Ritvika Nagula’s short, pragmatic playbook for résumé engineering — developed while she applied broadly after graduating in December 2018 and that she says helped land four job offers including from Microsoft, Amazon, and eBay — reads less like a list of tricks and more like a blueprint for converting technical work into verifiable hiring signals. Her core prescription: lead with the highest-impact experience, document projects with concrete tools and outcomes, and make your work easy to verify — especially by linking to GitHub. Those recommendations, recounted in a recent profile, reflect broader hiring realities in 2025: automated screens, time-starved hiring managers, and a premium on demonstrable, public evidence of engineering skill. (businessinsider.com)
This feature unpacks Nagula’s approach, verifies the central claims across independent reports, and evaluates what engineers should adopt — and what to treat cautiously — when adapting these tactics for their own hiring campaigns. The analysis balances practical steps you can implement today with a frank assessment of risks around automation, public code exposure, and equity. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)
Nagula’s story — a new-graduate who applied through LinkedIn, company portals, and targeted networking while prioritizing a curated résumé and public code — is documented in Business Insider and republished widely across outlets. She emphasizes that for software-engineering roles, the résumé often outweighs the cover letter and that recruiters typically get their first signal from the top section of the résumé: internships, co-ops, and mission-critical projects. Multiple outlets covering the interview note she organized projects into three buckets: internship/co-op work, academic/coursework projects, and side/passion projects — and that each project entry listed the toolchain and two-to-three lines describing impact or approach. (businessinsider.com, ca.style.yahoo.com)
These prescriptions are not unique to her story. Recruiter guidance and résumé experts consistently recommend concise, impact-driven bullet points, one-page formatting for early-career engineers, and explicit evidence of applied skills via public repositories or documented project pages. These complementary sources corroborate the article’s central claims and show the advice reflects accepted hiring practice rather than isolated anecdote. (businessinsider.com, nicksingh.com)
In addition, recruiter-focused guidance — including long-standing Microsoft hiring tips and résumé guidance from multiple experts — supports the emphasis on concise, impact-driven résumés and measurable results. These sources show that the mechanical behaviors Nagula recommends (project framing, GitHub linking, networking) are consistent with what hiring managers and internal recruiters say they look for. (businessinsider.com, nicksingh.com)
However, engineers should adopt these tactics with caution:
Source: AOL.com I'm a software engineer at Microsoft. Here are the résumé tips that landed me 4 job offers, including from Amazon and eBay
This feature unpacks Nagula’s approach, verifies the central claims across independent reports, and evaluates what engineers should adopt — and what to treat cautiously — when adapting these tactics for their own hiring campaigns. The analysis balances practical steps you can implement today with a frank assessment of risks around automation, public code exposure, and equity. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)
Nagula’s story — a new-graduate who applied through LinkedIn, company portals, and targeted networking while prioritizing a curated résumé and public code — is documented in Business Insider and republished widely across outlets. She emphasizes that for software-engineering roles, the résumé often outweighs the cover letter and that recruiters typically get their first signal from the top section of the résumé: internships, co-ops, and mission-critical projects. Multiple outlets covering the interview note she organized projects into three buckets: internship/co-op work, academic/coursework projects, and side/passion projects — and that each project entry listed the toolchain and two-to-three lines describing impact or approach. (businessinsider.com, ca.style.yahoo.com)These prescriptions are not unique to her story. Recruiter guidance and résumé experts consistently recommend concise, impact-driven bullet points, one-page formatting for early-career engineers, and explicit evidence of applied skills via public repositories or documented project pages. These complementary sources corroborate the article’s central claims and show the advice reflects accepted hiring practice rather than isolated anecdote. (businessinsider.com, nicksingh.com)
Why Nagula’s approach matters now
The hiring funnel is narrower — and faster
Large tech firms continue to rely on automated Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS), keyword matching, and initial recruiter triage to screen the overwhelming number of applications. That reality means the first 15–60 seconds of résumé review are decisive: clear signals in the résumé’s top lines increase the chance a human reviewer takes a deeper look. Prioritizing internships and relevant projects at the top of the résumé therefore functions as an immediate relevance signal to both machines and humans. (businessinsider.com, moneycontrol.com)“Show, don’t just tell” is now a survival skill
Public, verifiable evidence — GitHub repositories, issue histories, commit lifetimes, and README documentation — allows hiring teams to validate claims quickly. Recruiters and engineering interviewers increasingly treat GitHub as a primary portfolio; a well-documented repository can answer questions that a résumé cannot, and it reduces the friction for technical screens. Multiple independent reports echo this shift: GitHub is a baseline expectation for early-career engineers, and linking to projects is now standard practice in engineering résumés. (businessinsider.com, ca.style.yahoo.com)The premium on outcome and troubleshooting
Hiring teams want to see measurable impact or clear problem-solving narratives. Bullet points that quantify changes (reduced latency by X%, increased throughput by Y users, shortened build times) or that describe non-obvious technical challenges dominate attention. Nagula’s emphasis on describing the how and what of tools used in each project aligns with these expectations. Industry guidance reaffirms that describing a troubleshooting arc — what failed, how it was fixed, what was learned — is often more persuasive than listing a long stack of technologies. (nicksingh.com)Tactical playbook: the steps to emulate (and how to implement each)
Below are concrete, sequential steps distilled from Nagula’s advice and cross-checked against recruiter guidance and résumé experts. They’re written to be actionable for early-career through mid-career engineers.- Lead with relevance: structure the top of your résumé to show the most relevant experience first.
