I posted an Account Manager position like a week ago or so. I received 8 applications in a week, 3 of which were a great match for the position, which is quite a lot for the tight profile they are looking for.

Some features and services I liked about TheLadders:

• It’s Free to post jobs on TheLadders.
• Customer Care service is absolutely amazing. I called them up and a person picked up, no machine, no menus, no routing, no hold, straight to a person. This guy was amazing, he tracked my account in 5 seconds, provided me with all the help I needed, approved my postings within the minutes (the website states that it can take up to 48 hours) and sent me off with a smile.
• Their candidate managing interface and applications managing interface is absolutely great. Incredibly comfortable, simple, fast, with no unnecesary features, lets me save resumes, accept or decline a person for a position, gives me a direct contact link. Cheers for the developers at TheLadders.
• The database is very well fed. I found matches for my positions straight out, and my posting was viewed by more than 80 relevant candidates in just 5 days.

I recommend and evangelize the use of TheLadders amongst my colleagues. Of course that it will bring in more results in certain areas than others, but there is no cost in posting a position and it takes something like 5 minutes, and you can always decline an application.

Well, as promised, here is a full CV that you can use as a template when building your resume. I have deleted all personal info and company info from it, but left all of the rest because I thought this was a great CV, that provided complete and total information of the qualifications of a candidate with 16 years of intentse IT experience in very good form and lenght.

Enjoy! (You’ll find it below, I did the break because it would be too long if I didnt)

{candidate name}

12345 Fake St.
Asdasd, CA 99999
Work: 111-111-1111
Cell: 111-111-1111
fake@email.com

Objective:
To secure a position as a Senior UNIX System (Solaris,Linux,AIX,HPUX) and Network Administrator that lets me utilize my years of experience in Unix/Solaris, Linux, Windows System Administrations, Network administration.

Summary:

Highly versatile Systems, Network Administrator, with over 15 years of Unix (Solaris, Linux AIX, HP-UX) Windows(NT 2000 XP),Cisco Routers, Switches, Firewalls Administrations, Network Administration, Web Server Administrations(Apache, Sun ONE). Excellent knowledge of Unix Operating Systems (Sun-Solaris, Linux ,HP-UX, AIX) Sun Volume Manager (Disksuite) -,Veritas Volume Manager, Sun Clusters, VCS, TCP/IP, NFS ,NIS, DNS, LDAP DHCP, Sendmail. Veritas NetBackup. Expertise in Installing, Administering and Troubleshooting Sun Enterprise servers and Sunfire Servers along with HP, IBM and Linux servers. Excellent knowledge in writing Shell Scripts for automation of Unix Systems. Expertise in Enterprise Systems Management, Resource management, capacity Planning. RAID, Fiber Channel Storage. Proficiency with patch management using Solaris tools. Ability to work with business leads to translate business requirements to technical specifications. Automation of server builds using Jumpstart , Redhat Kickstart, Network Monitoring management, and customer QOS. Excellent knowledge of Troubleshooting network performance issues. Sound knowledge of Source code version control (CVS,Subversion). Working knowledge of RPM,SSH,SCP,SSL,SNMP. Implement tools to monitor Unix/Linux system performance.

CERTIFICATION

• Microsoft MCSE + Internet, MCP + Internet
• Novell CNA
• Introduction to Oracle: SQL and PL/SQL

OS EXPERIENCE
Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows 98, Windows 95, Windows NT 3.51 and 4.0 (Intel and Alpha), Windows and DOS, NetWare 3.12, 4.x, 5.x, VAX/VMS, and UNIX (AIX, SUN, HP, Digital, Linux)

PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES
Perl, PL/SQL, Transact SQL, Visual Basic, Visual C++, VMS C++, C, Java, HTML, CGI, VB Script, Java Script, Dynamic HTML, Active X, Active Server Page, Modula-2, VHDL, Assembly (MC68000), Pascal, LISP, ICON, SmallTalk, ProDOS BASIC

