The cover letter is the most important part of any job search. In mine I explained my side projects that I work on and my insatiable love of learning new technologies. I was up front in both cover letters, stating that I had no experience in the language they were hiring for, but I have a verifiable track record of being a quick learner when it comes to technology.

My resume barely matched the requirements the position, but I landed an interview on the strength of my cover letter. I basically made the same points about enthusiasm, learning ability, etc, and tried hard to come across as hard working and humble.

I disagree. I think the most important parts of any job search are attitude and aptitude. Some background: I started looking for a new job in early February of this year after the company I previously worked for shut down. At first I was worried that with the recession it might take a while to get new work so I got very serious about my new "job" of finding a job. I found one 3 weeks later without any connections (via craigslist) and I'm pretty sure it was because of the effort I put into:

- ensuring my resume would appeal to the kind of people I wanted to work with

- ranking and filtering position postings into categories based on how well they matched the kind of work I enjoy, the kind of work I'm currently good at, the salary I wanted, future opportunities and general working conditions

- writing specific cover letters explaining my background, my understanding of what the position required, why I wanted to do that job and what kinds of things I would do when I started.

- spending time preparing for interviews and studying things I believed it would be worthwhile to demonstrate in person

- ensuring my references were fully informed about my situation, understood my view of the companies I was considering and were easy to contact by potential employers without delay

When I started my search, I screened around 100 postings down into three 5-element lists (A/B/C) and sent a custom cover letter and resume to the top 10. This led to 4 interviews and 3 offers in the next 3 weeks and although I had to turn down two of the offers, I've kept in regular contact with them and have been asked to keep them in mind if my situation changes. I'm pretty certain that every one of the things I mentioned above was essential in this outcome.

Ironically for the past month I've been spending a few hours a week where I work screening and ranking resumes, conducting telephone interviews and making recommendations to our management. Although I'd prefer to be coding during this time, I know from experience that I'll be much happier in the long run if I help the company pick good people. So far I've been applying the same criteria I would want applied to me and before I agreed to do any reviews I made sure that my boss and our HR person agreed to:

- 5 specific responsibilities for each position

- 8 short questions we would send the candidate before we talk to them on the phone

- A 20 question, 45 minute written exam for in-person interviews.

Regardless of what their cover letter says, the first thing I look for is whether or not the candidate's experience and background is appropriate for the job. About 1/2 the candidates are immediately eliminated without a thought. Then I look more closely at the details and read their cover letter and assign a number from 1-3 for each responsibility indicating how well their stated experience and goals match that responsibility and record the details in a spreadsheet.

The top 1/3 of the candidates get selected for followup calls. When the call is scheduled, the candidate is emailed the questions we'll cover related to the responsibilities. Although technical in nature, none of the questions have right or wrong answers. They are intended to give the candidate an opportunity to demonstrate their ability to understand our company's goals and explain how they would fit in. Although the phone interview is limited to 20 minutes and candidates have to be clear and to the point, they are also offered the opportunity to follow up with anything they would like to say in email (although surprisingly few do so). So far only about 1/3 of the remaining candidates have been asked to come in for the interview and written exam and we've been pleased with all the ones that have.

Out of college I worked for IBM. Initial contact was at an engineering job expo. I had interviews on campus and then on site.

After that I submitted my resume to Xanga.com on a whim. I had a phone screen and then an on site interview.

From there I got a job at a law firm where my wife worked (the only connection based job I received).

Google found me via LinkedIn. I had two phone screens and an on site interview.

A recruiter found me via LinkedIn looking to fill a position for some other company. I told him I wasn't interested but from our exchange he picked up that I would like to work closer to home. When an opportunity at OpenX came along he contacted me again, and I did two phone interviews and then an on site.

In my experience LinkedIn is a great way to have jobs find you. Being able to interview well helps seal the deal - to do that you have to know your stuff and be able to present it well.

That said, never underestimate the power of connections. I got my first internship because I "knew a guy who knew a guy". You never know when your scoutmaster or soccer coach or parents' friend from church or whatever unlikely acquaintance is going to end up working for (or founding!) the company that can provide you your dream job.

