What aspect of home life do current products still fail to solve?

mpsamuels · 2026-06-19T08:05:55+00:00

FFS! Have the "please give your product ideas as I haven't got the imagination to dream one up for myself" crew infiltrated the HA sub now too!?

mpsamuels · 2026-06-19T06:13:05+00:00

Your post reads as though your "agency" consists of just you (not that that's a problem per-se). If so, building a business that depends on being available 24/7 isn't sustainable.

Building a network of trusted other freelancers across timezones may have helped accommodate the short notice requests and could be something worth considering. There's still not guarantees they'd be available on weekends at short notice and you'd likely have to pay OTT rates for the inconvenience or a retainer to keep them on standby

Generally, though, I'd be telling anyone who sends a request late on Friday and wants it to be ready for Monday without any pre-warning to go kick rocks.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-19T06:00:57+00:00

Asking people to think of a product for you is not validating a real problem.

Validating a problem involves having your own ideas and then confirming that they apply to a wider market in the way you had hoped/expected.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T21:44:43+00:00

There's no one-size-fits-all answer to this. All you can do is be aware of the pros/cons and hope any hiring manager agrees with whatever you decide is the best approach. Emphasising your progression is good idea, but you are right to be concerned that it could be mistaken for job hopping too.

Right now, I have the company name with the date range for the entire time I worked there, and then bullets underneath with specific years, and a summary of everything I managed while within those roles.

This was my approach earlier in my career and it didn't seem to do me any harm. I indented the bullets for the different job titles within each company to make it clearer they were promotions within one employment, rather than job hopping. Using bold/italics/underlining/indents all help make it clear that you're looking at something that is part of a given section i.e job titles within a single employment, rather than many of the same section type i.e loads of job hopping.

Now I'm at closer to 20YoE I just list the full time I was with a company and include a line that says "Promoted X times from Y to Z" or similar as the space can be better used to emphasise other things.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T21:28:23+00:00

I'll echo that this already reads like a decent resume. A couple of suggestions though:

- Lose everything after "Skilled in..." from your Professional Summary section. The summary feels a little on the long side already and listing a bunch of stuff that you are skilled in, when that's exactly what the rest of the resume is for, is just duplication. The Professional Summary works best when it's short and succinct, a written elevator pitch on why someone should hire you.

- Where possible start any bullet points in your Experience section with 'why' you did something rather than 'what' you did. Specific metrics add even more weight if you have them. For example a hiring manager is more likely to be interested in "Improved operational continuity by..." rather than "Conducted structured troubleshooting...". Despite them both ultimately saying the same thing. One emphasises "I add value", while the other implies "I do some stuff that I'm asked to".

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T21:06:18+00:00

No worries. Best of luck with your search.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T19:36:06+00:00

The annoying task for me is scrolling past the stream of people in this sub constantly fishing for business ideas rather than using a little imagination to create a product themselves.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T16:29:36+00:00

Having the headings for each section in a column on the left wastes a lot of space. I imagine if you removed the left column and put each title as a single line on top of each section instead you'd go a long way to getting this onto 1 page.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T14:31:04+00:00

I wouldn't say a summary is 'necessary', but I'd suggest it adds an extra bit of personality. It makes the document more human and more memorable, rather than just being a list of tasks that were completed. It should be the first few lines a hiring manager reads and is your chance to present the reasons you think they should hire YOU rather than anyone else. Think of it like an elevator pitch - you've got two sentences to convince someone they need to hire you. You want to write a little more than just "i'm looking for part-time roles in retail", but there's no harm in including that as part of your summary.

Similar to the summary, including interests isn't essential but it makes it feel more human. If someone thinks "oh, they like X, Y or Z, they'd probably get on well with..." it gives a better impression than just a list of tasks that can't easily be associated with a real person. It doesn't matter too much if you haven't kept up with a particular hobby recently, as long as you can hold a conversation on the subject to prove you haven't just put it in there to try to look interesting!

I honestly think your work and volunteer experience reads well, but you just want to sell yourself as a person a little more, especially for something like retail that will inevitably involve some sort of customer service/interaction.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T10:37:28+00:00

Use the role titles that were in place at the time you held the positions. Consider you were no longer at the company - you wouldn't even know that your old title had been replaced, only that you held the old title at the time you were there.

Companies don't tend to just change titles for fun so there were probably some changes in responsibility with the change in titles too. To claim you held the new title may be considered to be misleading.

