Archive for December, 2010

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Amy Adler

Amy Adler

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Amy L. Adler, Career Search Strategist is the president and founder of Inscribe / Express, a resume and career documentation company. She prepares resumes, cover …

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1. Writing the word “Resume” at the top of the first page. A job seeker who starts his or her document with the word “resume” fails to understand that the document will likely find its way into an electronic applicant tracking system (ATS), which is the exceptionally large databases that human resources divisions and recruiters use to store resumes. An applicant who makes the mistake of titling their resume “resume” runs the risk of a) being known in the database as Resume No Last Name, rendering her unfindable, and b) utilizing valuable resume real estate that would be better served with a headline that speaks to her value or personal branding.
2. Including an “objective” rather than a “personal branding statement.” Objectives are passé, as they focus on the candidate’s needs rather than the hiring manager’s requirements. Job seekers over 40 need to remember that until they are offered the position, everything they do or say in the job search process has to focus on solving the hiring manager’s pain, not their own.
3. Including date of college or university education. We can all subtract 22 from that year and get a sense of the applicant’s vintage. To avoid potential age discrimination, a job candidate should not telegraph her age on the resume.
4. Not including an e-mail address. Older workers need to have a professional e-mail (not their company’s) for job search purposes. Including an e-mail shows that the candidate is not technology-averse and is available for communication at any time of day.
5. Using a telephone line that might be answered by young children. When a job hunter, particularly a female, uses a home telephone number that is likely to be answered by children, it indicates to the hiring manager that the candidate might have certain liabilities, for example, insurance requirements or need for impromptu time off. As mobile phones are so prevalent and inexpensive, a job seeker over 40 should maintain mobile phone service, using a professional voice mail recording, that only she or he will be answering.
6. Writing a resume that is longer than one or two pages. No matter whether a professional has 5 or 25 years’ experience, her resume needs to be no more than two pages, as a) there probably is not enough good resume content to go onto a third page, and b) hiring managers are likely to stop reading after one or two pages, so it’s vital that the candidate present his or her best accomplishments in that space.
7. Writing about more than 10 years’ worth of job roles. Hiring managers are focusing on what a candidate can do for them today-not what they were expected to do 20 years ago. Professionals over 40 should use resume real estate wisely and hit their most recent position hardest and give a fair amount of attention to about two or three additional prior roles. If the candidate has a critical, relevant element of experience that is older than 10 years, he can include a line or two about it at the end of his professional experience section.
8. Not including a personalized (vanity) LinkedIn profile link. LinkedIn is the social medium most likely to be utilized by hiring managers and recruiters in the job search process. Candidates over 40 should take advantage of this free service and create a profile that makes a hiring manager want to pick up the phone. With that in mind, someone in the job market must create a vanity URL (available in the profile options) and put that link in the header of his resume.
9. Writing about only soft skills and not about accomplishments. Soft skills are critical in any job, but would “great team player” be anything but an expectation for a hiring manager’s new employee? Job seekers over 40 must remember that reporting on accomplishments-the successes they’ve demonstrated for each job-is what gets hiring managers’ attention.
10. Including personal details. A resume is a professional marketing document. Unless there is a compelling, relevant reason to include volunteer work on a resume, a job candidate should leave it out. There is also no need to mention marital status, parental status, or any other personal details on the resume.

I’m Amy L. Adler, MBA, MA, CARW. I am a successful Career Search Strategist who helps job seekers get the right interviews for lucrative jobs. Visit me at http://www.inscribeexpress.com or call me at (801) 810-JOBS.

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Take out the objective. Your objective is always to get a job. Employers “get that” when they receive your resume. Also, they don’t really care what your objective is. Their objective is to hire someone who is qualified to do the job they need to fill. The sooner you cut to the chase about why you’re the perfect person for them, the better.

Put in a career summary. Think of this as the ‘tell me about yourself” section, but in writing. This summary should describe what makes you unique from every other person who has a similar background as you. I will admit, these are the hardest to write, and are usually the last thing to write. Sometimes I’ll even come back to it the next day after I’ve had a chance to let the client’s background percolate in my head a bit. Do NOT use vague terms like “good time management skills” or “works well under pressure” or my all time fave: “team player.” YUCK! First, everyone puts those in their resume, and when I say everyone, I mean everyone-I’ve seen a lot of resumes. Second, there are very few people who would not use those terms to describe themselves. For the most part, everyone’s had to manage their time, finish something under a deadline or work with others. For the most part, they probably did it well. What you SHOULD talk about is what you do exceptionally well. Think back to the people you work with, and how would you distinguish your skillsets from theirs? I have described a marketing manager as tenacious because when I was interviewing her to complete her resume and I heard her describe how she worked, that was the impression I got-she was like a dog with a bone and didn’t give up until her project succeeded; and succeed it always did. She was also used to working with no marketing budget and still raising revenue. In this economy-that’s an incredible skill to have. What makes you stand out from the crowd?

