How to Create the Standout Resume
Dec 19, 2009 Resume Help
A Resume is essentially your personal brochure (all shine and spit polish) and everyone knows this.
Still, your ability to communicate tells potential employers a lot about your potential in their company. Your resume and cover letter are part of your PR package and should be about one thing: to assist your efforts to get job interviews as you directly approach hiring managers directly through cold calls, direct letters or use your networking contacts and referrals.
I won’t put too much emphasis on any exact format for what a resume should look like, because it is essentially a brochure for your work history. You need a resume to navigate the job marketplace and will use it at different times during the job search and hiring process. Basically, you want to create a clearly written, presentable document that does not give an HR recruiter an excuse to throw out your application if you are responding to a want ad. For the positions where you have done the leg work to get directly in front of a hiring manager or decisionmaker, the resume will directly influence the content of your interview. Those two points are what you should keep in mind as you create your resume.
Basic tips for resume formatting:
• Use Chronological or Chronological-Functional resume formats only (don’t use a functional resume!. Functional resumes are the ones that are organized by descriptive skill areas followed by a summary list of employment at the bottom. It signals to an employer that you are covering up some flaw or inconsistency in your work history. They will also try to guess which job gave you what skills. You don’t want anyone speculating about your resume, so don’t do functional resumes!)
• Use section headings on your resume and keep them consistent-looking (same font, bold, underline, etc.)
• Have lots of “white space” in your resume—easier on the eyes
• Use white or ivory resume paper only (I have to mention an exception: a friend of mine did use flower patterned paper for her resume at a job fair, which one employer found strange and “cute”—so much so they granted her an interview. I don’t know if you want to be perceived as “cute” when negotiating for salary, but her personality did get her hired (along with the fact it was an entry-level gig).
• 8/5 x 11” sized paper
• Stationery paper if sending in hard copies
• Avoid long sentences in your resume.
• Show dates and locations for employment and education
• Print out your resume on laser printer or inkjet printer with a minimum of 600 dpi (dots per inch). Never use a dot matrix or a typewriter (I know some of you don’t even know what I am talking about when I say “typewriter” or “dot matrix”! As for the rest of you–you know who you are) for materials you will send to employers
• Use margins, boldface, heading, indentations and bullets for emphasis and to guide the reader’s eye directly where you want on the resume.
• Put dates (years only) in the right hand margin.
• No abbreviations on the resume.
• No personal pronouns (I, we, my, me, they…)
• No physical characteristics or personal information.
• Include hobbies on your resume only when related to objectives.
• Omit “references available upon request”. Of course they are!
• Leave out anything else not in the sections listed above.
• Proofread for grammar, spelling and typos!
Advanced resume tips:
• Use action verbs and accomplishment statements.
• Use up to date industry terminology.
• Use your own words. This is very important. Although there are lots of resume books that will show you how to add highly powered, skill-based phrases to your resume, if those phrases seem canned or out of place (in comparison with other parts of the resume or your cover letter), you will lose credibility. That is why your resume should build upon your own strength statements. (The Rainy Day Guide to Finding a Job shows you how to do this). These build upon your actual accomplishments, the ones you feel good about and can talk about easily. They are a combination of your skills and interests.
One final note: Cover letters and resumes should always be sent to a specific name, verified by you before you send it. After you send your resume, always follow up with a phone call—this will help employers to remember you and take action on your behalf.
Tags: cover letter, interview, resume, resume writing, Resumes, written job search materials
Laid-Off or Fired? Your Next Job Is Still Right Around the Corner
Dec 18, 2009 Job Search Strategies
After you have gone through psychological and career self-assessment, you will begin to be able to articulate to others who you are, where you’ve been in your professional or work life, and where you are planning to go. A big part of this is verbal communication, the art of being able to tell someone who you are and what you want to do in 15 seconds. The better you know yourself, the easier it will be to tailor your pitch to any hiring manager’s needs. Sometimes called an elevator pitch (think of aspiring entrepenurs who only have a few seconds–in an elevator, natch–to grab the heart and mind of a potential joint venture capitalist), I call it the verbal rundown.
There are a few things to remember, though. Your rundown is not the time to go into how much you hated your boss or your job. No negatives allowed! This includes being laid off. With the economy as it is, layoffs are fairly commonplace. It does not have the stigma associated with it that it apparently used to. You may feel a certain way after having been with a company for a number of years, but do not take it personally.
How do you present a layoff to your colleagues, contacts, network, future employers? Companies cut back because of bad decisions by CEOs, economic downturns, or other catastrophes. The company did not fold because of you, so don’t shoulder the burdens of the company by telling someone, “They laid me off.”
