Guide - Boundless and Real Life - Resume Skills

So… A lot of folks ask me – How do you put a real resume together when you have no work experience but you are a gamer.

I have thought long and hard about how I wanted to write this, because everything we do in game, can be translated to a real-world skill that can be applied to a resume.

Sure Gathering resources doesn’t sound like a real-world skill, but If you translated to Market Manipulation, where you study items and their worth and learn the best places to sell those materials to make profit – That sure does.

Or how about Forging? You know how to play your chances with Lady Luck! You are great with managing risk, and applying logic to calculate what might come next.

Ooh I got it, Hard mode! How about those who are just social? Don’t do much but hang out on discord and voice chat bounding from Plinth or chiseled block to the next without touching the ground [You know who you are] – You are an Outgoing social person, great with people, have excellent hand-eye coordination and can multi-task.

These are life skills people take advantage of.

Now lets move on to the advanced stage-- What if those above seem too basic? I tried using them on a resume and was denied a job, they laughed at me.

Lets think about all our shop owners in game. Or Hub owners/managers/City Managers…

You do a job every day-- Resource Management is a BIG one. You are taking inventory when you run through and collect your coin – You see what is low, and what you need to adjust the price of to maybe market yourself better. You coordinate and negotiate advertising of your establishments-- this includes making catchy and easy to remember paths to follow, or even phrases/names that people know – DK Mall is a GREAT example. He has advertised beyond the normal, has marketted himself to have everything-- and then promoted his mall to entice people to go there first. Positioning of portals-- making it seen EVERYWHERE helps. All the major hubs-- Getting your connections out there is huge. If you want to grow-- Get a portal and pay for it for awhile. Make your hub easy to navigate, make it seen, and signs help. Organization of things is easy on the eyes.

Personal shops not connected-- you have to put yourself out there as well-- Painters by larky is a great example. Everyone knows what her shop is about without ever having to step foot in there. [You should, give her footfall. it’s a BEAUTIFULLY designed shop and still growing!] Her advertising is there in the name, she is connected to TNT and major hubs like GTG. And she has advertised on the forums. It’s what she talks about, works on, and is around, when she does Gleambow.

If anyone is unsure of how to turn a game-skill into a real-life resume skill I’d be glad to help. I do offer resume advice and would be glad to help you!

I know this post is kinda odd since it’s both directly and indirectly related to Boundless. Feel free to comment here, or add to this in your own thoughts. I may edit this post and add more, but it’s a great start.

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Nope! Not at all~ :slight_smile: Just trying to help folks.

I want to help folks too. . . don’t put video game skills in a resume.

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It’s never failed me before… Including my current job. o.o I don’t see anything wrong with it. It’s resource management, socialization, networking, people management, Inventory/retail management, and marketing. All real-world skills.

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I work in HR and management of a well known corporation, I think this is bad advice for the real world. We would view the resume as a joke if someone cited video game skills.

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So then, what would you recommend then for someone who has no real-world work experience? Maybe they haven’t been to school in several years so GPA/classes are out of the realm?

What would you suggest instead then?

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This is your thread and I love your write-up. It is very well thought out. I won’t hijack it and frankly I don’t feel like composing a path for success on the Boundless forum. I appreciate you, though. I simply want to disagree because people need both sides of an issue.

Best of luck on this thread. I’m out of this one. :wink:

Maybe I am high, but that bothers people less than cringe replies trying to put down people.

if someone is offering their help publicly and it doesn’t concern you, shut your mouth and walk away.

don’t start drama just to say your part.

forum rank doesnt stop you from needing to show respect

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I also wouldn’t suggest listing video game tasks as real world skills on a resume for employment. However, you are on the right track. I’ve helped people recently write up resumes and get hired into their desired career fields. They had no work experience. We listed their college credits earned, degrees (where applicable), their software skills, work they did at the school like helping the administration office or lower classes, work that they did for family businesses, and any special skills they had acquired up to that point.

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Whoa. I said I was out of this thread to show respect for Noni and the topic. As a professional, I saw something that concerned me. It turns my stomach that disagreement these days has to be so volatile. No one was attacking anyone until you spoke. You came out of 4 months of silence, so I get that you felt strongly. . . but you misread my tone and intention. I came in to offer a counter to something that I saw overall problematic. I’ve said my piece as calmly to you as I can. Now I am out of this one for real.

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Thanks for the input!

See, I believe both are an option, I know a lot of high-school drop out friends who I game with and they struggle to find skills they can list to put a resume together. College isn’t an option, and they haven’t worked but need a job else they get kicked out of their home, or face homeless-ness. So I tell them it’s not ideal but it’s Something than just sitting on your booty and doing nothing.

It’s not a first suggestion but if it’s all you have it’s still something. – I have done Asset Management for Partnered Streamers, Sprite creation for 2D and 3D Gaming companies, C++ Development, Assembly Development – all for games. I have also done Forum management, or community manager type of skills-- which can be translated to real-world skills. Being an independant contractor or an Entrepreneur – it doesn’t usually have to be a huge succesful company-- to show you have the skills and they can be applied.

Skills are a mindset in my opinion. You can do things if you put your mind to it. Sure, the college and degrees do certainly help a LOT more, and any HR company will hire a degreed person over someone who has never worked and they are referencing game management or video game skills any-day,… but not everyone has those advanced skills.