List your jobs. For most people, there isn’t a need for a functional resume (one that highlights skillsets rather than job listings). They drive recruiters and some HR Directors crazy. You might want to have one in your back pocket in case someone prefers to see it, but for the most part this can be accomplished by highlighting your skills as subheadings under the standard company, title, date banner. There is a long-standing debate about including months and years on a resume vs. just months. In most cases, you should include months on your resume to show continuous employment. Hiring managers/HR Directors understand if you were laid off from a job and it took you up to a year to find another job, especially factoring in your specific industry and location in the country. If you took classes during that time or did volunteer work-include it on the resume to show that you didn’t just lay in bed eating bon-bons all day.

If you purposefully took a break, either due to medical reasons or family reasons, you should indicate that in your resume and cover letter. The important point to get across is that the situation is complete. That if it was a family or a medical condition, that you’re fully recovered and ready for work, that there’s no chance of it interfering with your work situation to the same extent that required you to take a break. You can simply list on the resume Family Commitments, and the date. In the cover letter you can go into a little more detail about if it was personal surgery and recovery time, or taking care of a family member. Whatever it is, make sure you close the loop and state that the situation is completely under control and will in no way interfere with your ability to do your job. It’s better to call it out, than leave it up to the imagination of the hiring manager. You won’t like what they imagine.

Under your jobs, list your education. The only reason you’d put your education at the top is if you recently graduated from college or if you went back to school for a degree and you’re looking for your first job since receiving that degree. If you’re going for your first job out of school-it’s appropriate to list your GPA in your major and your GPA overall if they’re both good. Ideally, your GPA in your major is your biggest selling point. If your overall GPA isn’t strong (and by strong I mean over a 3.0) leave it off. It’s also appropriate to list relevant coursework on the resume-again, especially if you’re a recent grad or if you went back to school for something that you don’t have work experience in.

As an aside. You should ALWAYS take every opportunity to gain relevant work experience while you’re in school. I don’t care if it’s as a volunteer with an organization, an internship, a co-op assignment, part time job. Anything. Take it. You’re much less of a gamble as a new hire if you have some work experience to hang your hat on.

http://ezinearticles.com/5632937

There are probably as many, or as much confusion, misunderstanding and downright misinformation regarding cover letters as there are about networking. In fact, I would hazard a guess that a good chunk of the cover letters sent are never read. Because - frankly - a lot of cover letters are canned and lack focus, not to mention lacking in specifics and being downright unprofessional.

A few years back, my boss handed me a cover letter and asked if the applicant was writing to us or the competitor. Neither of us wasted our time looking at the attached resume. Who has time to read a stock cover letter?

The reality is that writing a great cover is not easy. For all the tools and advice out there for job seekers, at the end of the day; you must take ownership of that cover letter. That cover must sing to the person reading it or you’re a dead duck in the water.

To make it more challenging, you don’t even know if the person receiving your letter and resume actually wants a cover. So, that sheet of paper has to appeal to a hiring manager that wants to see one and also to a hiring manager who might be negative towards one to begin with. It needs to be dead on, not a dead duck.

The mechanics of writing a cover can be found all over the internet, bookstore, or library. You must do your homework. But as you formulate the outlines of your letter, consider some of these points to keep from sending a junk cover letter.

Is the letter personable? That letter we got started with, “Dear Store GM,” What does it say about you, if you don’t make the effort to find a name? With all the social media available, a letter that begins,”To Whom It Concern…” is unacceptable.

Is the letter conversational? What makes it canned is the reliance on buzzwords. Or rather, the over use of buzzwords. The letter must be professional, yet it must be conversational. The cover letter is your voice.

Is the letter specific? Does your letter beg the question, “is she writing to us or the competitor?” The cover letter must address the position, the company, and the industry. A part of that is to weave appropriate keywords and key phrases into the letter - similar to what you do with your resume.

Is the letter about you or the employer? The resume is all you. You should send a tailored resume tweaked to meet the specifications of the company you are applying to. Still, the resume is all you. The cover is all about what you can do for the that company. The letter is not your resume in letter form.

