A recruiter who reads thousands of resumes breaks down the exact shifts that move you from ignored to hired.
GROWTH PILLAR: Sales & Revenue
WHO THIS IS FOR: Job seekers / Career pivoters / Solopreneurs who hire / Anyone rebuilding after a layoff
WHAT THEY'LL GAIN: Honest resume tips from a recruiter who sees them daily, a clear look at how the hiring process actually works, and a job search strategy that stops you from getting filtered out before a human ever sees you.
Everyone blames the ATS for rejections. The real filter is a human with ten seconds and coffee. If your resume doesn't land in those ten seconds, no amount of keywords will save you.
Colin McIntosh knows both sides of the table. He built Sheets & Giggles — a sustainable bedding company — from a Techstars pitch into a multi-million dollar brand featured on Good Morning America, and exited in 2025. Today he recruits C-suite tech leaders at Riviera Partners by day and runs SheetsResume.com at night — a free AI-powered resume platform used by tens of thousands of people every month.
In this episode, Colin explains what the job market looks like right now, why the average search takes five months and two hundred applications, and what you can do differently starting today.
What you'll learn:
Key topics covered:
Guest offer: Use code K4B for 50% off a lifetime membership of SheetsResume's resume builder and other AI tools at SheetsResume.com.
Connect with Colin McIntosh:
SheetsResume.com | LinkedIn | YouTube | Reddit | X | Instagram
Listen on Simplecast | Watch on YouTube | Read the blog
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Bernie (00:23)
So question to the to the audience. Why are you qualified but still not getting interviews? That's the real pain.
Our guest is going to break down why great people get filtered out and how AI and recruiters actually read resumes today and what simple shifts in can move you from ignorant to in demand. If you're job hunting, pivoting careers, or a building after layoff, this episode is for you. Our guest is Colin McIntosh. He's an entrepreneur-turned recruiter who knows how to build brands and careers.
He first made headlines as the founder of Sheets and Giggles, the sustainable eucalyptus betting company, launched in 2017, featured on national programs like Good Morning America and grown through Techstars Boulder into a multi-million dollar brand that donated over $200,000 to charity before his exit in 2025. Today, Colin has returned to his roots in executive recruiting as a principal at Rivera Partners, a leading tech focused search firm.
Where he helps companies hire top leaders and helps candidates land meaningful roles. On nights and weekends, he challenged that same drive into his AI-powered resume platform, Sheets Resume, offering free and paid tools used by millions and providing complimentary access to those who cannot afford it. A winner of the Denver Startup Week's Pitch Competition and a pitch coach for Techstar's founders. Colin Blend startup grit hiring insight.
and practical generosity in everything he does. Colin, absolute pleasure having you back here again. It's it's great to have a chat with you. Do you ever fear a quote or say?
Colin (01:51)
No, it's great to be back too. I appreciate you having me on and it's fun to, you know, be talking about it's I feel like multiple parts of my life have finally started to gel. So this is nice to kind of have you know, the full-time job recruiting at Riviera Partners. and I wanna specify that I'm not speaking on their behalf, these are my own opinions. and then obviously my part-time passion project with sheetsresume.com.
And it's just been great to help so many people. We're helping tens of thousands of people a month with their resumes and their job search. So it's awesome.
Bernie (02:21)
the quote that you provided me you cannot reason a man out of a position he did not reason reason himself into. that was kind of cool.
Colin (02:28)
Yeah. It's a good one. I think that's Voltaire, if I remember, or it's at least attributed to him. that one really struck me when I was a kid and I was reading through those those, you know, famous quote books. and it's really relevant to modern society. Like I have conversations with people all the time. Bernie, we might be of a different generation, so I'm not sure if you were a big Spongebob Squarespants fan, but there's this episode where
did you have you watched any or movie with the kids? I don't know, but
Bernie (02:55)
Yeah, when you have when you have kids you get exposed to a lot of things that you wouldn't normally as an adult going, yeah.
Colin (03:00)
so so there's a great episode where the Man Ray is trying to convince Patrick Starr that he picked up his wallet and he's like, I found this wallet and Patrick's like, Yep. And he's like, It has your ID in it. Yep. And it's like your Patrick Starr. And he's like, Yep. Well then this must be your wallet. And then Patrick is just like, Well, it's not my wallet. And like, and I always think that that is like the modern
conversation online in person is like you you lead somebody right up to water and they're just like, well, I don't want to drink. And so yeah, for me, yeah, you can't can't reason a man out of a position that they did not reason themselves into.
