Category Archives: Résumé Writing

Make the effort; tailor your résumé

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Recently a jobseeker in my Résumé Writing workshop surprised me with an explosion of frustration. It bordered on anger. He certainly was incensed. I was talking about the importance of writing a tailored-made résumé for each job. He said, “You mean we have to write a separate résumé for every job? You can’t be serious.”

This was a moment for pause—pause is good when you want to make a point. “Why yes,” I said to him. “Because here’s the thing. Employer A has different needs than employer B, and employer C, and D, and E, and so on.” Your résumé needs to talk to the needs of each and every employer or it’s really doing you no good.

Whatever you to call it: “Cookie Cutter,” “Résumé in a Box,” “One-Fits-All,” this lack of concerted effort demonstrates to the employer that she’s not special. You fail to highlight the outstanding accomplishments related to the job she’s offering. Sure, you list some outstanding accomplishments, but you’re making her hunt for them, making her work.

Martin Yate says it nicely in his blog . “Have you ever looked at a Swiss army knife? It’s got knife blades, bottle openers, screwdrivers…it does practically everything. But companies aren’t hiring human Swiss army knives. They are hiring human lasers, with exceptional skills focused in a specific area.”

Some jobseekers believe that employers want to see everything they’ve done in their many years of work, when in fact employers are more interesting in knowing that you can meet their specific needs, address their specific problems.

The only way to offer them a human laser rather than a Swiss Army knife is by understanding the nature of the job and the nuances of the company. This will require thinking like the employer, who when writing the job ad has some very important requirements in mind for the next candidate she hires.” This will require you to carefully dissect the ad and decipher the accomplishments.

Make the effort. Yate states that your résumé is your most important financial document. It determines the rest of your life.

Make room for supporting skills on your résumé

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Guest article from Martin Yate, CPC, author, Knock ’em Dead Series.

If you want your résumé pulled from the databases and read with serious attention, it’s common knowledge that it needs to focus on the skills you bring to a single target job. However, employers still want to know about your supporting skills.

For example a colleague and hiring manager in the IT world says, “ I don’t just want to see evidence that someone is a hotshot in say, the .NET Framework; I also want to see that they can get around with other languages, so that I know (a) that they understand programming as distinct from just .NET, and (b) that if my company introduces a new programming language/development environment in the future, I have someone who will be able to handle that with ease.”

To satisfy these understandable needs, your resume must nevertheless

1. Be data-dense enough, with that data focused on the “must have” skills of the job to get your résumé ranked high enough in database searches. A recruiter will not read your résumé unless it ranks in the top 20 of that recruiter’s database search; because twenty résumé is about as deep as they ever go.

2. No one enjoys screening résumé, and the process is initially visual, in that recruiters scan a résumé for key content and will naturally favor those résumé where the layout enables a reader to rapidly access key information.

These factors contribute to the need for your résumé to have a laser focus on a target job: the résumé’s goal is to get you into conversation and if it speaks clearly and succinctly to capabilities as described in your analysis of Job Postings it will do so. This approach is proven and it is the default starting point for a productive résumé.

You can still get this important supporting skills information into your résumé, without taking up too much room, by using a Core Competencies section. This will come at the front of your résumé, after contact information, your Target Job Title and any Performance Profile or Summary.

The Core Competencies section is a simple list of all the skills that you bring to the job. You’ll start with those skills most important to your Target Job; but you can also add all those skills, that support your all-around professionalism.

Here’s an example of a Core Competencies section from an operations management resume:

Professional Core Competencies

Strategic Business Planning Project Management Cross-Functional Team Building
IT/IS Human Resource Issues Employee Benefits
Risk Management Hiring, Training & Coaching Negotiations
Research & Analysis Financial Modeling Business Modeling
Portfolio Management Acquisitions & Divestitures Policies & Procedures

Adding a Core Competencies section to the front end of your résumé and then repeating those same words in the context of the jobs in which they were used has two major benefits

  • It’s a concise review of all the hard skills you bring to the table and is a real attention grabber to a recruiter
  • It multiplies the occurrence of keywords likely to be used by recruiters in the database searches and will dramatically improve your resume‘s ranking

You can learn much more about resumes in Knock em Dead Resumes & Templates on the book pages here at http://www.knockemdead.com
Courtesy, www.KnockEmDead,com

The #1 way to stand out on your resume

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By Laura Smith-Proulx

Worried that your resume won’t stand out for that perfect job when compared to hundreds of eager job hunters?

One of the BEST ways to distinguish yourself is to measure and document your performance against that of peers (or previous incumbents).