Avoid overestimating the power of them as well; don't always assume it is who you know, or that who you know will make the experience better. When people err, in my experience, they seem to err in the direction of overestimating. They don't even bother to consider opportunities unless there is a connection involved, and they ignore red-flags they discover along the recruitment path simply because they have a connection there who downplays them. Often as not, they end up unhappy, but suffer through it because their only out is through more connections they don't yet have.

Sometimes, you have to look beyond the people you know.

I was in college, had no experience, and knew very little. I needed an in, and saw an ad in our Computer Science building. Emailed my resume, got a call, interview etc. I met with the owner who told me to go home and learn PHP and MySQL over the weekend. Did that, took a quick development test, and started work the following week.

I made minimum wage for about a year before we (the other newbie and myself) power played for a pay raise.

That job is what got me where I am today. We had to learn everything, be everything and do everything from support, engineering, development on through server admin and db schema design. I couldn't ask for a more rewarding first job.

From there all of my jobs have been based on my experience. My first salaried position I got because I was willing to move, could answer a battery of basic questions on programming and system admin, and I fit in. My current position I got because I learned ColdFusion at my previous job.

Everything builds from that first job. Being able to demonstrate your skills is extremely valuable. Connections can get you in the door, but real work will get you the job.

I actually got an interview through a connection once and was called the day of to cancel. That sword is double-edged.

Honestly, it wasn't very hard. If you're genuinely good at what you do, and you can prove it, then you're a huge anomaly compared to most people applying for any position, and you will stand out even without connections.

i wanted the job that i earned instead of the one i was handed. but, i'm kind of hardheaded about that type of thing.

it can be hard to know which is which sometimes.

For instance, a secretary who has a friend who is "really good with computers" who submits her resume for a job as a DBA, and that friend gets hired on the basis of that recommendation -- yes, the friend was someone I knew. I guess you could say the friend earned the job based on the criteria put forward, but not on any basis that is good for her, the company, or the DBA profession as a whole.

The staff member probably knows the applicant very well, so its basically like having the applicant be interviewed for months instead of just once. Sure the staff member could be recommending them just because he's a friend, but I'm assuming most people would not risk their reputation recommending someone who was incompetent.

So the job could have been just handed to you, or you could have actually passed the equivalent of an interview that lasted years.

Maybe I've just been around the wrong people, but this seems the primary motivation behind the recommendation one friend would give on behalf of another. Competence never entered the picture; even when I would ask about it, I was always told "it's not what you know, it's who you know," as if to reassure themselves as much as to admonish me. In some cases, the recommendations are truly noble-minded, but never underestimate the social pressure people have to practice nepotism.

I will caveat this by saying I've been hired in one or two places where the recruitment tango started through a recommendation. One of those places, it stopped mattering as soon as the phone screen began. The other, well, the person who recommended me was the hiring manager, so I'm not sure that counts. :-)

Job 2 (unplanned connection) 1999 The CEO of the 15 person software company went to highschool with a girl cousin of mine. He obviously use to like her.

Job 3 (no connection) 2001 thank you monster.com

Job 4 (no connection) 2002 side job, thank you careerlink.com

Job 5 (no connection) 2004 thank you monster.com

Job 6 (no connection) 2006 January..thank you monster.com, literally insane boss

Job 7 (no connection) 2006 July..thank you indeed.com, bored had to leave.

Job 8 (no connection) 2007 June..thank you craigslist

The thing that I am most grateful for that has helped me get jobs without connections is Job #5. The company was growing fast and had hundreds of areas where I could work on sql performance tuning. Even when I arrived home I would always dial in to work on sql performance tuning. I gained most of my confidence (not arrogance) making significant contributions during Jobs 3, 4 and 5. That confidence gained through experience helps during an interview.

