An Interview with a #mojoThrowdown Champion

By: kestleratmojo

Today I bring you an interview with Seán Prunka, probably most well known for being an Internet nuisance on Twitter under the handle @sprunka and winning the first ever #mojoThrowdown. He’s a PHP guy, among other things, but his mojoLive profile speaks for itself, so go ahead an look him up there before reading on. We’ll still be here when you get back.

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Done?  Alright, let’s do this.

The Interview:

mojoLive: What has your experience with mojoLive been like so far?

Seán: Honestly, I don’t think I could put it any more eloquently than Jeremy Kendall did  on Twitter: “I’ve gone from peevish and recalcitrant to interested and engaged to addicted. DAMN YOU @MOJOLIVE!” Although, honestly my own trek started as inquisitive and curious, but then when given the access code at php|tek ‘12 I jumped straight in to the interested and engaged zone. I hit addicted when I saw some of my own PHP super heroes with high stats, and my initial offering was comparatively low.

mojoLive: You were recently declared the winner of the first ever #mojoThrowdown. What was that like?  What did you learn in the process of maximizing your mojo Score?

Seán: It started off as friendly smack talk, because Patrick Schwisow and I both had scores around 12ish. I think he started off with the lead, actually, and I made the first jab with something about kicking his butt. Then you guys stepped in and declared it the first ever  #mojoThrowdown. It took the already gamified system and added a level of friendly competition that really increased the level of fun. Who ever thought that building a résumé would be fun? As far as what I learned, well, “everything counts.” I also think it might still be too easy to game the system. Too easy to pad with irrelevant skills, and, if you’re funny enough, get other people to give value to skills that may not actually be important. But, I think that the checks and balances does work out over all.

mojoLive: Lately, you’ve been tweeting out the link to your mojoLive Profile in response to job openings.  What drove you to start using mojoLive in that capacity?

Seán: I think it was Cal Evans who first mentioned just sending people to his mojoLive profile whenever he was asked for his résumé. Plus, I like the layout; quick overview of skills and employment, followed by a detailed breakdown of each area. It frees me from the restriction of “cram everything onto one page or no one will look at it.” The overview is [hopefully] enticing enough that a potential employer will like what they see and then dig deeper. The “everything counts” mentality has caused me to throw in a few skills/achievements for pure humor value, and I hope that a potential employer would see them and realize that dichotomy; that I have a balance or work and play. mojoLive lets me do my résumé in a way that somewhat reflects my personality, at least a whole lot better than traditional résumés do.

mojoLive: Do you feel that puts you at an advantage when approaching prospective employers?

Seán: It puts me more at ease. I think any employer that I would care to work for would be able to use the mojoLive format, and those who aren’t able to are more likely to be ones I wouldn’t care to work for, so it does give me an advantage in that way. If the company isn’t willing to view my mojoLive Profile I don’t need to deal with them.

mojoLive: How do you see yourself using mojoLive in the coming weeks/months/years?  Is it something you can see yourself using throughout your career?

Seán: Now that the Throwdown is over, I’ve noticed that I don’t push as hard to find every (and any) little thing to boost my score. I will likely try to find some work records for the big gap in my work history. I like the idea of the shelf, but I’m not sure how useful it will be for me, personally. My only reservation is that I really don’t know the business model/plan and I don’t know where they’re headed. But I do know that I am very curious to see where mojoLive is going to go next, and I will be right here, pumping stats and pimping mojoLive the whole while.