This is just offering to help with giving people a path. [Just my input] – I didn’t see anything on here to offer that sort of help on our forums, and it’s come up more than a dozen times from boundless folk.

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Here’s an interesting story …take what you want from it.

Video games are what launched my career. I’m old AF so I’ll take you back some years ago. I was working full-time in retail while also going to college part-time and I was gaming hardcore as much as I could along with learning HTML and web design on the side. I was lucky enough at the time to have a good computer at the time and I was playing a FPS online. I was jumping from server to server until one day I find this one server in Houston that always seemed populated and was team-based Capture the Flag.

Everytime I visited the server I always played with this one person that always seemed to play when I did and we struck up a conversation and started a little group of like-minded players and we all became good friends. New Year’s Eve was rolling around and the guy said he has a huge New Year’s Eve party every year and even though I thought about it as being a little risky…I went.

Come to find out it was a pretty well known party in Houston. There were a lot of people there and it was at my friend’s company which at the time was ran out of a house that he rented out for the business. After a LOT of adult beverages, I staggered outside to the front of his house where they had a couch setup and a few tables and I sat down. Here comes my buddy the dude is huge by the way, about 6’10 300lbs and all muscle… I only mention that because after drinking a ton …it was exaggerated and just something that sticks out in my mind. Around that time, he like falls on the other end of the couch from me and is drunker than hell just like I was. We look over at each other … give that little nod like guys do …say what’s up… and then we both leaned over and puked our guts up… he looks over at me leans over and gives me a high-five.

He then looks at me and asks if I want a job…now I know he’s drunk but he had the total look of seriousness in his eyes… and I said, “you aren’t just asking because you are drunk?” He says no…and passes out… I woke up the next morning laying on top of a pinball machine… all I can say is it was one of the best parties I ever attended.

After everyone was sober the next morning we cleaned up… he called me into his office and said he was serious and knew I could help with the web design and tech work at his company. Now this isn’t some huge corporation like @Creegle is talking about, but it was what launched my career.

I have worked at various-sized firms both huge and large many well-known and many just start-ups, but I always tell this story as I am always asked by many companies, be it a large company with a huge interview process like I went through with my current company where I would be interviewed by 4 groups of 10 people or by a small firm of 2-3.

Just be you … if a company doesn’t accept you for what skills you have an being who you are … it’s probably not the company for you.

In our interviews our dev team asks two questions we hold in high importance… “Do you like Halloween?” and “Do you play video games?” … while we do ask more technical questions … we are under the assumption you know the job or you wouldn’t have applied for the position… it’s long interview process… but in the end we can teach you the skills … but we can’t make you like our culture. We take Halloween seriously…

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I think it would depend upon the position being applied for and the size of the company. The skills you mentioned are definitely marketable & desirable to a lot of companies. It seemed like you were referring to people with no real world skills though. Which is not bad, everyone has to start somewhere. And yes, it will be more difficult for someone to get their foot in the door somewhere with no experience, no education, etc. Temp employment agencies are usually pretty good at finding employment for people in those situations. And that work experience can be used to start a resume to apply for a better position in the future. As long as you can work the hours & have dependable transportation, they can probably get you hired.

I actually do the hiring for both now and my previous company, and if anyone lets on that they are a pc gamer, I am always so relieved that they will understand what we feel as basic and normal skills we use everyday, not even a skill to us.

Teaching people how to operate a computer when all they have ever used is social media on their phone is tedious and stressful. Those who can understand computing process naturally and are familiar are a blessing.

So yes, hiring my employees are computer literate even from games, makes my job 1000% easier, and I do hire them over an identical person with same experience or possibly even more.

They can be trained on the business, as businesses always change and evolve, but business having to slow down because their employee don’t understand the equipment they are working with hurts more in the long run.

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An entry level job is more what I was thinking-- putting people maybe into entry level retail, fast food, maybe even fast food management, Perhaps getting their foot into a temp agency? or maybe a part time front-desk receptionist?

Obviously these skills are simple enough they wouldn’t get you an Accounting job, or maybe even a reverse engineering position – but it’s to help people get a start on life.

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In previous jobs I have ended up hiring people who had existing computer skills. I have a gent now-- has his Doctorate and asked me how to print his Outlook calandar-- so he could have a paper copy rather than a digital copy of all his meetings… I really feel bad because he’s making 6-digits of money but can’t operate his computer. I’d MUCH rather someone tech-savvy to help me on my team. But sadly they wanted the education over the experience.

So- you are correct position does matter.

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I would like to add

If your Mentally Challenged like me and can’t accomplish tasks like a normal person putting experience from gaming like nonie-chan has written down is one of the greatest strengths you can put on a resume

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do I, though?

Joke aside, ill have to save this post for when im older. might help me out in the future

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I think if a person could earnestly explain to me how their gaming experiences related to the job they were applying for and could demonstrate whatever competencies set out by my company e.g. does the job rely on time bound deadlines, good communication skills, etc and do the games they play use those skills, then I’d give it proper consideration.

Also, if my HR people were laughing at potential recruits’ credentials I’d be questioning their professionalism.

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