Jobs Blog

Join Bing PM, Tony Chor, for a Twitter Chat

BingJobs — Thu, 16 May 2013 22:44:37 GMT

Bing PM Tony Chor will be a guest at our Twitter Chat on May 23^rd at 11am PST. If you have questions about life at Microsoft, open jobs on the Bing team or even questions for Tony direct them to @bingjobs.

You can learn more about Tony by going to his blog at http://www.tonychor.com or www.linkedin.com/in/tonychor/

To learn more about Bing and the cool stuff they are working on: http://www.bing.com/blogs/site_blogs/b/search/archive/2013/03/21/satorii.aspx

Hope to chat with you soon!

Microsoft to Attend IEEE ICASSP 2013!

BingJobs — Mon, 13 May 2013 19:48:15 GMT

Microsoft is looking forward to attending IEEE ICASSP 2013 and would like to meet you, please stop by booth #11 and say hello! Microsoft luminaries in attendance will include Li Deng (Conference Co-Chair), Alex Acero and Larry Heck of MSR. Members of our Conversational Understanding team whose work powers Microsoft’s speech technologies will also be in attendance, we hope to see you there!

Bing Recruiter, Eugenia Sawa, Talks About Building a Personal Brand

BingJobs — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 21:10:25 GMT

One of Bing's top Engineering Lead recruiters, Eugenia Sawa, explains in this week's Microsoft's JobsBlog, why building a personal brand is crucial for today's job seekers.

Click here to read more: http://microsoftjobsblog.com/blog/why-personal-branding-matters

Meet Bing Platform Experiences - Michelle Holtmann

BingJobs — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 21:43:00 GMT

http://www.geekwire.com/2011/microsofts-bingbox/

Meet Michelle Holtmann, Principal Program Manager Lead in Bing Platform Experience.

I am also celebrating my 13^th anniversary with Microsoft. I have been blessed during my career here to have worked on so many interesting things, including spending the last two years working on Entertainment Search technologies for Xbox [for both their console and Windows apps]. During my tenure in OSD, I was also responsible for Bing’s first in-car search deal with Toyota which made its market debut in July 2011 [as part of their Entune® in-car technology offering http://www.toyota.com/entune/]. Prior to joining OSD I spent 3 years in the Windows Mobile [now Windows Phone] division as the GPM of the Networking team and then as a Lead Program Manager working on building differentiated features for Microsoft’s OEM partners [LG Electronics]. One of my true passions is anti-piracy [and anti-piracy technologies] and I spent almost 7 years working on core anti-piracy technologies for Windows XP, Vista and Windows 7.

Prior to joining Microsoft, I spent 10 years in the industry riding the .com wave [Spry, Inc.] working on one of the first commercially available Internet browsing software suites, “Internet In A Box”, which subsequently won PC Magazine’s product of the year in 1995. I have also had the opportunity to work other established companies in the greater Seattle area such as Attachmate and Boeing.

On a personal note, I am a Seattle area native, I am married and we have one child (17 year old daughter). In my free time I love to read, cook, travel and play golf.

Class. Humility. Hustle.

BingJobs — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 17:17:00 GMT

As we watch the NFL playoffs, we’re witnessing some pretty good football. The playoffs are filled with rookies , injuries, and physicality you don’t really see in the regular season.

What I have enjoyed the most this season? Watching Russell Wilson (at the ripe old age of 24) play football. Specifically how he in his rookie year, showed serious maturity and calmness both on and off the field, the immediate ingestion and application of skill, and how he never let his role isolate or limit him or his physical ability.

Hustle – Russell doesn’t let the title 'Quarterback’ limit his role in plays, control the way he acts on the field, nor let the title limit what he can do for the team. Wilson’s physicality in running his own first downs or getting forward movement himself shows his hustle– he hustles and hustles hard running to make plays and is an example for his team as to the lengths he will go to put the ball forward. The energy, drive, and determination behind his will to win is fascinating. Have you lost your hustle at work?

Humility - Today’s game against the Redskins is a great example. If you watched today, you saw him hand off to Marshawn Lynch – Wilson then ran with his teammate and uncharacteristically went to block for Lynch in essence removing obstacles so Lynch could score. We all know most QB’s would never do this nor would they usually have the physicality to actually make this work. I sometimes do double takes as I can’t quite compute the fact that Wilson is where he is on the field. I wonder how much more we could do if we didn’t think “that is not in my job description” – how much we can help “down the field” so that our team can score.

