The video resume ISN’T HAPPENING, people
Please tell me that I’m not the only person who understands that the “video resume” isn’t going to take off anytime soon. There are several important reasons for this:
1. Most people read faster than people can talk. So while it might take me a minute to give your two page resume a good once-over, it will take me at least 5-10 to listen to you drone on about your qualifications. (This is also why I don’t listen to podcasts or watch video blogs.)
2. You know how most people aren’t that great at public speaking? Being good in front of the camera is even harder. The idea of having to sit through even 10 video resumes to fill a job fills me with enough dread to give up the idea of being a recruiter if they ever become that commonplace.
3. Um, hi, discrimination laws? Companies aren’t allowed to ask for photographs of applicants (except in the performing arts), and conscientious HR departments are really careful about avoiding anything that could be perceived as discriminatory. I think a lot of those HR departments don’t want to see what you look like until you’ve walked in the door for your interview. Video resumes represent a lot of hassle that HR people don’t want to deal with.
For all its shortcomings and faults, there’s a reason we’ve had the paper resume for as long as we have. It’s fast, it’s generally not filled with a bunch of dorky “ums” and “ahs”, and it’s hard to discriminate against text on a page.
January 16th, 2007 at 11:10 am
You hit it on the head here. I keep seeing the idea of the “video resume” popping up online and in print and as an HR professional I can’t believe anyone would be dumb enough to think this was a good idea.
January 16th, 2007 at 5:00 pm
Absolutely spot on. The recruitment industry worldwide has spent, and is still spending, tens of millions of dollars on new technology to scan printed Word/txt documents into their systems. They are not about to ditch that for a fad idea any time soon.
However as an add-on, for people applying for jobs for which they cannot be interviewed personally, or for people where visual and and oral preentation are key requirements of the job, it could be useful. But not instead of, NO! And yes the discrimination laws too! big issue here.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:27 am
You’re missing a really key point here - video resumes are never going to take the place of word resumes, but video is becoming a valuable tool for certain professions, and uses of video inside corporations are going to increase as the general public becomes more comfortable with online video.
1) Quality is improving. Just like cell phones, and computers, digital video is improving, as home equipment allows for better digital recording and editing.
2) Spelling mistakes, grammar errors, formatting mistakes - are these less annoying in resumes than in video? You throw away poorly crafted resumes, just the same as you would throw away poorly crafted video resumes.
3) A great resume is still boring. A great video, on the other hand, will connect with an audience. If you are in marketing, or sales, or PR, or a college student trying to get your foot in the door, a well-crafted video will already help you land a job with a cutting edge company.
4) Discrimination - you’re on terrible footing here. If discrimination exists, the use of video doesn’t make you more susceptible to it. It merely exposes the kind of people you have in your company.
5) The generation coming up is far more comfortable expressing themselves, and they want video. Are you prepared to shut the door on them? They are already sending videos to companies, because they know that electronic resumes have a very small chance of being seen by a live person.
6) Justin - “As an HR professional,” you might consider using different language than “dumb enough to be a good idea.”
January 19th, 2007 at 12:38 pm
1. I’d prefer to evaluate candidates on their qualifications, not on their video-editing prowess. It’s still not a standard skill one would develop as part of one’s career (like the use of Microsoft Word is), so it’s still irrelevant and an unfair criteria. And even if the programs are becoming more accessible and easier to use, video editing is like design- anyone can learn to use the programs, but proficiency in Final Cut doesn’t make you good at producing video any more than proficiency in Photoshop makes you a good designer. The barrier to creating a quality video is considerably higher than the barrier to creating a good text resume. Are YOU prepared to shut the door on candidates who can’t afford to hire a good editor to produce their video?
2. It takes me 15 seconds to decide that candidate is poor based on a text resume. I still have to sit through significantly more of a video to decide that the candidate is crappy, IF I dont’ want to reject people on the irrelevant and unfair basis of video production values. So it still wastes my time.
3. If you think a great resume is boring, then you are reading the wrong resumes.
4. You are welcome to explain that to my legal department, then. Exposing the terrible people at a company is all fine and good, but most companies are interested in avoiding getting sued and would prefer to expose the terrible people in a way that does not expose them to litigation or an EEOC complaint.