Bernie (03:37)
You know, it it's been a dog's age since I've been applying for work and jobs, you know, the resume, the whole thing. I remember like when I was younger, like when I was eighteen, and that that was a whole different story. And things have changed since then. I've got a few years on my on on the frame. What does sheet's resume solve better than other people now? Like what what's happening out in the marketplace? First off.
And what what does it solve the sheets resume solve better than the your competitors?
Colin (04:05)
Well, you're gonna you're gonna send me on a rant here, but the what's happening in the market is that the average job search now takes five months and two hundred job applications. And each one of those job applications is gonna ask for your resume, then you're gonna have to type all that shit again, you're gonna have to put it either that that's like the meme, right? Is like, hey, can you type in all that shit you just uploaded with your resume? So it you have to upload your resume, type in all your work history.
Give them a cover letter, maybe do a video interview, maybe do an initial phone screen with an AI interviewer. It is a dystopia right now in the job market. And the worst part is nobody's hiring. In the US last year, there was an average of 7,000 jobs a month created in this country. There's been like and in 2024, I think the average was 149,000 jobs a month. And so we've gone down by a factor of twenty.
in terms of hiring activity year over year in the US. No, and and of the jobs that are being added in the United States, 90% of them are in healthcare. So there are there is literally a hiring freeze across almost every industry in the United States outside of healthcare. And there's a lot of reasons for that, right? There's the uncertainty which every business is facing from the top on down, where you have an administration
that can be incredibly vindictive one day to one industry or one company that can pass a surprise tariff on another industry, you know, that can tweet about a company and, you know, and and and cite a boycott on them. And so when companies look at their cash positions, they're, you know, looking at how long can we weather this storm for? Is it a one year storm? Is it a three year storm, a four year storm? And the best place to shore up cash is payroll. Now they're not going into mass layoffs yet.
Because the economy is still kind of, it's a $30 trillion economy. It's even if you just beat it over the head with a baseball bat and you lose 3% of a trillion $30 trillion economy, you still got a $29 trillion economy. So there's really not so much that one person can do, even though he's trying to cause this sort of uncertainty and chaos in the labor market and the hiring market. But that being said, companies can just not hire.
And they can just put a freeze on new hires. And that's really what they've done. And there's a there's a bunch of different factors of that storm. Obviously, you've got AI as another component where companies are trying to see how much they can do with AI before they hire humans, which cost payroll, which cost taxes, which cost health care. And in the US, they cost healthcare, not everywhere. and so that's kind of the perfect storm that job candidates are seeing right now. And I'm seeing people go six, twelve, twenty-four months without jobs.
And then once they get into that job gap, they're in big trouble because then recruiters, screeners, AI, ATS systems are looking at these job gaps on the resume. And that's a huge red flag, unfortunately, of like, okay, this person's not very good at what they do because otherwise they would be hired somewhere. That's sort of the traditional wisdom that they're they're applying. But now it's happening.
across many, many candidates all at once. And so people get frozen out of the hiring market at some point with these job gaps. so that's the situation the job candidates are finding themselves in right now. It's really awful. it's a dystopia. They're navigating all these different AI and tech systems. And so what Sheet's resume does, and I swear to God, this is like the mission of the company, is to make the job search less soul sucking and to make it less dystopian
And to give these people a fucking lifeline in this, you know, this really sad modern situation that they find themselves in. and so what we do differently than I think every other resume builder, every other resume template on the internet is I'll just to give you a very direct single thing, we offer one resume template. This. That's it. That's the sheets resume template. That's the one. And
We don't other websites have hundreds of templates for you to choose from. Do you want red? Do you want green and blue? You want a headshot up here, two columns or four columns? Do you want your skills to have stars or doodles or a graph icons? Like they are giving people that are already confused and already lost the choice of which direction they want to go. And that's not what people need. People need someone with expertise and guidance to say, hey, here's why this template works.
Here's my articulatable philosophy. If you believe it, great. If you don't believe it, that's fine too. But if you don't believe it, I will literally give this to you for free. You can download our template without giving us your email address. Just go to sheetsresume.com and hit the word download link or the Google Doc link, and I will give this to you for free. And if you want the AI resume builder for free, just email me and I will give it to you for free. That's how confident I am in this over other stuff. I'm just begging people.
Do not go to other websites because they're trying to sell you sneakers. They do not give a shit if you get a job. And I actually care.