Class – don’t slap your opponent in the face after the game is over….enough said.

I’m motivated for this week at work to see what I can do differently – anything to make our team win……and amped for our game next week. Go Hawks!!

Eugenia

A Recruiter's Dear Santa Letter

BingJobs — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 21:40:00 GMT

Dear Santa:

I don't ask for much but since last year's request of winning the lotto or hitting the jackpot in Vegas was a bust, I have prepared a better list. One with more tangible items that I know you can easily get your hands on.

Louis Vuitton Handbag
Jimmy Choo Shoes (size 8 ½ )
Diamond Earrings
Anything Burberry
Microsoft's Surface
Halo 4
and some toys for my cat Rose and puppy Colonel

Oh and last, but not certainly least, in the true spirit of giving this holiday season, my Bing Advertising team is looking for a backend Software Development Engineer. So, Santa, as you make your rounds this year, maybe make this job posting the landing page on any new computer you deliver (even the Macs). I promise to be good and will leave a few extra cookies and some milk with a little something something in it for you (cause I know you have a long night ahead of you).

Thanks Santa!

Katherine Stern

PS – I don't care about anything else on my list, just find me that developer (or more) and I will be a happy recruiter this year! (think of it as payback for not getting me that Easy Bake Oven I wanted when I was 6)!

GFS innovates to provide clean power to data centers

BingJobs — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 19:51:00 GMT

Click the link below to learn more about the research and development taking place in Global Foundations Services (GFS) to provide a zero carbon data center

http://www.globalfoundationservices.com/posts/2012/november/19/Microsoft-Recycles-Waste-to-Provide-Clean-Power-for-Data-Center-R-and-D

Learn more about Elisa Jasinska - Network Toolsmith

BingJobs — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 19:54:00 GMT

Elisa Jasinska started her Internet career as a Network Engineer at the

Amsterdam Internet Exchange in 2005. The exchange point, also called

AMS-IX, is a member driven non-profit Internet exchange based in

Amsterdam, the Netherlands. With its small team, great atmosphere and

incredibly smart people, AMS-IX made Elisa enthusiastic about networks and

Internet technologies and she has been enjoying the Internet industry

ever since.

Being part of a small team provides for a wide range of experiences. The

AMS-IX network team took care of everything around the Ethernet platform:

design, installation, troubleshooting, automation, liaison with sales and

marketing on technical matters etc. Elisa has worked on a variety of

projects for AMS-IX, for instance an sFlow collection and analysis

platform as well as the AMS-IX route server deployment.

In 2010 Elisa joined Limelight Networks, a CDN provider based in Phoenix,

Arizona. Elisa worked for Limelight out of Europe as part of the Network

Architecture and Engineering team. She enjoyed the chance to extend her

(so far mostly Layer 2 based) horizon into the the routing world, working

on various projects including traffic flow collection and analysis for

routing, peering and traffic engineering purposes.

Elisa recently joined Microsoft as a Senior Engineering Services Engineer

(aka. Network Toolsmith). She will continue working remotely out of Europe

for the GNS Core Engineering team. Elisa enjoys traveling the world, she

speaks 3 + 2 * 1/2 languages and likes the sea.

Find out what the Bing Infrastructure Comsos team is up to

BingJobs — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 16:32:00 GMT

Our very own Bing Lead Staffing Consultant, Eugenia Sawa, sat down with a few of our leaders within the Bing Infrastrucutre Cosmos team. Here what they have to say about how this amazing internal data storage/query system and how analyzing enormous amounts (as in petabytes) of data is crucial to understanding our customers and business.

http://microsoftjobsblog.com/cosmos_tech_jobs

Microsoft Careers Goes Mobile!

