Microsoft's JobsBlog

Dear Jobsblog: I'm a college student heading into my last semester, and my GPA is good but not great. How much does my GPA matter? Can it keep me from getting a job? I worked on outside projects, will that help?

Answer: This is a popular question, so you're not alone in worrying about your grade point average! Janelle has written two great posts on this topic in the past, Living with a recent college grad: Your GPA and you and Should your GPA prevent you from getting your next job?. Check them out and don't skip the comment sections! Both posts have substantial back-and-forth about GPA in the comment threads that's really worth reading.

Good luck in your last semester!

Nasa Koski is a Lead Systems Engineer at Microsoft and a volunteer with King County Search & Rescue. Find out more on Nasa’s interest in technology, mountaineering and how she makes a difference through the Microsoft giving campaign in the video below.

Meet Nasa, a Lead Systems Engineer

Summer at Microsoft means internship time (as you've probably gathered by other recent posts here on JobsBlog :).  And in recruiting and HR, we also host interns who, as part of their Microsoft experience, work in teams on a project of their choice.  Last year, a few HR interns produced a perks and benefits video (which is still, by far, our most popular video.)

This year, one of our intern teams created TechLeaders, a series of videos in which they interview top people managers at Microsoft to learn more about the tools and techniques these managers use to succeed.

In the video below, see why Drew compares teamwork to a string quartet and management to driving a boat.  You can hear from from Drew and 3 other Microsoft people managers over on the TechLeaders blog. This is good stuff that can apply well beyond the Microsoft world.

The summer Olympic Games kick off today, and in case you can't make it, the Popfly team brings the games to you.  They've created 10 games from gymnastics to boxing to swimming to soccer.  And guess what?  You can create your own games, too. :)

And for the tie in to jobs at Microsoft (you knew that was coming!).... Yes, you can join the teams that build Popfly and other developer tools over in our Server & Tools Business. Empower professional and non-professional developers to innovate with the stuff you create. :) Yes, you can help others reach for the gold.  Ooh, tingles. :)

 Have a great weekend, everyone!  Don't watch too much TV!

This ERE article - A Recruiter's Guide to Candidate Interview Prep - has some interesting insight into the candidate - recruiter - hiring manager relationship and offers up some sample questions you can ask interviewers on the big day, like ...

 

Candidate Positioning Question 1: Defining their Skill Sets
I’ve researched the company and reviewed the responsibilities; however, please give me an idea of what you need accomplished with this position — say, in the first six months to two years?

This is an excellent question that requires the hiring manager to define exactly what needs to be achieved or accomplished in a specific timeline. Once defined, the candidate should give examples of where they have excelled in those skill sets in the past. (Give real life examples! Don’t just say “I can do that.”)

EXAMPLE:
I’ve been there and I’ve done that and here’s an example and here’s how it affected the bottom line ……

OR: I’ve not been there and done that, but I’m looking forward to adding that to my professional experience. (Then give the hiring manager an example where you had to quickly become the subject matter expert on other skill sets in the past.)

Worth checking out!

Gretchen

Goodness, a good recruiter couldn't even make this stuff up. :)  Hear (and see) what intern Mariah has to say about her summer at the empire.

Mariah is in the Explore Microsoft program, a 10 week summer internship that is specifically designed for college underclassmen (freshman and sophomores) and offers the opportunity to experience working at Microsoft. Based on Mariah's blog, I'm seriously wondering when she had time to work between the Mariner's games, Mt Rainier trips, and boating excursions ... but I have it on good authority that these interns are ready to ship (yes, ship) some impressive work after their 10 weeks here.

Hope you had a great summer, Mariah!

gretchen

Several months ago, Jim posted a video from his experience at the Vancouver office. I’m pleased to say that I recently hired Steven Shelford, Senior SDE, to work out of that office for the Live Search Relevance team. I asked him to talk about the Vancouver office and what distinguishes it from Redmond headquarters. Here’s Steven, and what he had to say.

What was your first impression of the Vancouver office?
I have been impressed ever since arriving at the facility. It is hard to imagine that the MCDC only opened its doors in September. How much work must have been done for the facility to open so quickly from its initial announcement, and how much it has grown since, is hard to fathom.

The diversity of people is also amazing. While we are only about 250 people now, the MCDC employees represent over 40 countries, with over 15 distinct languages spoken. I’m sure that is a statistic that is increasing in impressiveness every month as we welcome new hires. This rampant growth and diversity obviously creates an exciting atmosphere. It seems that every month we are adding more permanent space. Strangely, there always seems to be room for the foosball table and we now have a basketball hoop with the future plans of building a basketball court. Shooting a few hoops always helps break up the day.