Competitive intelligence isn’t new. Anyone who sells solutions is constantly positioning their product for a win against similar offerings. And guess what? In a job search, YOU are the product.

Therefore, your resume must explain the reasons you’ll continue to outperform others in your next job.

Here are 3 tips to help gauge your work against others, and then add the results to your resume:

1 – Assess your predecessor.

Most employers find it necessary to reorganize teams from time to time, so you’ve probably found yourself taking over a role from a former colleague.

You may have even been hired to replace an underperforming manager, which gives you a great foundation on which to base achievements. If so, you’ll want to quantify the results you gained over that of the previous incumbent.

Turnaround performance is a great differentiator, and was used as part of the strategy on this resume for a Denver-based COO in the real estate investment industry – showing how he walked into specific challenges and removed obstacles to revenue success.

2 – Compare yourself against colleagues.

Believe it or not, a side-by-side correlation between your results and that of your peers will help your resume writing skills.

Think carefully about efforts you’ve handled at work such as special projects or collaboration with leaders at your company. Ask yourself these questions:

  • Was there a reason your boss selected you to lead a particular initiative?
  • Were you promoted faster than your colleagues?
  • Are you frequently pulled into leadership meetings to provide strategic input?

If any of these situations apply to you, document the ways you’re differentiating yourself, and then leverage them!

This example of a Sales Resume for a B2B sales executive in Minnesota shows how we compared his revenue achievement to peers – demonstrating better (and faster results) that intrigued employers.

3 – Evaluate your performance against the entire industry.

Here’s where economic conditions come into play. If you’re in a sales role, you might find that you’ve earned Top Producer ranking in a down year… when others in your industry struggled to even make quota.

Take stock of your performance against that of peers in other companies. Did your company stay in business – even when others shut their doors?

Were you able to produce revenue-generating or market-capturing strategies in an industry known for slow growth?

If these scenarios apply to you, note both the achievement and the conditions on your resume. Employers are keen to hire candidates that are able to address and resolve obstacles, especially in a recession!

In summary, even if it seems that you’ve just “done your job” throughout your career, chances are good that you can think of ways your performance differs from that of other team members or executives.

Adding comparative analyses to your resume – with a full description of your results against others –will help you make a stronger, standout impression.

Laura Smith-Proulx, Executive Director, National Columnist, Author, LinkedIn expert, and former recruiter.

As a social-media savvy leader in the resume industry, Laura combines a lifelong passion for writing with recruiting expertise, global recognition, awards, and master-level credentials held by less than 30 resume experts worldwide.

When someone writes your résumé, they need to thoroughly interview you. The experts will tell you

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You’d think that writing a résumé that is typically one, two, three, or even four pages long shouldn’t be difficult, yet even the most accomplished professionals find it daunting. Self-analysis is not an easy thing, as it involves some soul searching and brutal honesty.

Although some can easily identify their skills and experience, others need help in the form of a résumé  interview. Professional résumé writers will tell you that the interview is just the beginning of the entire process.

My Résumé  Writing workshop attendees often confess that they dread writing their résumé —these are people who have written white-pages, proposals, product documentation, newsletters, and other business correspondences. To answer them, I’ll say, “You just have to do it. Your livelihood depends on this document.”

The workshop runs two and a half to three hours long, depending on the number of questions I get as well as how talkative I am. The focus of the workshop is to help my customers 1) formulate a strategy, 2) position themselves through a Summary/Personal Profile, and 3) sell themselves to the employer by showing quantified accomplishments. This, however, is all theory. In other words, it tells them how they should go about revising an existing résumé , how to make it stronger.

Where my customers benefit the most is when I meet with them one-on-one. They revise their résumé  after the workshop and then send a copy of it to me. I’ll review and write comments on it, usually pertaining to a lack of accomplishments and/or a Summary statement that fails to illustrate their job-related skills. If their résumé  is outstanding, I’ll say so; but in most cases it needs at least some minor work.

What results from the critique is usually a soul-searching meeting where I’ll interview my customers for half an hour to dig into their background. The interview process is where it comes together for them. It’s the “Oh Yeah” moment where they see better their accomplishments and understand why a Summary statement full of fluff is not impressive.

“You say in your Summary that you trained staff to be more productive,” I’ll begin. First of all, employers have seen this claim many times. How can you elaborate on it? Give me a WOW factor.”

“OK. When I trained other staff on how to use the proprietary office management software, I noticed a rapid improvement in their output, perhaps double what they were doing prior to my training. Do you mean like that?”