Cover letters are an absolutely critical. Yet for some, writing a succinct, yet compelling argument on a single sheet of paper can be intimidating. You research yourself to write a resume. You research the company to write a cover. That can be daunting.

It is what it is. Yet, there are plenty of help out there. More importantly, it is a mindset. The time and energy necessary to send out hundreds of cover letters and resumes is probably about the same as sending out fewer, yet more targeted and tightly written ones. It is the quality versus quantity argument.

I’ll bet on quality every time, and so should you.

http://ezinearticles.com/5634938

Do you want to write a good resume that will help you get the job that you want? Before you can have a resume that is good, you have to be aware of the steps that will help ensure that is what you end up with once it is done.

The first thing you need to know is that it is important to take time to write your resume. Rushing through writing it is only going to produce a bad resume, so avoid making this mistake.

Here are the steps that need to be completed to ensure you have a resume that is good.

One: Resume objective - You want to be sure that you spend time to write a good objective. It needs to be brief, specific, verb-driven and concise.

It is wise to put in your desired position and what you will be able to provide to the company that you are applying at. This way you can catch the attention of an employer right from the beginning that will make them want to continue reading.

Two: Highlights for your qualifications - You want to be sure you highlight your experience that is relevant from any previous jobs you have had, your skills and your credentials.

One thing you can do to make you stand out from all of the other applicants for a job is to add an achievement to your resume that you consider to be outstanding and that will catch the attention of the employer.

Don’t add anything that you can’t really do because this can harm your chances of getting the job. For example, if you don’t have experience with computers, don’t put down on the resume that you are.

The employer will eventually find out that you lied about this and that will definitely not look good for you.

Three: Work history - Always include in chronological order your past work history. Be sure that you have the date you started and end with the job, the name of the company you worked for and what your job title was.

Don’t ever include your salary information on your resume, unless it has been specifically asked for by an employer.

Four: Education and training - You most definitely want to put in your educational background and any schools that you have attended. The dates you attended and the degrees or honors that you achieved are also important information to include.

Now that you have these steps in mind, you have a much clearer picture of where you need to get started to write a good resume for yourself. Just be sure you take your time and get everything important on it so you will have a good shot at being the person hired for the job you are applying for.

http://ezinearticles.com/5626291

Some treat job hunting as a numbers game. They hold to the belief that the more they flood the market with their resumes, the greater the chances of success. But much like the miners of old, the numbers game is a fool’s gold hunt.

The smart strategy is to target your efforts. Like a tight laser beam, a targeted approach brings far more intensity to the effort. And in today’s job market, intensity is what you may need.

You must distinguish yourself as a candidate in eyes of an employer flooded with resumes.

To that end, your most critical tool may be the cover letter. With a tight job market, it is this short document of 3 or 4 paragraphs that can determine whether an employer will invite you to an interview.

While it is true that a good cover letter can act as your sales pitch, that single sheet can also provide clues to the employer.

• It acts as a writing sample and provides a glimpse into your ability to structure thought.
• It shows whether you cared enough to do genuine research.
• It shows whether you can make a tight, compelling argument with brevity.

In essence, a good cover letter helps an applicant connect with an employer with that one sheet of paper. That is not going to happen with mass mailings where only the name and address is changed.

And in seeking to connect with an employer, there are a few red flags to be aware of:

1. Always open a letter with why you are writing. It should be simple and direct: I’m writing in response to your company’s ad for a project manager in the Boston Globe on January 1, 2011. I am also writing because Jack Slack recommended I apply for this project manager position.
2. When you write why you would be good fit for this position; write in terms of how the company benefits. The resume is the list of “me, me, and more me.” The cover letter is all about the employer and the company.
3. The second paragraph, or two, is about how your skills fit the employer’s needs.
4. Brevity and open spaces make for an easy read. That is, you should always consider using bullet points to list skills and/or experiences that are directly germane to the position.
5. In seeking to make a connection and inject your personality into the letter; you should not, however, get cutesy or frankly irrelevant. The letter must be professional and basically answer the question, “so, what do you bring to the table?”
6. Likewise, you should not get too cute with the paper and fonts. The best fonts will always be Arial and Times New Roman. And nothing about the paper should detract from the message - that message is how the employer benefits from meeting with you.
7. You must always end the letter with a call to action.

A well written cover letter can be a powerful document that can compel an employer or hiring manager to call you in and of itself. That is not going happen if you believe that your best chances lie with flooding the market with your resumes.

You should seek a more targeted approach.

http://ezinearticles.com/5613951