The company did not lay YOU off.
Instead, the company restructured and your position was eliminated. Remember that phrase. That’s all anyone needs to know. Stories are rampant in corporate America of the madness that happens during layoffs. Some examples I have heard are taking a list of employees and crossing off every fifth name, or upper management throwing darts on a wall to pick randomly who gets the slips. Sometimes managers lay off a whole team of people, and then are called in to be laid off themselves. Who knows why your particular position was eliminated? But you shouldn’t take it personally. And the company doesn’t owe you anything (unless they haven’t paid you some back wages and that’s a different story!)
Often we become married to the job or company, but the employer hasn’t married us! You may have filled your cubicle with all your photos and kids drawings, but if your number is up, it’s time to go. As long as the company has paid you for the time you worked, they don’t owe you anything. That’s life. That’s the dog eat dog reality of capitalism. It’s not personal. So don’t present it that way, or raise flags for people who may hold your next paycheck in their hands, or who can help you get to that next payday.
Tags: Employment., fired, firing, interview, laid off, layoff, personnel, termination, verbal communication
Google Interview Questions – Too Simple to Answer Correctly?
Dec 14, 2009 Interviews and Hiring
If you think preparing for a job interview is a challenge in general, imagine how much tougher that interview preparation would be when you are applying to share office space with some of the smartest people in the entire world! As you might imagine, the questions that are asked of potential applicants are a little tricky (to the point of appearing ridiculously simple to answer), truly designed to get inside how a person thinks and approaches problem solving. The Business Insider highlighted 15 of Google’s Interview Questions and came up with their own answers. Won’t you read the questions and see what answers you come up with?
At the very least, you’ll appreciate thinking about certain problems in different ways, especially if you ever consider taking a job to wash all the windows in Seattle.
Tags: Answer, interview, interview preparation, interview questions
Interview Performance – How to Review Yourself
Dec 13, 2009 Interviews and Hiring
We all hope that the job search process will not be long and drawn out; that our first interview is for our dream job; and that we will nail the interview and get offered that fabulous job! This can happen. Still, you must prepare yourself for an extended job search that will include multiple interviews with different employers and decisionmakers. The more you reflect on the job search and interview process, the better you wil get.
Below are some questions to ask yourself after your interview, thinking about both what you said and how you presented yourself (content and style). Your interview self performance review doesn’t have to be this formal, but you should at least take some time to think about what you are doing during interviews as you go through the job search process.
Interview content questions to ask yourself:
Did you demonstrate your research and preparation for the interview by citing specific company issues that you uncovered in your pre interview research?
Were your comments positive and relative to the interviewer’s needs?
Did you cover all of the essential elements of your background while keeping your comments concise and focused on the organization’s needs?
Were you able to provide specific, quantifiable accomplishments to support general capability areas?
Did you stay away from past company acronyms and jargon?
Did you attempt to defer salary discussions? If pushed, did you ask the interviewer for a range?
Were your answers to sensitive questions non defensive and brief?
Was your rationale statement for leaving your previous employer understandable and positive?
Did you answer any behavioral based questions with specific work related examples that highlight your capabilities?
Did you demonstrate your can do/will do abilities, specifically as they relate to the organization’s needs?
Interview style questions to ask yourself:
Was your entrance positive and confident?
Was your appearance professional and appropriate for the interview?
Did you stay away from negative body language … inappropriate posture, avoiding eye contact, shifting in chair, folding arms, tapping feet, fidgeting with pencil, inappropriate handshake, lack of smile? (Be honest!)
Did you listen well? Did you interrupt the interviewer at any point? Did you miss any cues?
Was your pace appropriate?
Were you able to ask your questions during the interview process to ensure a comfortable give and take conversation?
Did any question cause you to have a negative non-verbal reaction?
Was your voice steady and easy to understand?
You could probably think of other questions to ask yourself. The main take away message is that the only way your interview skills will improve is if you take some time to reflect on how things went, what could have been improved, and what really worked. The better prepared you are for the interview (in terms of doing your best to get to know the company or organization and its needs relative to the position your are interviewing for and knowing yourself well enough to point out how you could meet those needs) the better you will do. A good interview is only as good as the job offer that comes out of it. That’s the ultimate measure of success.
Tags: company research, interview, interview preparation, job offer, performance, self review
Can’t find a job? Sue your school!