BingJobs — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 15:35:00 GMT

Microsoft's careers page has a new look...Mobile. Use the link below to access job descriptions and apply to positions directly through your mobile device! You can even sign up to receive job alerts! Happy job hunting.

http://m.microsoft-careers.com/

Top Four Overlooked Factors in a Job Search

BingJobs — Mon, 06 Aug 2012 21:07:00 GMT

Check out the link from Microsoft Jobs Blog by our very own Bing Recruiter, Eugenia, as she answers a the burning question in candidate's heads as to what other factors should be considered in a job search. - http://microsoftjobsblog.com/overlooked

Challenges of Testing Data - Is it Really 73°F in Seattle right now? – by Cyril Bouanna

BingJobs — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 19:05:00 GMT

Cyril Bounanna is a Senior Development Lead for the Bing Data Quality and Measurement Team. Today he presents to us a real-life scenario that software engineers and testers encounter when they are building Bing.

***

Software engineers have developed a lot of expertise and solutions to assess code quality. From static analysis to E2E automation, performance benchmarks, or search relevance, we know how to verify if our code does the right thing. But in Bing, we also realize that without good data, no code can produce good search results. As the saying goes "garbage in, garbage out". So how can we verify the quality of our data?

Consider, for example, weather information. Every 10 minutes, we receive the latest temperature reading from thousands of locations around the United States. Should we trust it and show those temperature readings on our website? If those temperatures are wrong, our users will be disappointed in our site, not in our data provider.

We could at least guard against malformed data, and avoid showing 999° or ^$°. But how about 0°, or even a decent looking 73°? How could we know if it is really 73° in Seattle right now? (Isn't it always raining there?)

Well, there's really a lot that can be done with the right heuristics:

We can automatically compare data against historical averages. It
might be 0° in Anchorage, but 0° in Miami in July is definitely bad data;
We can automatically compare data across providers, to
cross-check multiple sources like any good investigator would do;
We can also compare across time. 73° in Seattle might be
reasonable, but not if 10 minutes ago it was 41° there, and 42° 10 minutes
before that;
Or across space. 73° in Seattle when it's 41° just a few miles
south in Tacoma doesn't look good either;
You can also apply "tolerance thresholds" to your heuristics:
it might be acceptable for a few neighboring cities to have significantly
different weather (no rule is always true), but if it's happening
everywhere throughout the US, it's much more likely you have a corrupted feed.

And here's another interesting aspect: if we really want to guard against bad data, data validation needs to be fully integrated into the data production process, making this 'testing' an integral part of product development.

Everyday we are building Machine Learning models that can figure out those rules on their own. Does this sound like interesting development challenges to you? If so, join our Bing Data Quality and Measurements Team and help protect your everyday search engine from bad data! Apply today http://bit.ly/bingexpjobs

Recruiting questions answered: To cover letter or not cover letter, by Amanda Matthews

BingJobs — Fri, 29 Jun 2012 18:45:20 GMT

Q: Dear Recruiter, Can you please tell me your opinion on including a cover letter? Also, are there any other items that I should not be included in my resume?

Great question, this is one that is often asked of me. Even within my own family, I have people who disagree with me on this topic. I have been in the recruiting industry for 12 years and have hired in all disciplines from Finance to Engineering, so I hope my opinion will be helpful to you.

The day in a life of a recruiter includes, hiring manager meetings, phone interviews, in person interviews, offer negotiations, community involvement, discussions about HR policy, blogging….just to name a few. There is also time set aside every day for resume reviews and prospecting new candidates. That time does not include reviewing cover letters. Studies show that on average a resume will get reviewed for 20 seconds. That’s it! You’ve got 20 seconds to sell your skills. When I tackle a stack of resumes, I ask myself each time, “Does this candidate meet the minimum requirements of the job?” This answer should be found on your resume and an easy to read format, not in an essay attached to your resume. And let’s face it, not all of us are born writers. The idea of writing a cover letter can certainly be a daunting task. Save yourself the trouble. Don’t write it.

Other items not to include on you resume include pictures, marital status, number of children, and dates of birth. I also recommend that you include only professional certifications, such as a CPA, CCNA, CCIE. Aptitude tests are not recommended on your resume, and often are distracting.

I hope this advice will help you on your quest for your next dream job. On behalf of Microsoft Recruiting, I wish you the best of luck.

Why Should You Talk to a Recruiter, You Ask? I’ll Tell You - by Andrea LaCoy

BingJobs — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 15:34:00 GMT

I think that everyone would agree with the statement that we live in a world that is ever changing and always evolving. The standard way of doing things in the past are being replaced with the better, faster, more efficient versions and this can been seen in almost everything we do. Making a career change is no exception.