What’s the environment / culture like?
That is a tough question for a newly created facility, especially one that continues to grow at a tremendous pace. I think we’re actually still determining our own identity and perhaps struggling to keep it unique from Redmond, which is tough with Redmond so close. One thing that I know about the group here is that we are all proud of being at Microsoft, and we all bring a unique view to work each day.

How is it similar / different than MS headquarters in Redmond?
There is the obvious difference: we’re smaller with a large percentage of new hires. This is quickly changing as we continue to gain experience here and as some employees from Redmond come up and bring their experience with them. Our smaller size can be quite advantageous for us: fewer meetings, getting more work done, and mixing more easily with other teams.

To tie in the previous question, I think we have a fabulous opportunity to shape our identity and culture. I don’t believe we need to replicate Redmond, but leverage our own situation and environment to create a fun, innovative, and ultimately productive work environment.

Are there many full-time teams located out of that office?
Don’t forget that the office is new. Teams need to be grown, not just moved. We definitely have a few teams that are creating a big presence here, such as the Live Search team. I am sure it won’t be long until the MCDC is recognized for its innovation, which in the end is what Microsoft truly needs to compete against its formidable competitors.

If you do have any questions about the Vancouver office, please feel free to post them. I’m sure I can get Steven to jump in to help answer them.

- Lisa

Derek is a product manager with Microsoft's Mobile Communications Business.  He works in downtown Seattle's Pioneer Studios.  And he is one of the brains behind last year's successful oFone campaign. ;-)  Check out his video to hear more.  And find more jobs like Derek's:  Product Management job openings.

Yesterday, Kenji wrote about the Microsoft Product Fair held last week out on our main campus soccer fields in Redmond.  I just want to put a quick shout out to all the employees who stopped by our booth, drank our beer :), and endured the recruiting paparazzi.  A few lucky employees even won their very own "I am the empire" tee.

To check out all our View<myWorld>-styled employee pictures from the fair, check out the View<ourWorld> album on the Workin' it @ MSFT page on Facebook.  And if you are already rockin' the empire as an employee, feel free to upload your own pictures to the page.

Want more pictures? Ok:

My teammate Melody & me workin' it at the Microsoft Staffing (that's what we call "recruiting" internally) Booth. We attended the fair to share our recruiting websites, blogs, videos, collateral, and give-aways with employees.  It was funny .... even though the fair was "employee-only," a few employees saw we were the recruiting team and shuffled by our booth quickly, mumbling, "I already have a job."  This was almost as funny to me as the time I attended the Server & Tools Halloween party wearing a Google t-shirt (with devil horns and a tail, of course ;-) and convinced several employees that I was a Google recruiter who infiltrated the party.

Our beer cups.  Employees, for more info on how to spread the love, go to, well, http://SpreadtheLove/. :)  

The laptop stickers we gave away ... "Rockin' the Empire" and "Will Code for Free Soda."  If you work at the 'soft and didn't get one of these, feel free to email me and I'll send 'em your way!

gretchen

Having pretty much just returned from my vacation (and having missed last year’s fair), I decided a few more hours couldn’t hurt and took some time to check out this year’s Product Fair in more detail. 

What I found was pretty darn interesting. At its most basic level, the Product Fair is a huge demo event with 100s of stations set up to showcase work the development teams have been doing the past year.  Lots of it I can’t detail too much due to non-disclosures and the like, though I will say it really made me proud for the company.  It was a great glimpse into what product teams have been working on this past year, and  I had a lot of fun seeing all of the exciting demos. I had a tough time deciding favorites, although I did enjoy myself at the MSN Entertainment, Search, and Xbox tents in particular.   

The fair is also a great relaxation event and opportunity to mingle and network with fellow ‘softies.   In addition to the standard-faire (pun intended) amenities mentioned earlier, there were also plenty of snacks, Microsoft schwag, and yes – even a beer garden! :)

Check it out – this year’s beer garden was event sponsored by Microsoft Recruiting!  Microspotting has more pictures of the event, including some cool View<myWorld> themed employee shots.  I wonder if I can convince someone (ahem, Gretchen?) to give me an “I am the Empire” shirt. :)

-Kenji

Dear JobsBlog: I recently found a position I'm interested in at microsoft.com/careers. I could rewrite my resume pretty much word-for-word as listed in the "main responsibilities" section. Would doing so be helpful, or would it seem like I'm trying too hard?

Answer: I don't think rewriting your resume to match the job description word for word is a good idea. I do think reviewing your resume to make sure that it addresses the responsibilities of a job description is a good idea.

A resume is something very personal. First and foremost it is important that your resume reflects accurate information about your experience. We see some resumes that have every technical skill and acronym known to mankind listed! This is frustrating for recruiters and managers to see, because it's hard for us to figure out your focus.

