Graduate employment opportunities. We are hiring

[David (PassMark)]

Open position - Feb / Mar 2007

Graduate Software Engineer – Do everything

• Use your C and C++ development skills on Linux and Vista
• Develop software for the biggest names in global I.T.
• Lots of variety in an informal environment

The candidate must have a bachelors degree in computer science, or similar degree, with above average results. Good written and spoken communications skills are mandatory.

The ideal candidate will probably have some professional programming experience, but we will train people who have limited professional experience but excellent academic results.

• Experience in some of following areas would also be well regarded, but not mandatory
• C / C++
• 3D graphics & DirectX
• Low level programming, (device drivers and assembler coding)
• GUI programming
• Web technologies (PHP, HTTP, Apache, IIS, TCP/IP)
• SQL
• Windows & Linux APIs

We require a motivated, self-starter who is capable of working in an un-supervised environment to help us complete existing development contracts and transition our software to Windows Vista.

The role covers the entire software development life cycle from design, coding, testing to customer support using the latest hardware and development tools.

This is a full time position, located in Sydney, Australia, Surry Hills, near Central Station.

Remuneration would depend on experience and academic results.

To apply please submit your CV to David Wren at
jobs [at] passmark [dot] com

Company details:
www.passmark.com
www.wrensoft.com
Phone: +61 2 9690 0444
Fax: +61 2 9690 0445

[David (PassMark)]

Tips and hints about applying for a job

Here are some important tips about applying for a job.

We see a LOT of extremely bad job applications. So here are some tips to help you improve your application and maybe stop us throwing your application straight into the garbage.

1. Check the spelling in your CV and cover letter. Those little red squiggly lines that Microsoft Word puts under words mean something!
2. Do include your full contact details. We can't employ you if we can't contact you.
3. Don't use an E-mail address like, MyFatArse@Hotmail.com , when applying for a job. Also don't use an Indian, Russian or Chinese E-Mail address. We might assume you are not actually in the country and throw your CV in the bin. You would need to be an extraordinary applicant before we would go to the expense of trying to get you to move to a new country.
4. Re-read what you write. Does it actually make any sense?
5. Get someone else to re-read what you wrote. Do they think it makes sense?
6. If your first language is not English, find someone with good grammar and repeat steps 4) and 5) again.
7. Be careful when you cut and paste. While we get a good laugh when we get job applications addressed to the wrong company, it doesn't help you. Another classic mistake is telling us how much you want the "Customer Services" position when the position is for a programmer. Take the time to make sure you send the right cover letter to the right company. Don't sent exactly the same letter to every company and expect to be taken seriously.
8. Learn how to use a word processor properly! THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT. Badly formatted CV's go straight into the bin. We are looking for people who know a lot about computers and software. For example, if you haven't worked out how to use the Tab key to align your text, we don't want you writing software for us. Don't use 10 different fonts in your CV. But please do use the 'center' button to center text on the page.
9. Do include links to cool stuff you have done. This might be a commercial web site, projects you did for Uni assignments, software you wrote, source code, contributions to open source projects, graphic design work, etc.
10. Following on from the previous point. Create your own web site, about yourself, with links to the stuff you have done. This can be really impressive if done right.
11. Don't have a ten page CV. Two pages are good. Three pages are OK if you have 20 years of relevant experience to talk about. As a graduate, stick to two pages.
12. Show us that you do software because you love it, and not just because it pays the bills. We want to know about the compiler you wrote for fun in your spare time, the computer you build from parts collected off the street at council clean up, the case mod you did, your overclocking exploits, and anything else like this that shows you are an enthusiast.
13. Don't spent half a page trying to tell us you have 'Excellent cross-cultural and inter-cultural communication skills' as result of a 3 month job cooking burgers at McDonald's. We both know it is bullshit.
14. Unless you are married to Bill Gates, we don't care who you are married to. You don't need to tell us.
15. Do include highlights from your University results when applying for a graduate position. Especially if you have good results.
16. Don't assume we are familar with your University. It can sometimes be hard to know if for example a result of 'D' means, Distintion, or Did not complete, or if it is a poor result on a scale of A to F. As another example, we got a CV with results from Zimbabwe Catholic University. Is a result of 2.2 a good result from Zimbabwe? Is a result of 6/7 from the University of Ballarat a good thing? We have no idea.
17. Get the terminology right. If you claim to be a C++ expert, don't write it in lower case and leave off a '+', (c+). Claiming you know 'Dreamwaver' will also make you look silly.

[David (PassMark)]

Thanks to everyone who applied. In the end we had 5 good candidates plus potentially a couple more good ones who's CV arrived too late for consideration.

The position has now been filled.