Convocourses Podcast: Remote Work Countries and ATS style Resume

Main topics:

• Challenge of working remotely in other countries
• The ATS style resume for IT and cybersecurity

 

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Audible:

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Welcome to convo courses. My name is Bruce, and this is gonna be kind of a different format podcast. If you happen to watch my old ones, normally I put 'em on YouTube immediately. Um, right now I'm kind of on the go and I'm in my hotel. But I'm able to knock out these podcasts and there's a couple things we're gonna talk about on this one.

And I'm trying to just help you guys out with everything that I've learned over the years, doing cyber security and doing specifically security compliance, um, and how to get into the cyber security and it space.  um, and, and things I've learned along the way I've been doing this for 20 years. Uh, I've been doing this since two, the year 2000.

I actually was in the military for eight years. Um, I, I ended where I was working as a physical security guy. I was a security forces member, protecting resources and assets, and then doing law enforcement, things like that. So I very familiar with security, physical security controls, but then I, I cross train into cyber security.

Well, actually I crossed into it and we call it computer operators, but I did all things, uh, related to it, including cyber security, where, and that's where I got into security compliance. So. What I'm gonna talk about in this one is gonna be, um, something I learned about resumes. I realized why my resume's been doing so well.

And it's because it's ATS or application tracking system compliant. Let explain what that is. And, uh, kind of walk you through how to do it, and I'll try to be as audio as possible, knowing that some people only watch only listen to these, uh, podcasts. Uh, but that being said, if you happen to watch this on YouTube, then I'll have, uh, some examples for you as I'm talking through it.

Another thing I'm gonna talk about since I happened to be remote. Is working remotely and some of the pros and cons and, um, got some notes here, pros and cons of working remotely, some of the benefits of it and some of the countries that, uh, a lot of Americans are going to and why. All right, let's start off with the actual remote work.

I'm gonna take you guys here outside for a second here, outside of my room. It's gonna be a little bit of a change of audio. So just bear with me, but you'll still be able to hear me well, all right, here we go. All right. So I'm not able to do this live. Normally I do these, I do these live and, uh, um, but I, the.

It's not good enough here. And so that's one of the things I talked about in the previous videos and previous, um, podcasts where you, whenever you go to a place it's about noise. Pollution is a factor. Sometimes. Anyway, that being said, let's get into this. I want to show you guys where I'm at. So I'm at a resort here in Manila, Philippines, and I've been here for, I've been in the Philippines for about a month.

Uh, I've been off for about two. At the end of that, and I'm actually looking for a job right now, learn some new things about the job market, which we'll talk about. Okay. So what I'm looking at, if you happen to be watching and listening to this on audio is it's just a group of hotels with a bunch of pools below it's.

It's beautiful. It's kind of a rainy, kind of a rainy day here in Manila. There's a freeway that's not too far from here. That's what you can kind of hear that far away. There's an airport, not too far from here. And then you can hear. Below that are in a pool and stuff. So that's, that's where I'm at. I'm like on a balcony of a hotel resort, pretty nice.

It's called the urban residence, urban residence. Crazy that I've gone to so many hotels. I forgot the name of this place. And even, even those places. Nice. Anyway. Okay. Let's talk about the benefits of remote work. You hear a lot of people talking about remote work and you probably wondering, like, why did everybody talk about this?

Why is this so popular? Why is what's going on with it? Well, there's a few reasons and everybody has their own reasons, but I'm going to name some of the most popular that come to mind. One of the biggest ones is, uh, when you're working remotely, especially in other countries, is that it's cheaper to live in other countries.

A great example is Manila is one of the most popular places that Americans will go and move to and work from because it's just, it's just cheaper to live here. The food is cheaper. Uh, for us, um, the cost of living here for Filipinos is, is not great. There are problems here. I've been here long enough to see some of the, the freight edges of, of a country.

And that's the thing. When you go to a country it's not all sunshine and rainbows, like you, you find there's issues in every country, just like in the us. So don't a lot of people just talk up on a country, but you gotta look at all sides of it whenever you travel. Anyway, one of the biggest benefits that Americans will come here in, in some other C.

That it's cheaper for us cheaper for us cost of living wise with food, much cheaper with your medical is much, much cheaper. It's cheaper to fly here or do medical, uh, and dental than it is to do it in the us. It's ridiculous in the us. It's cheaper for rentals are cheaper. Like these rentals here. Um, this, these are kind of an exception because these are, this is a private residence that are in a, a resort.