Bernie (09:01)
Well, Colin, no rent there at all. Sorry. Sorry. No, no, don't no. Don't no you don't having passion is important. And and you know what? It's true. because a lot of times, you know, here's a car and you know, it's you off you're off the s off the car lot. Next thing you know, the car doesn't do so well, right? And it's like, you know, not not my issue, right? And and yeah, taillight warranty sucks. So
couple of things are cropping up e like the gaps and I and I get that. I because you know when I when I was hearing I'd be looking for the gaps. Why is there a gap? What's happening there? And it's usually not so much like what happened in the person's life. And there's certain things you can ask about and there's certain things you can't ask about, right? Right. At least here here in in the province of Ontario, Canada, over the last 40 years, and there's things that you just you just can't ask.
And so that leads you to speculate, which is can be a really wrong thing to do, and you could be missing an opportunity. What do you recommend people fill the gaps with, like volunteer positions or stuff like that?
Colin (10:00)
So there's two answers here. Number one, what you're cluing in on is a truth that I want people to understand, which is that if you allow the recruiter or the screener to make up a story in their head about you, they will. And so if you give them a gap, if you take the year off of your college graduation, if you like, you know, what if you do something.
that opens up an opportunity for them to say, they probably didn't graduate college, or they probably have a whole second career that they're hiding because they're actually, you know, 30 years experience and they want to present as 10, or, they probably left the workforce for a few years because they burnt out here. Or, you know, they probably got fired in a layoff. If you leave that information open for them, then they'll just fill it with stories and they'll tell themselves all the reasons why they shouldn't talk to you. Because truth be told, if you're a recruiter and you're going through a thousand resumes a day,
You're looking for 20 interviews. Yeah, if you go through interviews 20 seconds at a time, you're gonna lose 20, 30, 40 good people out of that stack of a thousand. Absolutely. But you're gonna get through the stack, you're gonna have enough time in your day to send emails and meet with your boss and go home to your family, and you will find 20 people to interview. And so it's a numbers game and you can't give them an opening to make up a story about you. So what I would recommend filling that gap with is
You mentioned volunteering, that's fine. Absolutely. You can put that you were, you know, as long as you can have an organization name, like that is the key, is be like I was, you know, volunteer software development at blank or volunteer organizer at blank or whatever. And then in your bullet point, you can put, you know, I spent the last two years working in the industry in this, you know, space that I'm extremely passionate about, like helping to build XYZ.
Put numbers into it. How many, how many millions of dollars did the organization rake in? How many volunteers is it? Who were you managing? What you were doing? What work was it? But you can also create an independent consultancy that may or may not exist in real life. I don't mind lying on the resume if it's a white lie and it's something that actually gets someone to the phone call in order to discuss. Because like they recruiters and companies lie to you all the time.
Like they just do. And again, these are my opinions, not my employers. but they will lie to you because they want to withhold information about salary, or they may be in talking to somebody else and they don't want you to get cold feet, but they want to keep you on the hook and they're letting you know that you're the only person they're talking to or whatever. Like they don't mind lying because they're employed, they're doing a job and they're gonna justify whatever they're doing to hire the right person. Candidates feel like there's some type of legal or ethical obligation.
To not extend the truth a little bit on the resume and they end up shooting themselves in the foot all the time. When the reality is, like, I'll give you an example of what I mean by a lie. Like if you got laid off in, you know, January 2025 and you don't have a job and you're applying for jobs and you putting on your resume January 2025 is when that role ended. Well, now everyone who's reading the resume is like, wow, this guy's been unemployed for 13 months.
hasn't been doing anything, hasn't been working. Wow, what a not what a loser, but like, you know, like what's wrong with this guy? If you just put 2025 and you cut the months, and you cut the months from your entire resume, well now visually, we're only in February 2026. Visually, you've completely eliminated that gap.
And in my brain, I'm shit, I'm still writing 2025 on dates when I'm writing 2025, right? I'm still stuck in 2025. So the so the screener doesn't know what month that you left that job. It could have been December, right? Which is a big month for people leaving jobs. And so if I like your experience, if I like your background, your skills, same resume, same person, now I might reach out to you for an interview to get the full picture. And so that's what I mean by like, why lie, or like, you know, let's say your title.
Is you know VP of engineering, but you're applying for like a VP of AI engineering role. Well, just put VP of engineering parentheses AI focus. Or you know what I mean? Like if you have the skill, don't misrepresent yourself. But all titles are made up, they're made up by the companies often to keep you stuck in those roles so other people don't recruit you on LinkedIn.