We don’t necessarily expect that a candidate will be a completely perfect fit for a specific job. Most hiring managers and recruiters I have worked with like to see the following:

• A Summary / Skills section listing things you have done
• An Experience section that speaks in detail how you might have gained the skills listed in your summary. For example, if you have C++ experience it is important to show in the body of your resume where you used this skill or gained this experience. Just listing something like this and not backing it up in your experience is not helpful to us in matching your skills to the job being filled.
• Telling a story with your resume – what did you do personally, what were you responsible for on an overall project, how many products / services have you shipped, etc…

That type of resume is much more likely to get attention than a resume that's just a rewrite of the job description!

- Angela

Interested in programming or software development but not quite sure how to get started?

Jacqueline, a Lead Project Manager at Microsoft, is here to to help. She works with Popfly, where you can jump into creating games, mashups and gadgets without writing a line of code. Watch her video to find out more about Popfly, the next generation of developers, and Jacqueline's passion for getting more young women involved in technology.

Want a job like Jacqueline's? Check out some other project manager positions at Microsoft.

Video: Meet Microsoft: "Jacqueline"

• Windows Live Spaces – create your own family space
• A tour of a Microsoft kitchen (complete with a chance to create their own café pizza)
• MS Studio Tours
• Talk on Safety and Security for Kids
• A tour of the Microsoft trading floor
• Microsoft Shuttle Operations Tour

I was able to sit in on the Windows Live Spaces event where children created their own family spaces. There were many happy yellow badge employees enjoying their experience and learning a new technical hobby.

 I also caught up with Alex, 9, who was observing her mother Felicia, Staffing Associate for Windows Experience. Here’s what she said about her day.

What did you do today? Today we went to the cafeteria and got lunch and ice-cream. Then mom showed me what she does at work and I helped.

What did you enjoy most about your day? Eating lunch!

What did you learn about your mom’s work that you didn’t know? That she hires people.

What did you learn about working in the real world? What I think about having a real job is it's fun but hard.

Felicia and Alex

Maybe these yellow badge employees will convert over to blue badge down the line. :-)

-Lisa

If I hadn’t been there I never would have believed it.

This past Friday the Microsoft intern program hosted a "Zoo-n Fest" Intern Picnic, which was sponsored by the Zune Team and held at the Woodland Park Zoo (cute name, huh?).

Approximately 1000 interns were invited to the event along with 200 Microsoft employees and senior executives. Interns were treated to a catered dinner and an empty zoo (other than the animals!). The musical performances by Vampire Weekend and Ben Folds were an amazing entertainment. Prizes, great food, great music, networking with execs and a beautiful 75 degree Seattle day!

But if you ask this recruiter, the picnic wasn’t even the true highlight. Interns (as well as recruiters) were informed that to get to the Zoo no one was allowed to drive. Insert complaining (as Redmond on a Friday night can be at least a 45 minute drive from the Zoo)—and we didn’t want to leave our cars at work. I complained along with the rest of the full time employees, but my manager Jeremy said "it will be worth the bus trip over."

So I begrudgingly got on one of the 30+ tour-size buses and waited as the other buses filled up and got into a line. The buses were ready to go at about 5:30 pm on Friday.

Enter the police escorts.

Motorcycle cops cruised around the buses and led us in a police escort convoy for the 15 miles to the Zoo – all while closing down traffic on the 520 bridge and 1-5 North. That’s right - traffic was shut down.

We had a view of Friday night rush hour I had never seen. Interns cheered with glee and took photo after photo of the empty freeway. A trip that normally would have taken close to an hour took around 15 minutes. It was VIP treatment all the way!

Apologies to those who were travelling on that stretch of road Friday evening but it was something I will never forget (and luckily I was on the bus, not watching them drive by). So there you have it... Microsoft will stop traffic for its hires. Totally cool.

- Janelle

Hello Readers! Greetings from the middle of intern season.

It's been really busy around the office this summer with a ton of fun and technical events going on. The weather has been a dream and the interns are having a wonderful time. Who could ask for anything more?

A couple Saturdays ago, several hundred Microsoft Interns met in one of the buildings on campus to solve a variety of puzzles and coding challenges. The all-day event pitted teams of interns from all different locations around the country in a super tough competition with puzzles of varying degrees of difficulty.

Brandon Unger, a Penn State May 2009 graduate, was kind enough to take these pictures of the future CEOs of Microsoft concentrating hard on winning first prize.

One of the puzzles was so hard that no team could solve it! It was a version of the old school video game Asteroids. You had to shoot the asteroids, and when you did a number flashed. Everyone thought that the number was code for something... but upon second look when the asteroids broke apart it displayed Braille letters. From those Braille letters it spelled out a clue to look at the spaceship on the game. When you looked closely at the spaceship it left a trail in Morse code which was the answer to the puzzle. WOW!

I would be lucky to get through that game without losing all my turns… let alone looking for those intense puzzle answers. I think it would be great to get a puzzle challenge going on the jobsblog soon… any takers?

- Janelle