So this is gonna be a little bit more pricey. Um, but this, this place I. Which is, which is incredible, which has pools. It has has a clubhouse that right over there that, that dome looking building that donate, donate shaped dome looking building is a, is a clubhouse that has, it has food. It has amenities such as the gym.

It has all kinds of stuff there. And it's three levels, but this place I'm at is $45 a day for this resort. There's, there's like four pools here. There's an Olympic size swimming pool over there. This place is. It's it's, it's absolutely ridiculous. Um, not the best service I've had in the Philippines.

Philippines has some of the best service in the world. This place is kind of, so, so I don't know why it's the, management's not as way here, but this place is incredible. A place like this will run you probably $300 a day in the us. No joke, cuz this is like a five star resort. Um, here it's $45 and I found some of these places that you I'm looking at at hundreds of different.

Across from me and these units, some of 'em are only $27 a day. You could literally live here for $27 a day, $27 a day. It's like a thousand a month in a resort. Think about that. Living in a resort for thousand dollars a month or $30 a day. Yeah. About what, $30 a day. It's for 30 days, $900 a month. So that's still cheaper, like living in a place like this has a kitchen, it has internet, it has, uh, you know, um, Full bathroom.

Like you could, there's a laundry service downstairs. Like you could live here in this resort for $900 a month. There's a, there's a, uh, mall not too far from here. It's walking distance with a grocery store. Uh, everything you need is here and $900 a month, a place like this cost you $900 in the us. So that's one of the main reasons that people will travel and live in another place.

Some places that people consider besides. Would be that are cheap to live for us for American citizens is include Portugal, um, Thailand, Vietnam, Mexico, um, and Columbia. And there's a few other ones that are, that are comfortable for us to live and a Dominican Republic. That's another one comfortable for us to live much cheaper living standard and just your, your life is gonna be completely different there.

You. To really retire in some of these places. And this is 900 a month is, is, is crazy here. That's a crazy price. Um, you can get something that's not as doesn't have as many amenities for about $200 a month, $300 a month. A very, a pretty good place for about $300 a month. So, and then the food is, is cheaper.

It's uh, the transportation is fairly cheap. Um, here much, much cheaper than the us. It's all around. Like your whole living expense is gonna be different. So that said you don't need a hundred K job. You don't need a six figure job to live in a place like this. You have a six figure job here. You are living like a freaking king here, you know?

So that's one of the main reasons that people will go and live remotely. So, um, it's worth your time to look into everything's cheaper medical, uh, your dental, your food. Rentals your transportation, your whole living, your whole life is much, much, much cheaper in these countries that I named. Now, one thing you should know is that there's some countries that you probably sh can't go to, or don't necessarily want to go to, cuz you would not be able to work in an American or Canadian or some other countries going, you can't work from the following countries doing remote work.

I'm just gonna name a. Top of my head that are gonna be much, much harder for you to do remote from. And, uh, those, especially for American companies, cuz there's like an embargo. Anytime there's a country with an embargo, it's gonna be a lot harder for you to, to live there. And one of off the top of my head, one is Iran.

Um, Iran has some kind of sanctions, you know, and it's not that us American citizens agree with this stuff, but that's neither here nor there. If you're trying to work from. Cheaper location and you're trying to live there and stuff like that. It's just, you know, we are not necessarily the ones making the policies or controlling what's going on.

Right. So it it's fun. It's funny because the politically, we don't necessarily align with what the government is doing with the sanctions and stuff, but it it's a reality that we have to deal with. So one of those is Iran. Iran has all these sanctions. There's most American country companies that are paying you big money.

Will not be able to work from there. You can get there it's even gonna be hard for you to get there as an American. Another place is gonna be of course, uh, North Korea.  obviously, it's funny because it's so obvious. It's so crazy. It's gotten, the relationship has been so bad between the us and North Korea.

They just did not even a question anymore. You go there, especially if you're ex-military or something you're gonna be end up in prison somehow, you know? So unless you're Dennis Rodman or something, I don't know. Um, it it's, it's just not a place that you're gonna be able to go. That that being said South Korea.

Um, it is probably a place you could live, but it's, it's a lot more expensive in South Korea. So, um, it it's, a lot of people don't go there because of that reason, unless they have family or friends or, or, or their family fiance or spouse, is there or something like that. Um, another place that you probably are gonna have some issues with is gonna be VE.