TOOLS
InstallShield, FrontPage 98, Visual InterDev, Visual Studio, I-TECH SCSI and Fibre Channel analyzer, Network analyzer, SPICE, Analog Workbench circuit design, Mentor Graphics VLSI design, Mentor Graphics VHDL design, oscilloscope, HP assembly code analyzer

{Note: Depending on your experience and field, here you might also add a “Hardware” section, or anything else that is relevant}

Experience

July 2006 to Present:
Company 1 Inc
Systems Support Engineer.
Environment:
Hardware: Sun 120′s, 220′s, 240′s, 280′s, 420′s, 440′s, 480′s, 490′s, 880′s, 1280′s, and 2900′s, T2000. IBM Blades, x33* Series (NT and Linux), and Rackables (Linux), NetApps.
Operating systems/Softwares/Tools: Sun Solaris 10,9,8,7,2.6 Solaris X86, Redhat Linux Enterprise server 3.0, 4.0 Redhat AS 2.1, Samba, Apache, Unix Shell Scripting, Perl ,OpForce , Jumpstart, Kickstart , VCS, Clearcase.
Responsibilities:

• Providing installations and System Support services for Internet data centers .
• Deployment and Support of UNIX and Linux operating Systems, configurations of the same to specifications, and security configurations.
• Configuration of storage devices, Clustering software, and integration of the customer applications within the context of the cluster.
• Performing Testing and verifications of systems, network connectivity and functionality prior to being released into production.
• Performing UNIX builds such as Solaris 8.0 and 10.0 , Linux RedHat 6.2, 7.0, Redhat Enterprise 3.0, Redhat Advance server ,Cyclades(console servers).
• Building Solaris systems using Jumpstart and Redhat Linux systems using OpForce.
• Resolving the customer systems issues using ticketing systems (Remedy based) .
• Maintaining current hardware infrastructure while also building out new hardware infrastructure using Sun Servers , IBM Blades , X33* Series (Linux) Rackables (Linux).
• Configuring and troubleshooting Apache, CFengine .
• Configuring and troubleshooting NetApps.
• Key Member of the team which is responsible for the infrastructure that supports software development and release engineering environment before code changes deployed to company website.
• Deployment and management of Linux/Unix Servers, troubleshooting, Performance tuning, modifying DNS, Web server administration, allocating SAN storage and creating VCS clusters.

September 2005 to July 2006
Company2, Irvine, California.
Product Line Support Engineer.
Environment:
Hardware: Sun Enterprise servers 250,450,3500,4000,4500, Sun Fire 280 ,480 , V880, 3800 , 4800 6800 Sunblade 1000,2000.Sun-Cobalt LX50, Vx60/65.Sun workstations Ultra1, 2,5, and 10,60,80 Sun Storadge(A1000,A5200, D1000,T3 + ), HP/Compaq DL 360,380, MSA1000, CISCO Routers, Switches, PIX firewalls.
Operating systems/Softwares/Tools: Sun Solaris 10,9,8,7,2.6 Solaris X86, Redhat Linux Enterprise server 3.0, Redhat AS 2.1, HPUX, Samba, Apache, Patchlink Patch Manager, Unix Shell Scripting, Perl ,Concord Sysedge, HP Openview. VCS . RAID.
Responsibilities:

• Providing installations and System Support services for mission-critical Customer Businesses.
• Deployment and Support of UNIX and Linux operating Systems, configurations of the same to specifications, and security configurations.
• Configuration of storage devices, Clustering software, and integration of the customer applications within the context of the cluster.
• Performing Testing and verifications of systems, network connectivity and functionality prior to being released into production.
• Internet Data center (Web hosting and consumer online) tier 3 7/24/365 Unix/Linux Support.
• Apache , DNS/BIND, Sendmail configuration, maintenance and troubleshooting .
• Patching production Servers.
• Unix/Linux System Performance and Tuning.