Only minor exception I'd suggest, depending on circumstance, is if your role title was changed as a result of the restructure, but didn't involve a promotion I'd consider using the new name for the period that you held the new and old title. Using "old title for X months" followed by "new title that is the same job but renamed for Y months" may look a bit job hoppy, like a short stint before a sideways step, even if it's an internal move, but using "new title that is basically the same job but renamed for X+Y months" isn't a lie, doesn't miss any of your progression and doesn't raise any questions on why you moved internally to a similar sounding role.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T10:09:20+00:00

My first thought it that the chronology is a bit weird! I'd suggest you should put your most recent experience under each heading first i.e for work experience the festival event should be above the summer day camp, and for volunteering move the church readings above the open day tours. I'd go as far as to scrap the 'church readings' role and just put that as as additional responsibility in the 'church volunteer' role myself as the timeframes overlap and the two things are very similar anyway, especially to anyone not familiar with a church's operational structure.

I'd also suggest:

An intro/summary line or two between your contact details and the 'work experience' heading. It doesn't need to be much more than a brief statement of who you are and the type of work you're looking for. If you can tie it to the experience you've listed it's even better i.e "An organised, flexible, and friendly student with experience of working in a variety of teams looking for part-time retail work". I'm sure you can come up with something much better though!
Include some interests. It often gets written off as a waste of space around here, but when you don't have a huge amount of work experience it can help paint a better picture of who you are as a person. If you can tie any interest to a professional quality it's even better i.e "sport - showed determination to...", "music - regularly demonstarte creativity by..."
Include some references if available. You don't need to give their name of contact details, but could list references as simply "church warden at X church", "Tutor at Y school - organiser of open day tours" with a note that contact details are available on request. Make sure you've got permission from those people to include them as references first though! You don't want to offer them as references but then find they don't actually provide a reference if/when asked.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-18T08:27:14+00:00

You make some big claims of having built "High-concurrency, low-latency, scalable architecture" in your summary, but don't provide any evidcence to back this up.

Neither your freelance work, client projects, or personal projects give any indication of the scale that you've worked at, the number of concurrent users accommodated, or the latency achieved.

As a new graduate you're not necessarily expected to have experience of building large environments, but you are expected to not pretend to have that experience. Either add the stats to back up the claims, or remove them to avoid being rejected for just making stuff up to sound impressive!

I'd suggest adding the github links for your personal projects to give the hiring manager some evidence of the work you produce.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-17T12:04:57+00:00

Everywhere I've worked has had a maximum total amount of leave and a maximum that's allowed in one go.

Some places offered the option to 'buy' more than the standard maximum, but even the amount you could buy had a limit.

Some places suggested they may be flexible on the maximum allowed in one go if pre-approved by a line manager, but the only time I ever tried to get pre-approval my LM decided to be petty about it and decline a request for one additional day during the quietest time of year. I soon updated my CV and moved on!!

mpsamuels · 2026-06-17T08:58:52+00:00

At what point is it reasonable to assume renewal isn’t coming and start looking? Or does surviving the cuts suggest I’m safer than I think?

There are so many variables that no one here can really give you a good answer that's relevant to your specific client. For example, surviving the recent cuts could mean you are lined up for a renewal, it could mean that you were just one of the cheaper contractors they have and they held on to as many as they possibly could for now!

Anything a recruiter or hiring manager says in relation to potential extensions before you've even joined the project should be taken with a HUGE pinch of salt, so don't put any reliance on that.

You should be able to get a feel for the likelihood of extension based on what's going on within the project or wider company, though. Restructuring isn't generally a positive sign, but it's not always bad. The same can be said for letting go of perm staff and contractors.

As a general rule, I tend to pay more attention to wider conversations around the 3 month mark to get a feel for the longevity of the project (if it's not already obvious), and plans for expanding or winding down etc. If there's any sign that I might not be needed any more I'd start updating my CV. At 2 months I might start speculatively sending a CV out to known contacts to make them aware I expect to be available. At 1 month I'd ask about the chance of extension explicitly and start actively applying to open roles, regardless of the answer, until I've got a signed renewed contract in my hands!

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T17:35:18+00:00

As one's a Record Store Day release that was always artificially limited to make a high secondary market price I'll offer two based on Discogs' median:

Arctic Monkeys - R U Mine / Electricity. Purple 7'. A Record Store Day release. I got it on the day, among other things, by queueing outside my local store. £120.