And it's just unfortunate, cuz it's such a beautiful place with beautiful people, beautiful culture and all that stuff. It's just sad. But Venezuela, I know people are going there but to work from there, um, cause the what's happening with the economy. Cause there's, you don't know like the, the embargo thing is kind of flaky with the us.

Every time there's a new president, they put some kind of stuff against Venezuela. Venezuela is probably not a place you could work remotely. Uh, another place is Cub. Another one that's really unfortunate because it's such a beautiful place. It's so amazing. It's so close. It just makes sense to live there.

And it's just like, because of all this stupid stuff going on between our governments, we as Americans gonna have a hard time getting in and out of there, especially if you're working from there on, on, uh, anything with any kind of government information, it's just gonna be harder for you to work there.

And then all this political stuff happening now with, with. Don't know if you've heard, but like Russia and, and some other countries that are going and, and making bases and stuff and having relationships with it's just gonna go outta control here real soon. So it's not a place I would recommend that you, even if you have the ability to do it, to work there for an American company and, and go there.

So those are the three that I was, I'm sure there's many other ones. Maybe I'll make another, uh, video where I explain some other countries that are, that are not good to go to, to work. Um, and, uh, that's, that's about it for those ones. Um, let me see if there's any other things I wanted to talk to you about with remote work.

I think that's it for remote work. I want to talk to you guys a little bit about something I've discovered something I was, I've been doing right for many, many years. I'm gonna actually change locations here so that we can get a better sound change up the ambiance a little bit. Okay. Here we go. Going inside.

Room

are you on? Okay, sorry. Uh, okay. Sorry. I, my partner's, uh, doing some work there, so I'm gonna stay in. I'm stay out here.  oh, this is, uh, podcast. So that's what you get real life stuff going on. So anyway, um, I wanted to talk to you guys about a Ts. So what I discovered is all these years I've been doing something very right with.

My resume. If you didn't know, whenever I put my resume out there, I market my resume. It does really, really well on LinkedIn, on dice, on monster and all the other job sites. It does really well. And the reason why I discover is cuz I keep it simple. It's just a plain, it's not fancy. It doesn't have tables.

It doesn't have pictures. It doesn't have anything, any kind of overlays, nothing like that. It's just a plain document. White paper, white. With my name on the top contact information, and then job exper work experience. It has, um, certifications. It has education. It has that's about it. It's pretty simple.

Like I think I recently added skills, but it's pretty basic. And I normally put it in dot doc, turns out all that stuff is what you're supposed to do so that it is ATS compliant. Now, what is ATS? ATS? A application tracking software. It's basically like a database or software or a server that fortune many fortune 500 companies use to, uh, pull in the resumes and track, um, and, um, monitor and do analysis and do artificial intelligence analysis on resumes.

It pulls them in if it has the correct format. If, if the correct format is. It'll reject your it'll reject your, um, your applica your resume, right? And if you, you wanna know what I'm talking about, whenever you sign up for a job, think of this, have you noticed they always have you do an application? The reason why is cuz your resume is not compatible.

Normally people's resume is not compatible with the system that they, that company has internally. They have an internal database that pulls in all the information. It has. It has a database. Name, uh, where you've worked in the past, all your experience, your skills, your education, all that pulls, all that stuff in, and it compares you to other candidates and it, and once you're in their database, they have this big pool of people, um, that they can pull from and, and put into different positions.

And it allows 'em to put you quickly into those different positions and then call you con if you contact information's there, they'll contact you with via. Or via phone and say, Hey, Bruce, uh, we've got this position for you. Are you available on this day? We noticed that you have all the skills that we need for this position.

That is an ATS. It allows 'em to very quickly get you in their system. And if you have a resume, what they'll too, if your resume is right, is they'll pull all that information from LinkedIn or from dice or from monster or from other search sites. And. Put that into their database, just instantaneously, but that's only if your resume is out there in the correct format with all the correct information.

And that's why you have to fill out your complete profile. It has to be accurate and then upload your ATS compliant resume. That means a plain blank resume with the headers. All that stuff is in correct order. And one of the things that I noticed that my, my resume didn't get right, was the dates of work.

It's a work we're a little off, cuz there's a certain format that they want you to have in there. So ATS, uh, just having a simplified resume has helped me to get all these jobs and all these offers and all these opportunities over the years. And then now, recently I fine tuned it. I've I've gotten back into my resume, ripped it apart, rewrote it.