March 2000 to September 2005
Company 3 INC., Santa Clara, California.
IT System Technologist.
Environment:
Hardware: Sun Enterprise servers 250,450,3500,4000,4500, Sun Fire 280 ,480 , V880, 3800 , 4800 6800 Sunblade 1000,2000.Sun-Cobalt LX50 ,Vx60/65.Sun workstations Ultra1, 2,5, and 10,60,80 Sun Storadge(A1000,A5200, D1000,T3 + ) IBM Rs/6000, DEC Alpha 2100 servers HP D and L Class, Itenium servers. Dell Poweredge Servers.
Operating systems/Softwares/Tools: Sun Solaris 10,9,8,7,2.6 Solaris X86,Linux(redhat,suse) AIX, HPUX, Veritas Volume Manager , VCS, Sun Cluster ,Samba ,Apache, SUN ONE Webserver, Directory server. CVS, Subversion. Unix Shell Scripting, AWK, Perl, C, HTML, Smokeping, RRD tool.
Responsibilities:

• Installation, upgrade, configuration and customization of Sun enterprise servers and workstations.
• Installation/upgrade, administrations of Linux on Dell and HP Hardware.
• Developing shell scripts for automation, monitoring and accounting.
• Backup and recovery practices to ensure better availability of systems.
• Installations and configurations of webservers like Apache, Iplanet and Sun ONE web servers.
• Troubleshooting day-to-day problems Managing Disk space and configuration. Patches installations, Software management, installation and configuration. Hardware Troubleshooting and running diagnostic tools.
• Implementation of RAID using Sun Volume Managers (Disksuite) and Veritas Volume Manager.
• Configuring Troubleshooting Sun Cluster ,VCS .
• Assigning file and directory permission to the users. Restricting the file and directory access. Configuring hosts, disks and printers. Streamlining system procedures and restricting the root access.
• Maintaining network and data security. Configuring the systems for TCP/IP Networking with the existing Local Area Network. Setting up SSH and SCP features between SUN systems and other UNIX hosts.
• Implementing the Backup procedure. Crash Recovery and minimizing down time in case of system failure. Installing OS patches, automated patch deployment and maintenance updates. Core dump Analysis. Failure analysis and finding the root cause.
• User Co-ordination. Daily support to end user problems and maintaining the environment.
• Setting up DNS servers and clients.
• Production level support to CVS servers which hosts Sun ONE product codes.
• Storadge administrations.
• Supporting the Remote labs which are part of the Sun Education course curriculum.
• Measuring the Student connection quality (QOS) to the Labs from various locations all over the world including connections from student homes.
• Measuring Network parameters like RTT, Bandwidth, Powerloss etc for student connections. Monitoring Network connections quality between remote labs data Centers in US, Europe and APAC.

July 1991 to January 2000
Company 3, San Francisco, CA
Asst. Systems Engineer.
Environment: Sun Solaris Sun Enterprise servers, AIX Operating System, RS-6000RISC Servers, Ingress 6.4, MF-COBOL 3.0, SCO UNIX 3.2, SCO ODT 2.0, NetLabs Manager 2.0.3 , FDDI, HP NetServer LC.3. Running Microsoft BackOffice Server 4.0, Pentium PC’s Windows 98 & NT workstation as clients. Visual Basic 6.0 Windows NT 4.0 Server, MS Exchange server 5.5, MS Proxy Server 2.0, IIS 4.0, MS FrontPage, Windows 98, Windows NT Workstation, MS Outlook ,Digital DEC Alpha Servers, DEC Unix Version 3.2D.1 (Rev.41), Oracle 7.0, Windows NT server Windows NT Workstation 3.51, EXCEED
Responsibilities:

• UNIX (Solaris, AIX, DEC), Windows Systems and Network Administrations.
• Co-ordination between users and SW Vendors while the System was being customized for MBPT.
• Implementation of the Projects.
• Incorporating the changes and upgrades to the system reported by the users.
• Providing linkages to various systems as required. Monitoring the linking of monthly file transfer / receive from various sub-systems.
• User management. Resource management. Performance tuning, Disk management and Scheduling of processes.
• Data backups handling, system crash/restoration.
• Installations /upgrade of hardware and software.
• Networking of applications. Network administration and design.
• Administration of MS SQL Server. Testing the connectivity from Visual Basic client to the MS SQL Server database.
• Involved in planning for future expansion of the project. Providing remote connectivity. Planning the replication of the servers both on NT and SQL servers.
• Prepared documentation and conducted technical training for users.
• Optimization of the domain which contains Domain Controllers and several Member Servers running MS SQL Servers and Exchange Servers and IIS.
• Analyzed the present system and performed the requirement analysis for the expansion of the systems and Networks.
• Planning Local Area Network on the FDDI backbone spanning over 12kms. Procurement, installation, testing, commissioning and maintenance of networking equipments such as Routers, Bridges, Hubs, Terminal Servers.
• NetLabs Manager 2.0.3 running under SCO Open Desktop 2.0 for monitoring the health of data communication network. Netlabs Manager is a network management platform that can manage a wide range of networks and it supports SNMP, CMIP over TCP/IP & Ping.
• As a Network administrator and System administrator, I was responsible for testing, configuring, installing & commissioning of networking hardwares like Bridges, Routers, Hubs, Modems, Multiplexer Cards, and Dumb Terminals.

Education:

• Master of Science (MS) in Information Technology, Network Architecture and Design Specialization from Fake University, Minneapolis, MN.
• Bachelors Degree in Engineering (Electronics/Telecommunication).
• Sun Certified Professional (SCSA ).
• Sun Certified System Administrator for the SOLARIS 9 Operating Environment.
• Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA)
• Cisco Certified Network Professional (CCNP)
• MCSE (Microsoft certified Systems Engineer) for WIN NT 4.0 certified

- Grammar and Spelling.
- Readability and Summarization.
- Layout and Sections
- Lenght
- Esthetics and Tables

Grammar and Spelling:

Spelling mistakes take you down, definitetly. Have 2 or 3 people read your resume, run it thourgh spell check, the whole thing. Even typos are not acceptable. I can live with typos when I know the CV was filled in a website (IE: Monster), where tools are somwehat uncomfortable. But when reading a CV sent me via E-mail directly, or knowing that the person drafted the CV in word, comfortably, and still typos show up, this will definetly take out points. It’s really basic, so be careful!

Readability and Summarization:

Its a fact, bullets are better than paragraphs. I go over 30 CVs a day, and a good flow of bulleted resumes always eases my sight as short sentences in a constant format, with small comments is much better than reading paragraph after paragraph, and I’m sure that I can’t help it but to pay more attention to these resumes. It is ok to see paragraphing when describing Objectives, but when describing roles and accomplishments, use bullets.
Use short and to the point sentences, and dont try to squeeze in numbers and info in one sentence. Summarization is key.

Layout and Sections:

Typically, a barebone CV structure looks something like this (In the case of a technical CV)

- Personal Info
- Objective
- Summary
- Skills (a skill table might be present here)
. Hardware
. Software
. Platforms
. Programming
. ,etc
- Work Experience
(For Recent positions)
. Date begun – End
. Company
. Position
. Role
. Accomplishments
. Environment
(For Older positions)
. Date begun – End
. Company
. Position
. Environment
- Education
. Post-Highschool
. Certifications
. Trainings Attended

In the case of word resumes, a good use of Bold, Italic and Underlining, as well a bulletting levels, are vital to the readability. Tossing around formats is no good. You really need to look into it having a coherent formatting (For example, every job duration should have the same formatting, every section title also, etc). You need to use formatting to give a perfect sense to the hierarchy of each element of the resume.

Using standard fonts and as little tables as possible is important. CVs are often cut-pasted and read by automatic-parsing applications, and moving around a resume with too many tables, strange formatting or unavailable fonts can really be a pain, and definetly something that will make your resume go to the bottom of the pile now and then.

