Hi everyone,

I would greatly appreciate if you can spare some of your time and give me an honest feedback on my resume.

First, a little background:

• 25 years old with a bachelor degree in audio production
• worked in another entertainment industry for 1.6 years then had to help on family business because of parent health problems

Now, the issues that arose are resolved and the goal would be to pursue a career as an associate/assistant producer.

The problem is that my experience is in another industry and I don't have much experience in software development so I'm targeting QA jobs too to have a better understanding of the development process.

My resume is below so hammer at it with any good/brutal criticism you can come up with.

Thanks for your time.

I'm not sure if QA is your best door in, but sometimes its the only one if you don't have the skills necessary for other positions. I see lots of postings for assistant management positions or assistant producer roles where its more of a training position for a non assistant position later on I have had a few friends get into the industry this way with only business education.

Second of all most game companies do not consider beta testing as QA experience as its nothing like an actual development pipeline. It's pretty much the same experience as saying I play video games. Another thing is make sure if you are applying for a QA position you realize most jobs do not pay well in the game industry unless you are doing automation testing. You will most likely not get paid overtime either although this standard seems to be changing over the last few years with all the law suites happening.

From what your resume shows I'd suggest finding a junior or assistant position in a studio management/production roles.

most game companies do not consider beta testing as QA experience

Absolutely correct. Beta testing is not "experience" on a game application.

Maybe it's just me but I feel like there is a lot of useless stuff (as in, not belonging here) on your resume.

I am not a HR guy but for example I don't see why you would list the games you like the most, if anything it will be used against you.

I find the "profile" part a bit weird too, never seen it before on a resume.

Like people said above me, betas is not testing so this part can be removed.

Overall I feel there is way too much talking on your resume, it's like resume + cover letter mixed into one.

Here is what I see putting on my resume-reading glasses:

-- begin reading from top --

Profile section: Fluff. No idea what "Improved production by 100%" and similar are supposed to mean.

Experience:

* Funeral job. You were a receptionist or book keeper. I don't know how you would "increase efficiency by 50%", efficiency of what? More efficient communicating with suppliers? More funerals were held? You recommended increasing grave stacking from 2 per grave to 3 per grave?

* Studio assistant job. You were a studio assistant, not a "producer" in the normal job title sense. Again, not sure about "increased the production by 100%" line. You doubled what part of the production? They were able to accommodate twice as many performers? Twice as many recordings? There was only one person before and you were the second worker?

* Volunteer game testing. Playing games after work or after school is not a job. Matrix online was Sega in 2004. DAoC was by Vivendi tested back in 2001. SW:G was 2003. Based on your high school graduation date of 2008, you were 11 or 12 when the games came out.

Additional information section: If this was a music job, then piano, guitar, and drum would be useful.

Discography credits section: You worked on 11 recordings over 19 months as a "producer" at a record label. Looking a few up, on last.fm one has nine listens total, over its lifetime, another has 37 lifetime listens. The others I search for don't show up at all. I may have missed your blockbuster work, but at least these check out.

Education section: You got a bachelors degree in audio production, good! And you got a 3D animation certificate where you list the skills as "modeling, sculpting, rigging, animation, rendering, photoshop". WTF? Photoshop isn't a 3D animation program. And your high school diploma had a business specialist specialization.

-- end reading --

Wow. Open up the Forum FAQ. Read all of Section 1, and most of the links in Section 5.

Figure out what job you are aiming for.

QA has a lot of job openings, but they tend to be short contracts and rarely become an 'in' to production. There are some very rare openings for "assistant producer" and "associate producer" jobs. There are also very rare openings for audio jobs.

With your audio production degree you might be able to break in to the industry as an audio professional. Unfortunately those openings are relatively rare so it may take some time to get the job. I think based on what you wrote the most about, those would be the best.

No matter the path, cut most of your resume. Playing games after school as an 11 year old is not work experience. "Using the Windows environment and Microsoft Office" is not usually listed on game industry jobs, not even as a transferable skill. Most of the skills you listed are irrelevant to game development.