And now I'm like really getting into the weeds on the each one of the key words that they wanna see. And the format tightened it up. So it's perfect so that whenever they pull in those resumes, mine is gonna just come in and with no problems. So that is what ATS is. And, um, that is, that's something that that's really helped me out to get jobs and stuff.

Um, I would like to, at some point what I'm gonna do for you guys that watch me on YouTube is I'm gonna walk you through how I actually apply using my ATS. May, um, and how you can, um, maximize your opportunities, uh, to get these different jobs, high paying jobs, by the way, that's about it guys. Um, I'm got about three days left here.

I'm a little bit sad about it. Um, I've gotta go back into the workforce here real soon. , uh, it's been a great vacation here in Manila and I, I actually travel to, uh, different parts of the Philippines. Um, this Philippines, the reason why I come here so often is because it's been like a second home to me.

Um, I have over the years of these high paying jobs, I've been able to buy some condos here. Um, kind of got in early on some condos and, um, got some, uh, friends and family and stuff here. And that's, that's why I come here. And I know where things are, kind of have a better feel for this particular country.

Next country. I'm. To I've been here so many times. It's time for me to, to move to another place. I'm probably gonna go to like Indonesia. I'm gonna try that. At some point, I would like to go to Europe and, uh, countries in Africa. And, uh, those are things that are gonna be in the future for me. I would love to go there and, and visit.

But right now, this going to places, I know that I, that I'm familiar with that can go by myself and feel, and, and feel familiar enough to where I feel safe. So that's, that's why I. Year. And that's why I come here so often. Um, if I would, I get a job here, I noticed somebody asked me a question. They said, Hey, Bruce, like, would you get a, a job here?

And they said, Hey, I'm looking for a job in the Philippines. Could I do it? You totally could do it here. If I was doing that, I've got my kids and stuff are in the us. I'm not, I'm not doing it myself here. And it's a bit too crowded personally for me to live here. Uh, maybe in the far future, you know, and buy some.

Somewhere and then go live there or something, or have my spouse, by the way, you gotta be a Filipino citizen in order to buy land. Or anyway, what I would do if I wanted to get a job here is I would, first of all, tighten up my resume, right. Uh, tighten up my resume and I would look for either a job in Metro Manila or in Sibu I'd open myself up to those I'd look at all the job sites for Sibu and.

Metro Manila, cuz those are like the biggest cities here I'd apply for those jobs. Put my re, get my resume, right? Put it out there. And I noticed just kind of glancing at it that there's a lot of banks that need the kind of work that I provide. So I would apply for all of those, but my biggest play would be on remote work.

I would look for remote work in the us cuz it's a job. It's a hot job market right now for it. And cyber security. I would look for remote jobs. Would allow me to actually work from home and then I would fly here and work from here. That's what I would do. Um, if I was, if I was so inclined to actually work here and at one point I really considered it, I would actually consider bringing my kids here and like living here like three months out of a year or something like that, it didn't work out.

So now here I am by myself. Um, just enjoying my vacation here and. I think maybe in the future, what I'll do is I'll, uh, I'll look for some other country that I could live in. Uh, it probably won't be, like I said, Philippines, a little too crowded, but I'm looking, I'm kind of head hunting for, for different countries that I could live in.

Um, for a while. I like to like live in a country for like a year and, uh, and just to see how it, how it feels to actually be a resident of that country. So I would look for a. That will allow me to stay there for some time. And, but just off the top of my head, Portugal keeps coming up. Portugal is one that I would look into.

Um, maybe, maybe Thailand. I really love Thailand so much. Um, Indonesia's one. I want to check out. Those are what like that are, um, within my price range and I feel more comfortable in those places. Um, cuz I've been to Southeast Asia. So. Times that I kind of know what to expect. And then I would like to learn the language and stuff like that.

So I'd be pretty serious about it if I did do it. Um, I think that that's about it for this particular podcast. Guys, let me just, uh, end this on, uh, letting you get for those you, this is where I'm at. It's pretty nice. Um, got a few more days here. It's been great. Um, just enjoying the culture, enjoying the, the atmosphere and, uh, the humidity.

I love. Back in Colorado. We don't really have that. Um, it's, it's very, very dry mountainous and stuff, which is beautiful, has its own, you know, amazing beauty, but it's not the Philippines. You know what I mean? , we're not too far from the ocean here. Um, feels so amazing here. And, um, I'm gonna miss it once again.

I'm gonna miss this place and um, next time I'll gonna go to another country and hopefully I'll be able to do some podcast. There too. All right. Talk to you guys.