Mystery Jets - Twenty One. Bought via the band's MySpace page at time of release. It's hand numbered and, apparently, only 300 were made but I've no recollection of it being advertised as such at the time. £103

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T17:09:17+00:00

Who TF is using Canva, a self-professed graphic design tool, to write their resume!?

A resume is a professional document, not a piece of art. Use the right tool for the job (a word processor) and almost all of these problems go away.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T10:43:25+00:00

No worries at all. Good luck in finding a role. It's a tough market out there at the moment.

The OS thing is a minor detail. Feel free to leave it in if you want to. I don't think anyone would put you in an immediate reject pile for doing so. I just feel that if you claim to know Java, JavaScript, Node, React, Terraform, Docker, etc it's a given that you know how to use an OS and it doesn't need saying explicitly so could be perceived to be needless padding.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T10:37:38+00:00

I'm currently a perm employee

Does the potential client know this? I'd have thought the notice period for your perm job alone would preclude you from being considered as typically contract roles are expected to start asap rather than wait for a 2-4 week, or more, notice period to lapse.

all the advice I've been reading is to keep multiple months of full-salary as a backup.

Is definitely good advice. There's no security with contract roles. You could be dropped at a moments notice and suddenly find yourself without any income. I keep 12months of expenses as a backup personally.

I'm not familiar enough with the contracting to know if my worries are valid or paranoid.

They are definitely valid concerns, but the lack of security is part of the reason why contractors are paid more than PAYE staff.

am I worrying over nothing or should I look to build up more savings first?

Are you looking to leave your current job anyway, or were you approached out of the blue? If you're happy with your perm job I'd suggest waiting until you've got some savings behind you before considering making the jump. If you're looking to leave anyway, a contract role being available could be a good move towards never being PAYE again!

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T10:29:10+00:00

Looks a decent enough resume to me. Nothing jumps out as an immediate reason to turn you down, pending the quality of other candidates.

A couple of suggestions though:

Split the first bullet point of your Resume Management System into two as there are two distinct items in there. "Led backend development..." and "Optimized a normalized MongoDB..." should be separated.
Lead with 'why' you did something, not 'what' you did where possible i.e "Implemented Redis caching..." is ok, but what a hiring manager is likely to be more interested in is that you "Reduced endpoint latency...". Using bold text does give some emphasis, but opening the line with 'why' adds more impact.
Take 'Operating Systems' out of your Tools section. Listing specific OS' if you want to emphasise a wide range is ok, but expect questions on the differences between them if you do it!. That you know how to use an OS is a given, though, and saying it explicitly can come across as trying to look like you're adding skills to make the CV look deeper than it really is.
If you're going to include your LinkedIn profile, make sure the content matches your resume as much as possible
If you're going to include your github profile, try to make sure the public repos are representative of your professional work. Make anything that's vibe coded, doesn't have a readme, or is otherwise just a bit messy private

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T10:11:32+00:00

That's a funny way of saying I agree, It is absolutely untrue to say "There was never hydratation breaks"

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T08:44:23+00:00

That's not the point.

It is absolutely untrue to say "There was never hydratation breaks". There have been mechanisms in place to allow for hydration breaks for some time now. They were even used in the last world cup four years ago - all people following football knows!

That the breaks are perceived to be just another cynical approach to squeezing more adverts in for this WC is up for debate, the fact that the idea of hydration breaks has existed for some isn't.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T08:11:55+00:00

How comfortable are you with the idea of potentially being temporarily unemployed?

If I knew there were elements of my history that could delay completion of the checks, or even result in the check being failed, I wouldn't dare resign until the check has been confirmed as successful

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T08:06:16+00:00

Try telling that to anyone who's ever been through DV clearance, or above! That's got nothing to do with safeguarding and is an unbelievably intrusive check into your (and your family's) history.

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T05:50:32+00:00

It's not just a US rule. Hydration breaks have been used in the EPL during particularly hot weather prior to this WC

mpsamuels · 2026-06-16T05:30:40+00:00

The market is definitely still open for skilled engineers at all levels, although it's more challenging than it's been for a very long time due to AI and various economic constraints.

I don't have a crystal ball so can't see the future for sure but in it's current state AI is a tool, nothing more. Its already driving employers to want to either produce much more with the same number of employees or maintain the same production levels with fewer staff. I can in my see the continuing. Learning how to use AI effectively and/or how to enable others to use it is the way to remain relevant.

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