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RE: job interview question: ethical issues about portfolio
Subject:RE: job interview question: ethical issues about portfolio From:Syed Ahmed <SAhmed -at- DKSYSTEMS -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Mon, 14 Jan 2002 15:18:09 -0600
Keith,
My experience has been similar to your own. During my own interviews, most
prospective employers did exactly what you said, which is skim through the
whole thing right in front of me. Once I was asked, from my portfolio,
which doc I would like for them to read. Obviously, I suggested the one I
liked most.
However, twice I was asked to take a short writing test after submitting my
samples. For both tests, I was given a feature spec in paragraph form, and
I was asked to re-write it as instructions. One company insisted on this
because it was discovered that a former employee had stolen his portfolio
from somewhere and had never written a single tech doc before. He assumed
it was no big deal and he could wing it, but he didn't succeed. The other
time I took a writing test (via email) was for an employer whose policy was
to not even go through the trouble of bringing candidates into the office
for a face-to-face interview until they felt that the candidate was "the
real deal".
Basically, these experiences clearly demonstrate Keith's point. They liked
the pretty packaging my portfolio offered, and they most certainly
appreciated the organization and thoroughness. But as far as actually
reading them, I feel that they don't really care too much as long as you can
demonstrate that you wrote the wonderful docs you're presenting.
Considering the ease with which you can steal anything from the Web
(especially docs), coupled with the fact that our names don't appear on most
of the documentation we write, I can see this trend of "on-the-spot-testing"
continuing, as well as a lessening of emphasis on the actual contents of
your portfolio.
Syed
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