- Place internships, co-ops, or high-impact contract work immediately after your contact information.
- If you led or contributed to a measurable feature or service, summarize the impact in one line beneath the role. (businessinsider.com)
- Adopt the three-project framework: include one internship project, one coursework/academic project, and one side/passion project.
- For each project, list:
- The tech stack (languages, frameworks, CI/CD tools).
- Two or three lines describing the challenge, your contribution, and the outcome (quantified if possible). (businessinsider.com, moneycontrol.com)
- Make GitHub your living portfolio — but curate it.
- Link the exact repositories referenced on your résumé.
- Include READMEs with setup instructions, screenshots, and a short “problem → approach → result” write-up.
- Keep commit history readable (use clear commit messages) and avoid exposing sensitive credentials. (ca.style.yahoo.com)
- Optimize for both ATS and human readers.
- Use simple, linear formatting (avoid multi-column templates or graphics that break parsers).
- Mirror role language: include keywords from the job post but avoid stuffing irrelevant terms.
- Keep early-career résumés to one page; mid-career resumes can be two pages if both pages contain substantial, tangible impact. (nicksingh.com)
- Prepare the “resume-to-interview” narrative.
- For each bullet on the résumé, prepare a STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result) story.
- Expect interviewers to drill directly into technologies listed; have short code or design anecdotes ready.
- Layer networking onto applications.
- Use LinkedIn outreach to connect with current employees and, where possible, hiring managers.
- Request informational conversations and referrals; referrals can help bypass initial automated filters. (economictimes.indiatimes.com, moneycontrol.com)
- Avoid common pitfalls:
- Don’t include half-finished, unmaintained repos; these can harm credibility.
- Don’t list every single tool if you can’t speak to it confidently; narrow focus to top 3–4 technologies. (tech.yahoo.com)
Why these steps work: evidence and verification
Nagula’s account — that the résumé mattered more than a cover letter and that GitHub visibility was decisive — is confirmed across multiple outlets and recruiter guidance. Business Insider published the original as an as-told-to piece and a number of independent sites republished or summarized her advice, showing consistent, cross-platform reporting of the same claims. Reports from The Economic Times, Yahoo/CA, Newsbytes, and Moneycontrol all repeat the core points: prioritize relevant experience, document projects with toolchains, and link to GitHub. That independent corroboration reinforces that the recommendations are representative of broader best practices rather than an isolated anecdote. (businessinsider.com, economictimes.indiatimes.com, ca.style.yahoo.com)In addition, recruiter-focused guidance — including long-standing Microsoft hiring tips and résumé guidance from multiple experts — supports the emphasis on concise, impact-driven résumés and measurable results. These sources show that the mechanical behaviors Nagula recommends (project framing, GitHub linking, networking) are consistent with what hiring managers and internal recruiters say they look for. (businessinsider.com, nicksingh.com)
Critical analysis: strengths and blind spots
Strengths — why this approach reliably improves signal
- Verifiability: Public repositories and clear project narratives let hiring teams directly inspect outcomes, reducing reliance on unverifiable claims.