5. Yes, actually, I AM prepared to shut the door on them if they will not present their qualifications to me in a way that respects my time and doesn’t annoy the hell out of me. Don’t forget, Jim, that I’m only 28 myself- I’m not some old fogey shaking her cane at “these kids today.” I was one of them not so long ago myself and am still culturally more like them than you are. They can hire based on videos all they want when they’ve paid their dues and have my job. Until then, I’ve got work to do and it doesn’t involve spending all day watching iMovie after iMovie of people who don’t know how to deliver a presentation but who think they need a video resume because some recruiter on the Internet said so.
6. Nothing about being “an HR professional” precludes calling an idea dumb if it is. Video resumes are a terrible, terrible idea for anyone who isn’t already an accomplished public speaker with the resources to produce a professional-quality video.
January 19th, 2007 at 2:06 pm
1. So for resumes, do you prefer to judge people on their ability to write, or perhaps on their ability to pay a professional resume writer?
2. Woe betide the job candidate who finds out their resume gets only 15 secs of scan time. Where do those resumes come from? How much effort did they put into them? Are they available? One thing a video resume can communicate is the level of interest a candidate has in your company. If someone takes the time to put one together, at least you know they are interested. How many resumes do you scan, sort, and call, only to find out the person was just kicking tires?
3. The world’s best resume won’t get someone a job. It’s just the key in the door. A great video, on the other hand, can blow off the door’s hinges.
4. Every bit of contact you make with any candidate is grounds for some kind of lawsuit, whether tha be phone contact, e-mail, or in-person interviews. There are companies that screen their candidates only by phone to prevent visual discrimination. They don’t want anyone but employees on site to avoid lawsuits. Maybe you work for one of those companies - maybe not - but that’s a choice - are you going to be an effective recruiter using all the tools available, or someone afraid of their own shadow? Fear of lawsuits doesn’t actually equate to proof that video resumes are more dangerous to companies than any other form of interview. In fact, the case can be made that
“hiding” your discriminatory employees is less ethical than exposing them.
5. Recruiters are overwhelmed with electronic resumes right now. Isn’t that wasting your time? When someone sends you a CEO resume for a tech support job, isn’t that wasting your time?
6. People who give themselves the title of HR Professional are ripe targets when they start talking about how “dumb” something is. It’s not exactly the kind of language that one would associate with a department scared of lawsuits.
No one is saying video resumes are taking over the world. But discounting them when they are in their infancy, and before interactive television has made its mark, is a bit like saying that PC’s don’t need more than 10MB of storage.
Vlogging is a big phenomenon. We don’t know how it will affect recruiting. But calling it dumb is a bit like saying blogs are written by angry people in their pajamas.
January 19th, 2007 at 2:43 pm
I do some of my best blogging in my pajamas, Jim.
Of course a CEO resume sent for a tech support job is a waste of my time, but it’s a waste of the aforementioned 15 seconds, not the couple of minutes it would take me to make the same conclusion about a video.
And you know perfectly well that while a bad (or even good but ill-suited for the particular job) candidate can get rejected in 15 seconds, a good resume is going to get a much more thorough reading. But no amount of development in internet video is going to make it possible to speak three sentences faster than I can read the same three sentences on a paper resume. Adding a bunch of extraneous video slows the process down, and until that problem can be addressed (and it certainly won’t be solved by a bunch of people sending me videos when they have nothing to say), video will be a burden, not a boon, to recruiters.
And the fact is, companies afraid of HR lawsuits are far, far more common than ones who aren’t, and we can’t all work at companies who don’t believe in having lawyers.
So if it’s short-sighted to dismiss video resumes in their infancy, it’s just as short-sighted to proclaim them the wave of the future without having very serious conversations about an effective way to use video in one’s job search. You seem to think that people are going to assemble a unique video for each company they’re interested in, but the reality of my job is that I am constantly having to tell people that they need to customize their TEXT resumes for each position they apply for. If people don’t understand that one text resume doesn’t fit all, they certainly aren’t going to understand that one video doesn’t fit all.
In short, most people are so terrible and clueless about job searching that no amount of fancy tech tools in the world are going to correct that fundamental problem. So I’m horrified that people are being encouraged to use tools that demand more and more of MY time as a recruiter when they clearly haven’t figured out how to use the tools they already have.
January 19th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Gotta agree with Jim on most of this. I think that there is a definite place for video in the recruiting/staffing/hiring process. The company that figures out how to use it well in all instances is going to make a killing.