1. I was working at an ISP help desk and a local computer repair company called in desperately needing help with a *nix box. Went out on my own after a shift and helped the tech out. He emailed me the next day and asked if I was interested in working for them as a repair tech and if so when would be a good time to do a short interview. I eventually moved up to the director of web dev at this job. (Side note: Getting the ISP job was because of a direct referral)

2. I applied for a web dev job at the local newspaper about 4 years later. They offered me the positon about five weeks after applying - two weeks after my second interview. They were notoriously slow for interviewing and hiring people.

3. (current gig) Two years after that I applied for a web dev gig at the state university and was offered the position about 4 hours after my first and only interview. The interview went really well and all my referrals were awesome.

Now between all those jobs (about a 6 year span) I've probably applied for at least 5 other web development jobs and didn't even get interviews for all of them. For some I'm sure the lack of a college degree really made them think twice. In one interview I got burned on some technical questions that I couldn't answer which probably removed me from the pool.

While knowing people can be extremely helpful, I've found being ready when opportunity knocks much more useful. To put it another way, don't stop learning new things.

By continuing to expand your knowledge you prove that you're smart enough to learn and use new things, and that you care enough about your work to make yourself better at it.

If you're looking for something new, I'd seriously recommend getting to some events and at least making _some_ connections. If you're in a city that has IT jobs, there are groups out there; it might just take a little looking to find them

From the internship came the job. Yay.

You could go the route of posting your resume to job boards, writing great cover letters, etc; but knowing people is a two-way street. Not only can they give you an in, they can also tell you if a place is any good or not to work for.

Hit rates for monster etc are pretty low. Local job boards, University "career center" online listings other low volume job sites are still worth looking at. It is how I found both my current position and my last position.

Having experience that isn't related to work or school seems to be key.

As for difficulty, it was 5 interviews including coding exercises, so I guess I did okay.

Never underestimate the value of a reputation in the community.

That sucks. I won't do that again if I can avoid it.

One, in the paper(!), the second through a local technology association website.

I'm still working there, 6 years later.

Left that job to go to a start-up where I was introduced to the founders through a connection. The problem is that (initially to me) the position didn't seem sufficiently technically challenging to me (standard LAMP development), so my connection ended up both a) "selling" the position to me b) "selling" me to the founders (who in turned tried harder to convince me that the position would be interesting).

That's always a sticky issue with referrals: they give additional reasons for hiring a person and a additional reasons for the person to accept the position. The company will feel the referring employee will be happier and more productive if his friend/former co-worker is hired; the referred connection will want a chance to work with someone they already knew and enjoyed working with. Problem is that these reasons can detract from the real questions at hand: "is this person a good fit for the position" (for the employer) and "is this a position where I know I will be happy" (for the employee). Neither side should be trying hard to sell themselves. Note: obviously I am talking about engineering vs. sales. In sales the candidate should be selling themselves (they're expected to sell the product) and should have built up a rolodex of connections in the industry.

When it came time to leave the start-up (due to the office moving out of my reasonable commute range and lack of technical challenge meant I wasn't interested in moving yet again), I applied to four companies (three of them big names, one a mid-sized start-up)-- two by sending in a resume in response to online job ads (Dice.com, LinkedIn), one by a contact from a recruiter, one through a referral. Got interviews from all. Got offers from three and (after more sleepless nights than I imagined) chose one-- the one position I didn't get an offer for was the one where I was referred (yes, it was Google).

All of this happened in Summer/Fall of 2008, as the market was crashing. So, your mileage may vary. My tips are this: write your resume smartly (show that you're competent, don't tell) tailor the resume (and especially) the cover letter to show that you're passionately interested in that specific job. If you use the UDP Multicast method of sending a resume (blast out 100 copies of it to 100 different positions), as expected with UDP Multicast, don't expect it to be processed. Apply only to jobs you (judging from the job description) feel you will be happy to do (which will make displaying passion and interest in that position very easy).

Here are some good resume tips (although I've read them after writing my resume): http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2007/09/ten-tips-for-slightl...

http://www.globalnerdy.com/2007/09/26/steve-yegges-resume-ti... (in case your response towards the first link is "TL;DR")