Gone are the days of reading the ‘Want Ads’ in the newspaper, or dropping off your resume to that potential employer. In some professions, gone are the days were you even have to look for a new job; new jobs are often coming to you. This is largely due to people who look for talent day in and day out, people who specialize in matching your resume to hiring profiles and making sure that the match is good for both the employer and employee. These people are called Recruiters and here is why you should consider talking to one.

Some of the top companies in the industry that are known for hiring the best of the best, are all able to attract talent and hire the right people because they have a recruiting team dedicated to doing just that. Recruiters are the hiring managers’ window into the talent pool and team of experts that they turn to when they have open roles to fill. The hiring manager looks to their recruiter as being not only a subject matter expert on the talent market, but also their “gatekeeper” to any potential candidate.

When a recruiter reaches out to you, it’s your first step in the interviewing process within that company. It’s not an extra step that you should avoid; it’s the step that is essential to you getting considered by the hiring manager. When recruiters contact you they are doing so based on a set of criteria and requirements that they gather directly from the hiring managers themselves. Recruiters have information that goes beyond what you read in a job description; they know exactly what type of person needs to be hired
and what the person will be responsible for. While this is a benefit to the hiring manager, it also benefits the candidate. Talking to a recruiter will give you invaluable insight into the company, the specific team and the details of the position – something that you would never be able to learn off of a job description. Being able to talk to a recruiter prior to interviewing for the job and getting all of the details upfront will only help you through the interview process.

Companies have been using recruiters for quite some time now and the process has allowed them to be more effective in their hiring. The partnership between hiring managers and recruiters has proven to be a better, faster, and more efficient process and one that job seekers should understand the value in when exploring new opportunities.

Are you ready to connect with a Recruiter and see what opportunities are out there? The Microsoft Online Services Division is currently hiring and we are seeking Program Managers who are familiar with or can quickly learn about deeply algorithmic topics. This is the cutting edge of computer science - extremely technical and extremely data driven. We’re looking for PMs who drive for results, aren’t afraid to code, who can fluently cross the language barriers of technologies and customers, work closely with Microsoft Research, are extremely creative, and who want to win in the biggest battleground on the web today.

Scouting For Talent - by Brian Christensen

BingJobs — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 19:05:00 GMT

Working as a Staffing Consultant within Online Services Division here at Microsoft, I am constantly reminded that my job has a lot of similar aspects to sports and trying to put together a team that is set up to win. While watching the NBA Eastern Conference Finals this past weekend, I noticed the intricacies of what it took to put a winning team on the court. Even before teams come together, there is a lot of behind the scenes work that needs to be done in order to produce a winning product.

Sometimes I feel like I am a Scout (Staffing Consultant/Recruiter) working with General Managers and Coaches (Hiring Manager) providing them potential talented players (candidates). I know that GM and Coaches are always looking to find that MVP talent. But part of putting together a great team is help GM’s and Coaches look beyond what is immediately need, but also look at potential and long term goals. As a Scout you also have to provide the reality of the situation of what is available. If there are pressing needs in order to meet goals they have, from time to time you don’t have the ability to wait for that MVP to become available. If they wait, they may miss the chance to still win immediately. Look at the Miami Heat for example. Love them or hate them, their team has bought into winning and committed to the long term. They have their MVP’s in LeBron James and Dwayne Wade. They have proven veterans in Udonis Haslem and Chris Bosh. They drafted potentially a great player in Mario Chalmers. The Heat also have their specialists in Long-Range Shooter Mike Miller and James Jones as well as Defensive Expert and Role Scorer Shane Battier. All committed to the long term goal of winning multiple championships. Now whether they win or not is another story, but the Scout never stops working and is constantly providing the team information and opportunity put the best team on the floor.

Do you want to be a part of this winning tradition. Currently you have the ability right now to join us within Online Services Division at Microsoft and be a part of a championship team. I am actively looking to fill Software Design Engineer in Test roles focusing on the development of test automation within the online space. These roles are critical to the development of the dynasty that is Online Services Division. Come be a part of the experience.