So don't feel any obligation to put your exact specific title if it doesn't match the job you're applying for. so you know, that this is what I mean by by you know, white lies on the resumes. Fill fill that gap. Put that you were doing a consultancy, put that you were volunteering, whatever it might be. And I've even seen people put sabbaticals and that sort of thing on there too. I don't mind that at all.
Bernie (14:30)
One thing I noticed and and this is for you know almost a decade ago, the HR department that was kind of circling around, would say, you know, resumes, no photos. Ever, never send a photo in. never. For a couple of yeah. So I was I'm surprised that some people would offer, you know, yeah, put your put your mug on there. And and that that could automatically filter your eye or a bias would kick in.
N not, you know, either bias, you know, I I only like talking to pretty blondes with blue eyes. Yeah, which, you know, it that's not how you hire 'cause, you know, unless
Colin (15:04)
You're not an HR, are you, Bernie?
Bernie (15:06)
Can you t can you tell? You know, but I obviously I would do that because that's that that you know that's that's not a filtration process, that's a bias process, right? And I I get that. So is there anything that should not be going on the resume that some people have been putting on? Like you know, even in the IT sector, my my wife works at a healthcare institution in in the IT department, and she said the CVs coming in are like
Five or eight pages long. You know, it's crazy. But it's unique to them. Apparently that's that's the norm for that particular spectrum. but everybody else, like if I when I was looking at resumes, what page is good. Two pages if you got something interesting, right? But after that, I
Colin (15:48)
So a resume, so this is the way I like to describe the length of the resume, which is kind of what you're cluing in on the end. There is again, recruiters are looking for a thousand resumes a day, you know, five hours, two hundred an hour, three every minute, one every twenty seconds, drinking coffee like crazy in between each each click. And if you don't give them your entire pitch in ten seconds or less, and they can't transact on it in ten seconds or less, forget about it.
I've seen people do two pages where they bury the lead about their education, their skills, their experience. They put a summary like this big at the top. So y to answer your question, what should not resume have? I believe strongly they should in the United States they should not have a headshot because it opens you up to visual discrimination on something that should not be you know, it has it should only have something to do with your skills and not who you are as an identity.
And that goes both ways, by the way. I don't just mean that for minorities or, you know, women, which I see most discrimination against, obviously. but you know, I look a certain way as well. And like, woe is me, right? Like I'm like I'm I'm not super I'm I'm very privileged, but you know, like people are gonna think that I'm like some like bro, and yeah, like I wasn't a frat, and like they probably are gonna be correct on that stereotype in some ways. But like, you know, some people might think of me in a particular way. So
The second thing you should not have on your resume is your LinkedIn. I think your LinkedIn is completely, fundamentally pointless to have on your resume. Your resume should be an absolute banger, line for line, about everything that you do and why you're so good at it. Your LinkedIn is totally ancillary to your resume. Now your LinkedIn on its own is important because it gets you recruited by recruiters who are looking at LinkedIns. But on the resume, it's pretty much useless. And the only thing that it does is once again.
opens you up to visual discrimination. And so I would not put the LinkedIn on the on the resume. Third, so headshots, LinkedIns, I would not put a summary or objective on the resume. And there's two reasons for this. Number one is it the first thing on your resume should be a your most impressive thing. So whatever you've done that's most impressive, whether it's your company name, your role,
your title, your first bullet point, like those are the really the three things that they that a recruiter will like bang, bang, bang. Company name, how long you've been there, role that you have, your title, and what your first bullet point is, maybe what your skills are. That, or if your most important thing, if you're earlier in your career, is your education, your your bachelor's, your master's, your PhD, put that right up top, right? Whatever's most important should be the first thing top left they see. And if you're starting with a summary or objective,
then you are telling them that you have nothing more impressive on your resume than I really want a job and I think I'm great. And that is what a summary and objective is. That's all it is. And and the second piece, the second piece there is that anyone can write a great objective or summary, especially now with AI. Anyone can write a pretty paragraph about how what a hard worker they are or why they're so valuable. And it is fundamentally useless. And so recruiters skip them entirely.
And they go to your first job and your first title. And so if that's happening, save that space, get rid of the summary and objective and go straight to your work experience or your education right up top. Or your skills right up top. If you're doing a transition period in your career and you want to apply for a role that you don't have experience in, but you have the skills in, then you can lead with your skills. Obviously, is your most impressive thing. People ask me also a lot, like, hey, I want to leave out irrelevant.
experience and that's a good question. Should they leave out irrelevant experience? the answer is that no, because it creates a gap chronologically, right, on your resume. And that becomes really difficult if your most recent experience is your least relevant experience. And so what I tell people is create two i if if you if this applies to you if you have a relevant experience, create two work experience sections relevant work experience or relevant experience.