Aug 3, 2009 News and Trends
This article appeared today on MSNBC. The headline read, Jobless graduate sues her college for $70,000. It was a stark reminder that in the rush to go back to school to get a degree or training in another area in this current dire economic climate, there is no guarantee that investing in that additional training will automatically land you a job. (Promises of the school notwithstanding, which is what the lawsuit argues). No matter the experience or background or additional training you receive, there are certain pro-active steps you must take to show up on employer radar. These steps are outline in the free report on how to get employers to look for you. You will greatly increase your chances of job search interview success if the hiring decisionmaker has heard of you, seen you or spoken with you before the interview.
Tags: education, finding a job, interview, job search, Job., lawsuit, recession, school, sue
How to Use the Little Red Book of Sales Answers in Your Job Search
Jul 20, 2009 Product and Site Reviews
In the past when I’ve had a tough time in the job search, I’ve found inspiration and brilliant ideas looking at the techniques from other professions. For example, you can get good ideas for your cover letters and resumes by looking at the examples of top copywriters, whose whole profession is to create written materials that sell. In fact, when you are in the job market, a big part of what you are doing is selling yourself. The things is, how do you go about it? Are you marketing yourself like a cheap informercial product or useless products that people have to be heavily convinced or even tricked to buy? Or, knowing that you are a skilled, exceptional, highly competent and dedicated worker that any employer would be lucky to have, are you putting your best foot forward so that when hiring managers and decision makers come across you or your materials they are already sold? Which seems like the better strategy? The latter course is a no brainer. The problem is that a lot of job search books re-hash the same old advice (albeit in increasingly creative ways) about resumes and cover letters, the importance of networking, etc. But just how do you do these things effectively, especially the cold calling and networking that will uncover those “hidden” jobs that successful jobseekers know and use to their advantage so well?
How about going with what works in another field, say, the world of sales. Sales professionals who make commissions for a living have to know what they are doing or they starve. In fact, sales is the kind of cut throat field that weeds out the poor performers really quickly, letting the best rise to the top and make lots of money. In a down economy like we are currently experiencing, those good in sales are still making a financial killing. (Their savings and assets may have taken a hit, though, like the rest of us. But they are in a better position to rebuild.)
Every commercial industry is engaged in some form of selling–either retail products to consumers, financial or insurance services, or business to business sales (e.g. supplies for a hospital or office), and so forth. One bestselling tool used by top sellers is the The Sales Bible by Jeffrey Gitomer. In this book, and his other titles, like the Little Red Book of Sales Answers and Little Red Book of Selling, he uses plain talk to make the psychology of sales accessible and easy to understand with checlists, cartoons, bulleted lists, and so forth. That’s why I think it makes a useful tool for jobseekers, as the tips can be easily translated to how to succeed in the job search. For example, the Little Red Book of Sales Answers covers things like:
- asking for appointments (same skill needed to set up informational interview–a part of networking)
- ask for the sale (why not ask for the job?)
- earn referrals (get other people to recommend you to future employers, something I cover in the free report on how to get employers to notice you)
- establishing rapport (kind of handy during interview, no?)
- overcoming price objections (name your salary and stick to it)
and so much more!
In fact, the subtitlte of the Little Red Book of Sales Answers is: “99.5 Real Life Answers that Make Sense, Make Sales, and Make Money.” Read more about these great books below and use top sales techniques to land your next job.
Little Red Book of Sales Answers: 99.5 Real World Answers That Make Sense, Make Sales, and Make Money (Jeffrey Gitomer’s Little Books)
Price: $13.59
Pages: 208, Hardcover, FT Press
Little Red Book of Sales Answers: 99.5 Real Life Answers that Make Sense, Make Sales, and Make Money (VIDEOBOOK)
Price: $36.49
Edition: VB has 2DVDs, 1 DVD-ROM & 1MP3 CD, MP3 CD, Simon & Schuster Audio
The Sales Bible: The Ultimate Sales Resource, New Edition
Price: $19.77
Pages: 304, Edition: Revised, Hardcover, Collins Business
Little Red Book of Selling: 12.5 Principles of Sales Greatness
Price: $13.57
Pages: 220, Edition: 1st, Hardcover, Bard Press
Tags: book, career, guidance, interview, networking, salary, sales, selling, social
Latest job opportunity reports
May 31, 2009 Downloads, Product and Site Reviews
Check out some of the latest job opportunity reports and resources you might find of interest:
Complete Interview Guides
– These guides are comprehensive, will prepare you for every situation you might face. Site also has free information for download.
Guerilla Resumes
– Get more interviews and get hired. Guaranteed.
Survey Scout
Make Money Taking Surveys
- Don’t wait to make money. Get paid while you are looking for a job!
2009 Oil & Gas Job Guide – The oil industry continues to make money even while our finances are going down the drain. Get some of that money back by getting paid in the industry!