“Exactly. Now tell me more about your training style. Why was it effective?”

“Oh, and also I won an award for training my colleagues. I, like, totally forgot about that.”

And so it goes. With fresh new ideas in their heads, my job seekers leave my office armed to revise their résumé  for yet another time, and probably not the last.

Some jobseekers have the resources to hire a professional résumé  writer who will guide them through the entire process, beginning with the interview and culminating with a product that should get them a number of interviews.

I won’t dissuade my customers who ask me if they should hire a writer, especially if they can afford the cost. However, there’s one condition I lay down; if a résumé  writer is going to take their money, the writer must interview them for an appropriate length of time before going to work writing it.

I’ve seen too many job seekers come through our urban career center with a poorly written résumé . In some cases, they spend up to $700 for a résumé  that is worth no more than the paper on which it’s printed. One woman I spoke to said she was interviewed for 10 minutes. What she showed me was no more than a work timeline with a long column of keywords. Oh, but it had a nice border around it. Plainly stated, it wasn’t a résumé .

Writing one’s own résumé  takes self-reflection, so it follows that assisting with or writing another person’s résumé  requires the time to completely understand the client’s relevant experience, scope of their duties, and, most importantly, what accomplishments they’ve achieved that separates them from the rest of the pack.

WHAT THE PROFESSIONALS SAY:

Wendy Enelow, Co-Owner of Career Thought Consortium and author of many résumé  writing books, articulates in one of her blogs the need to capture her clients’ accomplishments: “As professional résumé  writers, we all know that a great deal of a résumé ’s effectiveness is based on accomplishments—what a job seeker has done to improve operations, increase revenues, strengthen bottom-line profits, reduce operating costs, enhance business processes, upgrade technologies, and so much more.” To write about a job seeker’s accomplishment, the résumé  writer must invest time in learning about that person. Wendy puts no limit on the time it takes to interview her clients and write some of the best résumé s out there.

Darrell DiZoglio, Owner of RighteousRésumé s, emphasizes the importance of setting his clients apart from the ordinary. He states, “[Clients] want a serious advantage over their competition in the race to get hired and do not mind paying for it. It is my mission in life to give it to them.” I’ve spoken with Darrell on a few occasions and got the impression that he loves what he does and takes pride in producing the best possible résumé s for his clients. When talking about the time he takes to interview his clients, he says, “I don’t wear a wristwatch.”

“The amount of time I spend interviewing a client before pen is put to paper is no less than 2 hours, but there is no restriction on time. Our process is one of working to accomplish a goal that is not driven by time.” states Marjorie Kavanagh, President of Panoramic Résumé s. She also says the interview process helps people realize accomplishments they may not have considered.

Tracy Parish, CPRW, Executive Résumé  Writer, says that sometimes her clients don’t talk enough. But knowing the importance of getting valuable information from them, she won’t give up until she has that information. She mentions a funny occasion when her fear of a silent client was subsided after she used her charm to warm him up, “I’ve also had the extreme where you couldn’t get them to talk at all. I’m usually great at getting them to open up. One guy had his wife sit in on the call too—she warned me he wouldn’t talk much so I thought having her there for input would be nice. However, he talked so much [his wife] was shocked. She told me she had never seen anyone get him to talk so much!”

Whether my customers attend my workshop and a critique session or pay someone to write their résumé , the interview process is an essential component of the process. I understand the difficulty of interviewing job seekers, as do the professional résumé  writers who I contacted; but when done well, it lays down the foundation of the most important document of their life.


What documents do you need to conduct a successful job hunt?

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I recently read an article from Laura Smith-Proulx, CCMC, CPRW, CIC, TCCS, CPBA, COPNS, on the types of documents executive-level jobseekers should have in their arsenal. She is correct in asserting that a résumé is not enough to conduct a successful job search.

I am sharing her article with you (below) with this addendum; the documents she suggests for high-level jobseekers (executive biography, LinkedIn profile, cover letter, and full Résumé) are not exclusive to them. Mid-level people in the job hunt can benefit from these documents, as well. Read on to learn what Laura has to say:

If you’re an executive planning your next career move, it might surprise you to learn that you’ll be judged by more than just your resume during your job search.

In other words, a full resume is NOT necessarily the best fit for every job search contact.

Surprised? You’ll find that recruiters, company owners, Boards of Directors, and other hiring decision-makers often look at your experience through a series of interviews and investigations—which means that your executive resume is just one part of the process.

Here are 4 must-have documents for an executive portfolio designed to capture attention at all the right levels—along with recommendations for the timing of each component:

1 – Executive Biography.
A short, narrative-form document, the Biography often appeals to readers that are not engaged in the technical detail of a full resume.