And then other work experience or other experience. And then you can basically say, okay, so I've had this job, this job, this job, that's like impressive, relevant, bang, bang, bang. And then also, just so you know, fill in the gaps chronologically, I've also had these other jobs that are less relevant. and so that's also a really good way to do that. and what else should not be on a resume? so I'll tell you what should be on a resume that
I think is less obvious. there's a lot that should be on the resume, obviously, work experience, skills, technologies, softwares that you're you're capable of, all those different things. With good formatting so they can really quickly read your dates and that. But something that should be on resumes that I see on very few resumes is, and this is probably controversial with other recruiters, but I'll explain why I believe it, is interests.
I believe that your last line on the resume should be a line about your interest. And the key about interest is that they have to be interesting, not too interesting, not weird, right? You can you can put that you you can put that you raise chickens, but you can't put that you stockpile firearms for prepping, right? You know what I mean? Like there's that there's that line of like Yeah. So
Bernie (20:54)
Well if you're applying for the N R E I guess that might work out well but
Colin (20:57)
Well,
then it's also know your audience, right? Like what jobs are you applying to? Are they more buttoned up? Are they more casual, loose? Are they in California? Are they in New York? Are they in Texas? So those interests, there's three strategic reasons why you should have interest on your resume. number one, it's a really nice differentiator that forces the screener to see you as a human being and not just as another faceless black and white resume that comes across their desk. So it kind of breaks that.
breaks that barrier in their brain of like this is just, you know, no empathy, another person, another, you another cr applicant, applicant, applicant. Now it's a human being in front of me that has their own interests, their own lives, maybe a wife, maybe kids. And that is, I think, very important to actually get on the phone with somebody. and in that, in that number one reason, they might share an interest with you. And now they feel a connection with you. And number two is it's a wonderful icebreaker.
during an interf interview. And so it actually really helps with the next step of the process is that if you put Seinfeld on your resume, they're going to ask you first question in the interview, what your favorite Seinfeld episode is. I guarantee you. And so it it's a really great icebreaker and it makes the whole process a lot smoother, makes it more likely you get hired. And the third reason is that it actually it it it's when they well they're looking at a resume, they're not just looking at like can they do the job?
This is someone that you're going to spend 40 hours a week with for weeks on end, potentially years on end. So they're also wanting to know: are you cool, for lack of a better word? Are you going to be a good coworker? Someone that spending my life with and my energy with is actually someone that I'm going to enjoy spending that time with, going to happy hours or work events, or Christmas parties, or meeting our spouses. and so interests are also a really great way for them to see you as a coworker.
as well as the human being and then to open up that interview in a really nice icebreaker way. So those are three reasons why you should have interest on your resume.
Bernie (22:49)
In sales, and and you know this from your your past past project with sheets and giggles, right? A little bit of humor, you know, gets you a little further along. How and but sales is it's about a little bit of an emotive content. And when you're doing a pitch, like if you're doing a company bit pitch or a business pitch to somebody, there's a certain emotive piece in there. But a resume, it's it's a it's
Yeah, it's two dimensional do object, right?
Colin (23:16)
Yeah. Yeah.
Bernie (23:18)
You know, put enough salt but not too much salt that you don't go, my gosh.
Colin (23:22)
People don't really have discretion as like a natural tool in their toolkit, which is kind of interesting. I I find it fascinating that like most people are like, Why why can't I put that I collect anime plushies? And I'm like, You can't, you can't put that as an interest on your resume. Don't do it. Like, so people I do struggle with this a little bit because I know that I'm instructing some people to do something that is not gonna be helpful to them because they just don't have this. But at the same time, I'm not trying to be an ass here.
That's good for the company because I've just saved the company maybe an interview someone with like is a little off the reservation and like, you know, can't be discreet about what they should put on their resume. So like, yeah, I I think it you with interest in that sort of thing, like building computers is really cool, right? Like, or like ki you know, i if you just put outdoors, what does that mean? But if you put kayaking or backpacking.
The, you know, when you live in Denver or, you know, Seattle, they're gonna ask you, where do you like to go backpacking? Right. Like, and and so I think that there is like, you know, if you put travel, it's a little bland. But if you put international travel or, you know, parentheses, 25 countries, or you put road trips, you know, something like something that's more like th you this whole process takes empathy. And a lot of people
either don't have it or they don't want to extend it to the person across the screen from them. But the the person who's making the resume needs to understand what is going through the mind of the person who's reading it. And I think that that empathy connection is what I try really hard to give people with Sheets resume is I'm I'm explaining to them both in long form written text on the website and videos that I make.
