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Comment by mnw21cam | Hacker News Reader

Good luck uploading your CV in PDF. I tried that a few times and got moaned at a load that my CV must be in Word format. In the end I converted the PDF into images, and created a Word document in OpenOffice (this was a while ago) with one page image per page. Got moaned at for that too.

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Heh. A buddy of mine once applied for a Linux job and sent his resume as a PDF. They called him back: "OMG, you're the only applicant who didn't send a Word file. We're not worthy."

Did he create the PDF in LaTeX?

The only reason they want your resume at all is to run a keyword extractor over it. If you know this, why are you making their job harder?

I haven't had that experience for a single job that I ever applied to. Always sent in PDFs without any issues.

Recruiters and large firms tend to ask for a Word file. I sent the plaintext file (minimal markdown) I used to generate the pdf to a recruiter recently. They directly asked for a docx instead.

Recruiters probably edit the file before passing it on to the actual business... Add some more buzzwords, remove direct contact information, obscure exact project details. Some recruiters play quite dirty business and likewise assume the worst of their customers.

That is exactly the complaint I got about my word-document-with-page-images. The recruiter couldn't work out how to edit it. I saw the CV they actually ended up sending to one of the workplaces I interviewed at. They had retyped it, and it looked awful.

> Recruiters and large firms tend to ask for a Word file.

Again, not my experience at all.

I think if a company didn't accept my PDF CV and asked for a Word file instead, I'd strongly reconsider whether I'm actually interested in working there.

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