Your numbers, a vague 50% improvement and a vague 100% improvement, look made up; when numbers are used they are typically specific: Increased sales by 47.3% over the first six months. Reduced overruns by 17%. Reduced disc production time by 39%. These are values that are verifiable, even though they probably never will be verified.

Once you know what job you are actually applying for, cut everything else that isn't related to that job. Applying for a QA position doesn't need discography. Applying for an audio position doesn't need your 3D animation certificate emphasizing photoshop.

Profile section: Fluff. No idea what "Improved production by 100%" and similar are supposed to mean.

Some resume advice sites state to include a profile section especially for career changers.

I wasn't sure on including it and really didn't know how to write one properly that wouldn't overlap with the content of the resume so will probably remove it.

It takes space without adding anything.

* Funeral job. You were a receptionist or book keeper. I don't know how you would "increase efficiency by 50%", efficiency of what? More efficient communicating with suppliers? More funerals were held? You recommended increasing grave stacking from 2 per grave to 3 per grave?

In fact it was not only a book keeping or receptionist role. Since the business is managed by my family i had to effectively run the business when for major causes they couldn't be there. Close deals with customers, organize the funeral, etc.

My bad, should probably expand the section and explain it better.

* Studio assistant job. You were a studio assistant, not a "producer" in the normal job title sense. Again, not sure about "increased the production by 100%" line. You doubled what part of the production? They were able to accommodate twice as many performers? Twice as many recordings? There was only one person before and you were the second worker?

In this particular case i began as a studio assistant then approximately 6 months later was entrusted with the production from start to finish as a producer for the remainder of the time alongside maintaining my usual work as a studio assistant.

Given that should i split the section with two different titles and the various tasks performed?

Discography credits section: You worked on 11 recordings over 19 months as a "producer" at a record label. Looking a few up, on last.fm one has nine listens total, over its lifetime, another has 37 lifetime listens. The others I search for don't show up at all. I may have missed your blockbuster work, but at least these check out.

Yes no blockbuster work unfortunately, mostly indie stuff and more on the physical market than digital (even if most of them were on iTunes etc. don't really know why some are now out of it) but still my name is on it.

Was thinking that even if no blockbuster work it demonstrate that I finished and shipped some projects even if not directly related at the game industry (looking by a project manager perspective).

Should I take it out when applying for a position not directly related to audio?

Education section: You got a bachelors degree in audio production, good! And you got a 3D animation certificate where you list the skills as "modeling, sculpting, rigging, animation, rendering, photoshop". WTF? Photoshop isn't a 3D animation program. And your high school diploma had a business specialist specialization.

The main topics section explain a simple list of some of the contents that the course explored. Photoshop was used in this case as a tool for compositing different rendered images for stills of the model etc. Should probably have used "Compositing" instead of the specific software used (read that sometimes photoshop skills are needed on producer jobs to prepare pitch presentation so tought listing the software would be a fine addition. Tought bad will change it)

No matter the path, cut most of your resume. Playing games after school as an 11 year old is not work experience. "Using the Windows environment and Microsoft Office" is not usually listed on game industry jobs, not even as a transferable skill. Most of the skills you listed are irrelevant to game development.

On most job opening as an assistant producer or even QA, an excellent knowledge of Office is required so showing that seemed a good idea.

Regarding volunteer testing it's a bit controversial...

It was not only beta testing but closed alpha too on some of them and i did some testing on a production pipeline on some team projects during the development process.

The fact is that i was done on "illegal" stuff, unofficial emulators of some MMORPGs as a part of the team. While the assets were taken from the client the code was all a reverse engineering of the original mechanics so I tested everything from the ground up.

Not to mention that, the recent popularity of early access releases as a business model, made possible to test in a developing environment.

I know that it's not "Work Experience" so I'll need to take it out from the experience section... but since it was not simply open beta testing I want to include it somehow.

Should I include it in the additional information?

Got the advice about being more specific about accomplishments on the job and remove the fluff not pertaining the offer and will surely do.

Thanks for your feedbacks