Kevin Butler and Revolutionary Resumes
You’ve probably seen Kevin Butler, though some of you may not know his name. Think back to the last Playstation 3 commercial you saw, do you remember the guy who worked for Playstation?
This one?
Yeah that one. His name is Kevin Butler (he is portrayed by Jeffrey Lambert) and, according to his YouTube page, is the VP of…lots of stuff, giving him a dream resume.
In the past I have seen other bloggers joke about how they wish they could add their gaming exploits and accomplishments to their resume, and no one makes me want to do it more than Kevin Butler. Which makes me ask the question, should gaming exploits be claimable?
Now it doesn’t mean that every gamer should start adding things like, “Assassin’s Creed II, Supervisor Ezio Auditore da Firenze, job description: removing pestilence from society…”; that would be silly.
What I am talking about is using a solid game example to explain a skill like “creative thinker” or “problem solver”. This does not mean that you should not have a real world stock answer of a time that you were creative or solved a problem, but slip it in as one of your examples. “Well at my job I…, but one of my hobbies is video games which have taught me a great deal about thinking creatively and problem solving in unique ways…”.
In a recent interview of mine the interviewers said, “Any example of a time you creatively problem solved”, which sounded like an invitation to use a game related example. I hesitated though and gave a commonly acceptable work example, but it nagged at me that I hadn’t used my strong gaming background.
If nothing else at least you will stand out from the crowd, which seems to be one of the keys of getting a job these days. Wouldn’t it be nice.