With the AI assistant and the builder that I've trained, I'm trying to walk them through how they're being perceived when somebody reads their resume. And I think that that's maybe the thing that people are missing in is when they're making their resume and they spend, I mean, people spend hours and days and weeks in tweaking the resume in this version and that version, and they drive themselves crazy. I think what's missing is they just don't know how it's being.
read. And I think that if you can empathize and understand with the person across the screen from you and what they're looking for and what they're not looking for, it makes the whole process a lot easier. And to your earlier comment about page length, some people think that like limit like lopping off you know some experience in the past is like lopping off an arm. They're like, but in twenty fourteen
God, that year was so important for me and my career. And like, I I can't leave that off. Like it, and I'm like, it was 12 years ago. Like, they don't like you should have it on there, but what you did in 2007 is probably not that relevant to 2026. And you can have it on there as a as a line and a company name and a role and a date, but do you need a bullet point? Like
Or do they know what help desk in 2007 was like? And do you not need to explain it at all? And you can just save that room for your most recent role that you really want to dive into what you've been doing the last three or four years. That's that's the the thing that people need to realize is that a resume is not a representation of oneself and one's identity. A rep a resume is a tool to get on the phone.
with a company to talk to them. And once you start looking at a res as a resume as a tool and not as a representation of your identity and everything you've done in your career, it becomes a lot less emotional. And you actually start writing it better where you're like, actually this is gonna hit. This isn't, I can leave this out, nobody cares. And it becomes less emotional. And I think that that's what I also want people to realize is making a resume should not be emotional. It needs to be strategic.
Bernie (27:08)
So when I was interviewing people almost a decade ago, I did not have an AI to scan the stuff. our HR department probably had a little bit of a a process, you know, kind of a sorting pile. But now I'm gonna assume that things have changed a lot. So
Just yeah, yeah, I no, no, I know, I know. some things some things don't change, some things change a heck of a lot. Does the and and you also mention AI interviews and which is like that's interesting. you know, how how do you prepare for these things? How do you how do you structure it so that the AI hits the mark to get advanced you? And now, you know, if there's a hundred of you out there with everything is equivalent other than the name, you know,
Colin (27:48)
It's a nightmare. Yeah, it's a nightmare. And I know guys, I know, I know, I know guys that I like who I really like, who are building like AI ATS systems for companies that like force rank candidates before the company ever talks to them and you know before the recruiter ever gets to see them. The secret that I try to let people in on is that the AI ATS is like the friendliest gate. Like
The only way the AI can get fired uninstalled, right? Is if the company goes into the reject pile, which they do, and looks through the rejects and they go, they email the person who made the software and they go, hey, what the f WTF. these are a lot of really good reject candidates. Like, does your is your AI stupid? Like, does your AI not know what we're looking for? And so the AI ATS systems actually err on the side of inclusion.
Because they're not they're they're they're not certain as as certain as a human is about who should get on the phone, who should interview. So the what ends up happening is if you get 10,000 applications for a role, guaranteed right away, 5,000 of those are going to be irrelevant, bot applications, eight-page resumes from India, like just throw them to the side. That's just the way it is. And and the AI ETS is really good at just
throwing all that away, which is actually a huge help for companies. But then you still got like 5,000 people that are like reasonably qualified, right? Because they're applying for this role that is like, you know, that they're obviously qualified for, they think they're qualified for. And so that's kind of the secret that I want to let people in on is if you're remotely qualified for the roles that you're applying for and like you feel like you're qualified, you're getting through the AI ATS screen. It's not this boogeyman
That everyone has made it out to be online. Now you might get ranked lower than other candidates that have better experience, but you're getting through and you're getting reviewed. And once you understand that to be true, your focus and your strategic focus should not be on getting through the AI ATS or doing some keyword harvesting trick in your summary or the footer to get to trick the ATS and the passing you through to the human screener.
You're through. If you're qualified, you're through. What you need to focus on is getting that human screener who has 10 seconds to spend on your resume to say, hell yes, sheet yes. And just put you in the correct pile and move on to the next resume. So the entire focus of the candidate should not be this AI boogeyman, how to get through the ATS gates.