- Signal clarity: Leading with relevant experience creates an immediate relevance heuristic for both ATS parsers and human reviewers.
- Interview alignment: The résumé becomes a roadmap for interviews; candidates who list specific projects set the agenda for technical discussions.
- Scalability: These practices scale across role levels — the format holds for interns, early-career hires, and can be adapted for senior engineers by emphasizing system design and leadership metrics.
Risks and limitations — what to watch out for
- Public code is a double-edged sword. A live GitHub can validate your work and expose immature code, quick hacks, or security oversights. Curate repositories carefully and remove or refactor anything that undermines your credibility. Candidate guidance in multiple reports warns against linking to unpolished or abandoned repos. (ca.style.yahoo.com)
- ATS and keyword fragility. Well-crafted résumés can still be misinterpreted by automated filters. Over-optimization for one role risks making the résumé appear irrelevant to others; balance tailoring with truthfulness. Recruiter-centric sources emphasize balancing human readability with machine parsing.
- Equity and access concerns. Not all candidates have equal access to internships, side projects, or mentorship networks. A heavy reliance on portfolio evidence risks amplifying existing inequities unless hiring teams compensate by valuing potential and alternative experience. This systemic risk is noted in analyses of portfolio-driven hiring practices.
- Overemphasis on tools vs. systems thinking. As AI-assisted coding becomes more prevalent, hiring teams are shifting toward evaluating debugging skill, design thinking, and system-level reasoning — qualities that are harder to capture in a GitHub repo alone. Résumés should therefore highlight systems design, debugging stories, and leadership in cross-functional contexts.
Practical checklist you can implement this week
- Rewrite the top third of your résumé so the most relevant project or internship appears immediately beneath your header. Use a single line summary that quantifies impact where possible. (businessinsider.com)
- Pick three projects to showcase (internship, coursework, side project). For each:
- Add a one-line problem statement, one-line action, and one-line result.
- List key technologies used inline.
- Audit GitHub:
- Remove sensitive data and credentials.
- Add READMEs with installation steps, screenshots, and a short “what I learned” section.
- Pin the repositories you reference in your résumé so they’re on the top of your profile.
- Optimize formatting:
- Save a text-only version of your résumé to check ATS-parsability.
- Keep section names conventional (Experience, Projects, Education, Skills).
- Limit early-career résumés to one page; use concise bullets (no paragraphs).
- Network intentionally:
- Identify two employees at target firms and request 15-minute informational calls.
- Ask for a direct referral only after establishing a small rapport and showing you’ve tailored your résumé to the team’s needs. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)
What hiring managers need to remember (and what they often overlook)
Hiring teams should explicitly weigh the downsides of aggressive portfolio-only screens. Public repos may not reflect the best candidate work due to time constraints or privacy obligations. Managers should combine portfolio review with problem-solving interviews and consider pathways for candidates without prominent public projects. Shrinking the bias toward GitHub-only evidence will broaden the talent pool without a significant loss in signal quality. The industry reporting on résumé trends highlights these trade-offs and advises balanced evaluation rubrics. (businessinsider.com)Final assessment and recommended priorities
Nagula’s résumé tactics are practical, verifiable, and aligned with current hiring dynamics: prioritize relevant experience, document specific technical work, and link to curated, readable public code. These steps improve the probability of passing both automated and human screens and make the résumé a useful conversation guide for technical interviews. Independent reporting across Business Insider and other outlets confirms these as mainstream recommendations rather than outlier advice. (businessinsider.com, economictimes.indiatimes.com)However, engineers should adopt these tactics with caution:
- Curate public code aggressively.
- Avoid over-customization that sacrifices broader applicability.
- Be mindful of systemic barriers that make portfolio-based hiring harder for some candidates.
Quick reference: top résumé rules from the synthesis
- Lead with relevant experience — place internships/co-ops at the top.
- Use the three-project framework — internship, coursework, side project. (businessinsider.com)
- Link to curated GitHub repositories — include READMEs and screenshots.
- Quantify outcomes — use percentages, user counts, latency reductions where possible.
- Optimize for ATS and humans — simple formatting, keyword alignment, and plain text check.
- Network strategically — referrals still matter and can bypass initial filters. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)
Source: AOL.com I'm a software engineer at Microsoft. Here are the résumé tips that landed me 4 job offers, including from Amazon and eBay