On Friday, May 1st, I got this email from someone named Willie Jackson who had happened upon my website. Pretty neat, right? It gets better. He’s also studying IT (in California) and was instructed by his professor to do a vanity search.
His unedited message is below.
Hi Willie,
True story… I’m finishing my Associate’s degree for Information and Technology and in one my classes, during a discussion about reumes, my professor tells me that I should Google my name and see what comes up. To my surprise, there was a website called williejackson.com at the top of the results. I was even more surprised when I learned that the site had tips on resumes and maintaining a good web image (which was the very topic that lead me to Google my name in the first place).
I was pulled over for speeding once and the officer told me that there are at least fifty Willie Jacksons in California with warrants out for their arrest. Needless to say, I rather be mistaken for you than for any of them. Anyway, I will have my Associate’s degree in June and as I continue working towards my Bachelor’s in Computer Science, I will check your site frequently for more tips and information. Keep up the good work!
-Willie Jackson
P.S. How do you start a career in web design or programming when all of the openings seem to be looking for people with 3 – 5 years of experience?
Not bad, eh? Because of his email (and the fact that he has the greatest name on the planet), I will certainly be making myself available to him regarding his questions as he moves towards graduation and full-time employment. He’s keen to point out what is often a catch-22 in the IT field: employers want years of experience, but they won’t always give young professionals a chance to gain that experience with their company.
A subtle lesson here is that when you’re establishing your personal brand online, you need to move quickly. I have a three-year head start on anyone who shares my name if they’re trying to build an online presence. I own multiple variations of my domain name, and this site is built on what is perhaps the most SEO-optimized WordPress framework on the planet – Thesis by Chris Pearson. You’ve got your work cut out for you if you want to dominate the search results for my name.
Heck, my website is the first result when you Google my name – beating out Willie Jackson the NFL player. Hopefully he never takes an interest in managing his brand online :)
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Finally!!! A forum in which to show off my awesomeness.
Good post though. You bring up a lot of good points, and you’ve almost given me the impetus to snatch up the .org and .net versions of my name. It’s also a good idea to use a nickname that might be less common than your given name – I knew you in college as Will Jackson, and you knew me in college as David Schwarz.
Although I never really experienced the issue of not being able to get hired cause of my lack of experience. I just wrote up a sweet resume and posted it on Monster. Within four hours, I got a call from the recruiter who landed me my first job. There are always going to be tech companies looking for relatively cheap, inexperienced labor to do the grunt work, even (or maybe especially?) in this economy.
Yeah, you’re pretty much dominating your Search Engine Results Page (SERP). My goal this year is to dominate mine similarly, so we’ll see how that goes.
I don’t think computer science graduates will ever have trouble getting hired. As you know, I have a technology degree; not a computer science or software engineering degree. This requires me to be able to explain to employer why they should consider someone who isn’t a programmer (me) over someone who is. While I’m very comfortable doing that (selling my strengths), it’s just as important for me not to be applying for the types of jobs where I’m being asked to do something that doesn’t represent one of my main strengths. I have no desire to become a programmer.
My advice to aspiring technology professionals is to build or do something. My good friend built a database application for student-athletes like himself before graduating. Although he graduated from FSU, he was recruited for a position that’s typically fulled with graduates of the top-tier universities. A company would be foolish to overlook a self-starter who has the presence of mind to voluntarily undertake a project that increases their skills.