If you can’t see how it would save time, then I don’t think your are evaluating it properly. JMO -Carl
January 28th, 2007 at 11:05 pm
Recruiters may well be overwhemed Jim, that is why even more millions are going into non human, as in IT, culling and sorting out the good from the bad. Only the good, or hose meet the criteria, will get though to the recruiter. Video only has potential as an add at this stage. I am with Tiffany. She sounds like a knowledgeable HR professional to me, while you sound like a salesman for a new video product
January 28th, 2007 at 11:08 pm
Geez what a terrible typing job there from me
Maybe I should have said my piece on video and just dropped a link here 
February 19th, 2007 at 9:42 pm
From the perspective of a job candidate, as opposed to an HR professional per se, I’ve got a few things to add to the string. My first comment is directed to Tiffany, who indeed sounds like a true HR professional to me, but perhaps also an individual who is willing to throw out the proverbial baby with the bathwater in an effort to air her less than enthusiastic views on the subject of video resumes as a whole. That’s fine with me, but it does seem odd that a person of Tiffany’s age would appear in this forum, to be a rather close-minded individual about what will certainly become a more prominent recuiting methodology in near future. Video as a medium is culturally pervasive, no matter what its purpose or intended audience, and it’s at the very least an aspect of technology as a whole. Reasonable thinking then, would seem to allow for the fact that since technology is the most common identifier for the progressive cultures of developed nations like the US, that “video” will continue to evolve and broaden the way we all communicate with one another. Many developed European nations have actually promulgated the use of video in a number of different channels, both personal and professional, that we haven’t quite gotten to yet. As an example, just check out what the Brits are doing with video calling as a very basic, inexpensive but highly effective add-on to an average consumer’s cellular contract. So, while I agree with some of Tiffany’s perspective, I would suggest that she get ready for video as a rapidly evolving component and tool in the HR toolkit One that will impact the way the business of HR gets done in some major ways. Again, as things go technologically, there’s really no way to avoid it.
Also, I would appeal to both Tiffany’s and Jim’s position by recommending the video as an adjunct to the paper resume, and particularly as an eventual replacement of that last bastion of self-promotion know at the “cover letterâ€Â. As you both probably know, many cover letters are all over the map in that they attempt to convey certain intangibles (including enthusiasm, excitement, genuineness, and interest) that are supposed to somehow convince an employer to move forward with a personal interview. Paper is good, and the pen is still in many instances mightier than the sword. But what about candidates who may be otherwise marginalized by the static presentation inherent in the written word? Alas, these candidates may be the clear winners when it comes to making a practical case for the use of video resumes. Many candidates will of course, not have the inborn ability to make an effective video resume, no matter how sophisticated the production technologies available. But if we can consider that individuals looking for employment in fields such as advertising, marketing, sales, public relations, and other interpersonally dynamic vocations are probably more effective presenters in the first place, then the odds are for a greater yield of well-suited as a result of a video resume, than just paper alone.
Just imagine the day when an effective elevator speech can be easily produced and refined on the fly from a mobile device of one’s choosing. Imagine a 30 second self-made video that excites and motivates the HR team to action, when the resume and cover letter may have gotten a 30 second perusal before hitting the round file with mostly automatic and at least occasionally reckless aplomb. Sure, the paper way is good, but the video resume can make it that much better. In the end then, the video resume will become a potentially huge differentiator for those prospective employees that might otherwise be dismissed prematurely, thereby causing no small amount of lost opportunity and productivity on the part of both parties.
Cool.
July 12th, 2007 at 10:21 am
what is the conclusion/recomendation for using video resume??
February 11th, 2008 at 11:48 am
[…] *Online job postings. Unleashing the power of the internet to reach anyone with a keyboard, expanding the talent pool tremendously. Exchanging job information through cyberspace. Much faster, reaching a wider talent pool, but unreliable results. Unfortunately, resulting in employer abuse through video resumes. […]
March 8th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
HR is still that ignorant?,
The video’s reviewed are selected from a whittled down select group of candidates. Hard qualifications are still left nicely summed on a resume. The video is reserved for softskills hardly tangible in ink.
I’m working on my first Video Cover letter, I’m doing it myself and, its currently filled with umms and ahhs, and i’m camera shy but, its a ROUGH DRAFT! retake retake retake. Reason not to use a proffesional service. Every video can be unique to the position and polished til perfect.
The lighting excentuates my facial features, i’m in front of a neutral backround. I remove any humming from the microphone in edditing and normalize the sound level.
Descrimination liability is no differnt than what is liable at interview.
Those 15 second scans are exactly why HR is so ineffective at staffing. Your judging people on their writing skills not the skills applicable to the job.
Those 15 second scans punish independant learning.
If someone can’t learn on their own. if they need to be taught or shown everything first. You put them in HR finding people who can. What a joke.