It still needs to be to impress the human who is actually scheduling an interview with you, reaching out for your schedule, your time. Now that being said, there are a lot more barriers to job applications that I think actually aren't productive. there are now A AI interviewers, you know, where a holographic zoom call thing, creature, dystopian algamation of human features.
you know, asks you about your background and you have to pretend to be polite to the AI and because you know you're being watched by somebody who watches the video or the AI system that, you know, force rinks the videos, it's really awful. I think it's it's it's terrible. And I I will recommend for the rest of my life every company that I ever work for or start to never use AI fake human being interviewers because I think it's quite disgusting.
And I think it's like disgusting in a really like insulting way to the candidate. Like this candidate is someone who wants to work at your company. They've applied there, they put their themselves out there. Putting your resume out there, applying for a job is a very personal thing. There's a fear of rejection, there's a fear of failure that you're not good enough, there's imposter syndrome. So for you to apply for a job, I think is a very emotional thing. And I think it's it's inherently emotional. And for a company to be like,
Hey, like we don't really want to hire someone to like look at your resume or to talk to you. Instead, we want you to talk to this like faceless creature that is gonna like ask you embarrassing and derogatory questions about your background that we could have already figured out just by reading the resume and application that you submitted is like so insulting and degrading to candidates that I it's hard for me to put it into harsher terms.
and I would not work at a company that used an AI interviewer because it tells me they don't give a shit about their job applicants as human beings, which tells me they probably don't give a shit about their employees as human beings. and so if they're if they're willing to degrade their job applicants with that AI process, then I think that they're willing to degrade their own employees with with AI technology that is gonna make them feel subhuman and doing their duties. so that's my take on that. and it is something that is out there.
but I would I would not stress too much about the AI gates if I were people. and instead I would try to get really targeted and old fashioned. And I would try to find the person who is the hiring manager at the job that you're applying to. And I would try to get in their inbox using, you know, some type of email finder or contact information.
Or just by being clever and doing first name, last name at gmail.com with maybe some different combinations. I say, I mean, it works. And or you know, their their first name, last name at the company.com or first initial last name at company.com. And I would reach out to them. I LinkedIn works quite well. I just hired two people for the resume builder who reached out to me, number one on LinkedIn and number one on Discord. And what that tells me is like they're clever enough to like find me.
Reach out to me, send me a message. They're resourceful. They they care about working here. And they're able to put their message right in front of my eyeballs. and so I think that that out that actually really works well in today's day and age because people are are overwhelmed with AI applications. And I would not use auto-apply. If I'm a job applicant, I would not buy those.
False promises from those AI auto-apply softwares, which we do not do at Sheets Resume and will never do, that take your resume and gun it to thousands of jobs all over the internet because you will not get hired. And not only that, it's an awful game of prisoners' dilemma where you're poisoning the job market and recruiters are overwhelmed with.
pointless and irrelevant applications and it ends up being a worse environment for everyone. So we're in a really bad case of game theory right now and we're kind of spiraling. And so that's why everything I build is meant to make the job seeking process that much easier for candidates.
Bernie (34:12)
Alan, one quick last question here. Overqualified and underqualified. Overqualified is someone who's, you know, left corporate in one space and they yeah, they have a huge skill set based on their last job. Or I just finished high school. But y you're looking for 20 years experience. you know, I didn't I wasn't born into the job, so you know.
Colin (34:32)
Ha ha ha.
Bernie (34:34)
How do I make that work? Right. But but you want to pay like I'm a I'm a 20 year old, but you know you want the experience of a 40 year old. how how do you structure that? How do you how does a person position themselves so they don't seem over and under? I mean, it it's a matter of can you do it? I mean, if if if you have to reach up if you're a basketball player, you you can make the throws easier. Not that you could make it when you're shorter.
But you if you're playing a game against everybody else that's super tall, you know, shorts, shorts not always ideal, right? It's it's like best fit. How do you how do you make sure that, you know, I'm I'm targeting like for example for myself. I would never be an accountant. Can I count? Yes. Could I do the job? Probably. Would I would I have a lot of stress doing it? Probably, yes. And so I I know that's not my it's not my sweet spot. Do I understand numbers? I do. But, you know, and I'll stop there.
How do you how do you find that kind of that perfect fit? In other words, you know, a square peg round hole.
Colin (35:30)
Well, so personally, I think there's no such thing as overqualified. Like I and and what I mean by that is I think that overqualified is a term that companies use to politely decline candidates who will want more salary than the role is willing to offer. That's that's my opinion. now of course it would be weird if somebody with a PhD in robotics
was applying to be a my marketing associate at Sheets Resume, I would be like, are you okay? Like, you know what I mean? Like it's not so there's there are like there are situations where it doesn't make sense. But the in my in my opinion, if you are applying for a job, you are telling that company and that you believe after reading the job description that you think this job is right for you.
