experiences are. That said, it's also a matter of marketing (read presentation of you). Imagine someone else - all things being relatively - equal to you. But they are better presented. Who gets the call? Like it or not. For better or worse. Recruiters aren't going to buy something they can't sell.

More random-y thoughts:

- Two weeks isn't that long. If you were on a dating app looking for an LTR - and jobs are relationships - would you expect a match in two weeks?

- Not much of LinkedIn profile? I would imagine many recruiters can't be bothered. What about LI activity? What would a fly on the wall say?

- GitLab / GitHub profile and activity?

- Similar to GL / GH, what about side projects? Anything to show?

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Is the market hot or do people with 20 years of experience have to still work on additional signals like a portfolio / github profile / side projects?

Those things seem necessary as a way to signal competence when you're lacking other signals like experience or education.

20 yrs experience? Nobody cares. That not a benefit. It's a feature. No one cares about features.

Skills X, Y and/or Z?

Ability to A, B and/or C?

These are more important. Whether it 20 yrs, or more, or less. No one cares.

I didn't mean to say 20+ yrs of experience is an advantage. Its the other way around. My worry is that the application may not even be considered because of 20+ yrs of experience. Skill can be proved only after getting an interview.

I've got 20 years of experience and have never bothered with side projects, portfolios or the like. You have to have the confidence to pitch your real experience and let it shine on your CV and at interview, both from a technical and people point of view. That's what hiring managers are looking for from someone who has been in the business for a while.

If you get rejected because you don't have a recent GitHub project, that's their loss, and they don't know what they're missing.

> Recruiters aren’t going to buy something they can’t sell.

Unfortunately most recruiters don’t have the faintest idea of what they’re trying to sell, let alone what they need to buy.

Fair enough. But they do know what they have sold. They do know what clients have bought. If you're not semi close to that it's gonna be a tough go.

Thanks. Yah. 2 weeks is not enough. But I could sense the overall trend. Yes. I need to make my resume marketable. My linkedin activity also is empty. Although, I have done a lot of POC's, none of them are in public places like github etc. Agree with you that skills, quality of work etc matter the most. But that can be proved only after getting an interview call.

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