Lenght:

As a rule of hand, a resume with as many pages as Years of experience / 2 is too long. So, if you have 10 years of experience or so, your resume is too long if you have 5 pages, you should probably be aiming for 4. With 12, your goal should be 5, and it should never ever go over 8 pages (This would be for a very Sr applicant, with 20 years of experience or so, in a very detailed resume). Some tips for shortening a resume are:

• In the “Layout” section of this post, I mentioned a different structure for recent experience and older experience:

(For Recent positions)
. Date begun – End
. Company
. Position
. Role
. Accomplishments
. Environment (For Older positions)
. Date begun – End
. Company
. Position
. Environment

• Shorten down those descriptions. We all know what a Sysadmin does, so you dont need to be too redundant in those repetitive job descriptions. I would be glad to see a “similar to previous positions, with these additional responsibilities”. Leave something to mystery. If you give 100% details of every position in your resume, what will you talk about in the interview?
• “Summaries of qualifications” that have more than 6 or 7 bullets, or more than one paragraph, are probably too long.
• Dont hit “Enter” every time you put in a skill. Use comma-separated-lists, they are just as good and readable.

Esthetics and Tables:

I, personally, dont go for esthetic resumes. Design is something that I dont look into. Nothing is more of a hassle than receiving that beautiful work of art resume only to cutpaste it to my notepad to parse it, taking 20 minutes to do it because of “Esthetics”. I generally leave them for last. Thus, you’re at the bottom of the pile. Everything said before here is a priority before esthetics.

On future posts:

• Tips on how to get your resume out there.
• A full CV Template with indications.

Michael Dennis said:

I have used jigsaw in the past for both client leads as well as sourcing talent. I find that it is a good tool, but you really need to sift through most of the contacts as there is a lot of outdated information that they have not flushed. It is not a bad resource to have for its price, just be mindful of the e-mails you send and be sure to confirm the person still works at the company with a follow-up call.

David Gentry said:

I currently have a pro account and am not too impressed. There is a lot of bad contact information. You can only search candidates job titles, therefore it hard to tell if the person is worth contacting. I wouldn’t recommend it. Use LinkedIn and Zoominfo.

April Eubanks said:

I love Jigsaw… Sometimes it will give you outdated info, as Michael indicated. When this happens, I just make the extra effort to get a good number – since I now have a solid name.

I use it daily…

Michelle Battle said:

I have used the “free” account…but I have gotten a lot of bad information from it. If you have the time, I really don’t know who does, then you can challenge the bad information and get more contacts…but I think that is only with a paid account. I just found it more time consuming than useful.

Mark Bergman said:

I use jigsaw regularly, mostly when I know that there will be people I want to recruit at a particular company, and I sift selectively through the titles before selecting the contacts to download.

The process of entering info to gain points is too cumbersome and time consuming for me, so I just “buy up” points when needed, usually spending $100-200 at a time to replenish my account.

Matthew Liptak said:

Use it all the time, it is one of the better tools. Zoom Info is used as well but isnt better than Jigsaw. If I had a choice I would go with Jigsaw. Zoom info search tool is better but has a lot of higher ups and C-Level candidates and those are not always the ones you want. The info on Jigsaw is always corrent as is Zoom, but Jigsaw has more of the midlevel candidates.

***

My conclusion: 

The feedback was mixed, but it seems to be that with Jigsaw you’re looking at a payed account for getting not so-good contact info. Using the free account would be a problem, since submitting candidates probably means they are gonna start getting calls constantly for any reason. Challenging the bad contact info to get the double refund (which is never cash, just searching credits) seems like more of a hassle and a service to them than actually getting something off of it, I feel like im doing the cleanup for the other guys that are submitting bad contact info on free “Play” accounts. The database size (6 million or so) is not that bigger than my own LinkedIn network (2 Million, and it’s free), and contacts in LinkedIn are pretty much 100% accurate. Ok, you dont get a phone number, but there are better (free) ways to get a phone number on the Internet than paying for a JigSaw account.  It just doesn’t seem to be worth the while.