And that you think that you're interested in it. So I I think that overqualified is like a made up term to politely decline people who are just going to be more expensive than more junior candidates. I like to hire overqualified people. If I can hire PhDs, if I can hire people who are super smart or go getters, like with 40 years experience, like, hell yeah, like that is that's a huge get. Now I'm gonna tell them up front, like, hey, I can't, I can't pay you.
What you can probably make elsewhere at a larger company. but it's gonna be fun working with me. You're gonna be able to work remotely, take days off, totally flexible schedule, dah, dah, dah, dah. What you think? And that's always worked out really well for me. Like I've gotten some really amazing, talented people to work for me over the years that probably below market rate just by being honest with them about the what the trade-offs are. from an underqualified perspective, I mean, that's hard because like
there are realities to, you know, does somebody have the skills to do this job? That, you know, do they have the certifications that are required? Do they have the years of experience in something or the hours of experience in something that are required? You know, there are there are requirements for pilots that they need a certain minimum number of hours. And there are probably require yeah and there are requirements, you know, for people who do email marketing that they probably sent, you know
at least some campaigns to do email marketing and they've done now you can you can learn things. So I think what I'd like to maybe change this question into is how do you convince a company that you have the correct values, abilities and skills to do the job? Because those are the three things that companies hire people on values, abilities and skills. Values are things that rarely change, if ever.
You develop them early on in your life, and you can tell by talking to somebody in their 30s or 40s, wow, this person's never gonna change because their values are set. Abilities can change over time with a lot of effort and education. So you can stretch your natural gifts, but your natural intelligence, your aptitude, your IQ, your EQ, whatever you want to call it, without a lot of effort and introspection.
is also pretty fixed, but it can be grown. Your skills are the things that can change rapidly with the right abilities and values combination. So if you desire to work in an industry and you're smart enough to grok a certain skill, you can go build that skill for that industry. And so what I usually encourage companies to think about is does this person have the right set of values and abilities to do the job? And if so.
If they're missing two or three skills, do we think that they can learn those two or three skills on the job? Because it's more rare and more difficult to find somebody who has the correct values and abilities than it is to find somebody who has the correct skills. The skills are are everywhere because those are the that's the malleable thing, right? You can learn any skill if you apply yourself to it. or most skills, you know, I can I'll never be in an AI machine learning engineer, you know, I'm never not gonna create an autonomous vehicle.
but like, you know, there are some there are a lot of skills, like probably 80, 90% of skills in the job market that can be learned by anyone as long as you apply yourself and you have the right values to want to go apply yourself. And so that's what I think I'd turn the question into is like, are you underqualified? No. You just either are missing the current skills or the abilities or the values for them to be comfortable in hiring you. And if you're missing all three, you're not gonna get hired.
If you're missing one of the three, depending on which one it is, you may get hired, but usually not if you're missing the values. If you're missing the values, and that's where companies actually get into a lot of trouble, is they need to hire quickly. And so they hire somebody who has the skills, but they don't have the abilities they're looking for. They're kind of lower level, or they don't have the values of the company. And then they wind up losing other better.
employees A players because they hired someone who doesn't share the values of the other employees and the culture of the company. And so that that's what people need to start thinking about when it's like, how do I get a job? How do I you have to make sure your resume screens might have the same values, the correct abilities, and at least most of the skills that you're looking for.
Bernie (40:34)
Colin, someone wants to reach you, how do they reach you?
Colin (40:36)
SheetsResume.com, Colin at SheetsResume.com. if you are a CTO candidate or a company looking to hire executive tech talent, you can also reach me at at LinkedIn for my Riviera Partners contact. I do CTO recruiting as my day job and I do this at night and on the weekends when I can't sleep. and I have an ADHD, so I come alive at night.
And I am on social media, but unless you like politics, you probably shouldn't follow me there. You could probably guess guess what I post. But yeah, LinkedIn, pretty easy, Colin McIntosh, sheets resume or re Riviera Partners.
Bernie (41:10)
Colin, I want say thank you so much. It's enlightening. It's good to hear and understand what's happening in the in the market. Colin's gone through a lot of his own experiences and he's built businesses and he's also has a platform that's out there that can help you. So if you're looking for a job, sheetsresume.com is the place to go. And you're welcome, Colin. Absolute pleasure.
Colin (41:31)
Yeah, man.