The best readers for an Executive Biography are usually networking contacts (who are easily overwhelmed by a full resume) or Boards of Directors (who typically interview you in the later stages of the hiring process).

2 – LinkedIn Profile.
While not technically a “document” created just for job hunting, your LinkedIn Profile is a critical—and often underutilized—piece of an executive portfolio.

Most executives set up a Profile very quickly and then abandon it, becoming preoccupied with their work, which is a costly job-hunting mistake.

Your LinkedIn Profile may actually be the first piece of information encountered by a recruiter. Therefore, it must be polished, professional, and keyword-heavy (to aid others in finding you through LinkedIn’s search engine).

3 – Cover Letter.
Despite the myth that hiring authorities rarely read cover letters, some audiences (company owners, CEOs, and Presidents) might not even glance at your resume until they’ve fully digested the contents of your letter.

These groups are usually probing for leadership abilities that they feel are more evident within the letter. Investors, in particular, like to read a very short, bottom-line value proposition letter, in lieu of a resume.

In short, don’t write off a cover letter as an important document in the hiring process, as you might find that it was this part of your portfolio that influenced an interviewing decision.

4 – Full Resume.
Not a month goes by when a social media or recruiting expert poses the question, “Is the resume dead?” No, the need for a resume won’t go away soon. You’ll absolutely be asked to send your resume to many contacts at different stages of your search.

No matter who reads it, an executive resume serves as the centerpiece of your presentation, and therefore must convince employers of your brand, value proposition, and leadership standing—no small feat.

Often, the best readers of a full resume will those that thrive on analytical detail (such as operations or technology executives hiring EVP and Director-level candidates).

In summary, an executive portfolio is a must for serious job hunters ready to assume a leadership role. The days of distributing an executive resume without backup in the form of an Executive Biography, LinkedIn Profile, or Cover letter are gone.

Your job search will be smoother, faster, and more effective with a well-rounded and branded portfolio that appeals to the diverse audiences you’ll encounter.

Grab an employer’s attention with your cover letter; don’t be boring

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The Wall Street Journal online, wsj.com gives some sound advice on writing a cover letter, How to Write a Cover Letter. Like any article, there are some points on which one agrees and disagrees. For example, wsj.com recommends that you include a quote from a supervisor that praises an accomplishment or two. What someone else says about you carries more weight than if you write it.

On the other hand, the article suggests you use a post script at the end, as in “PS. Did I mention that I was voted best employee four months in a row?” Obviously you forgot to mention it, so why bring it to their attention?

A very important point. I was a bit disappointed that the article didn’t advise jobseekers to do something I think is commonsense. This is to write an opening line that grabs an employer’s attention with what is called a “tag line” or a “hook.” This is similar to how the first two or three pages of a novel will entice you to buy the book.

We are used to seeing an opening like: “I read on Monster.com with great excitement about the Marketing Specialist position and am submitting my résumé in consideration for the position.” Boring.

Instead, start your cover letter with something that shows personality. The wsj.org piece mentions researching the position and company, so use this information in your cover letter. “Twice voted employee of the year at company ABC, I will bring to your company a dynamic Marketing Specialist that will help your company excel in the corrugated box market.”

Perhaps you’d like to show your knowledge of some challenges the industry is facing: “With the employment rate growing and fewer jobs being advertised, I realize the need for jobseekers to learn how to penetrate the Hidden Job Market (HJM) by networking. I am champion of the unemployed and would like to bring my knowledge of the labor market to your organization.”

I find these two openings more interesting and eye-grabbers than the traditional, boring, predictable openers. You can come across as the typical jobseeker, or you can separate yourself from the normal. Unique is in, boring is out.

Go a step further with your cover letter. One of Katharine Hansen latest blog entries on cover letters talks about how story telling can add some character to your cover letter.  To close this entry I highlight her view on how stories can spice up a cover letter and  have chosen quotes from two of her contributors. Katharine writes, “But many of the cover-letter wants and needs that hiring decision-maker opinions expressed in the report could be met by stories in cover letters.”

[I want to see] a cover letter that shows some personality as we are looking for someone who will complement our company culture and will fit in. — Sheri Graciano, human resource manager, Sacramento Convention & Visitors Bureau

I want to be tantalized and teased by a cover letter! I do not want a rehash of the resume. I want to see the 3-4 juicy accomplishments from a candidate’s career (that match my advertised need). These highlights must excite me to such a level that this candidate becomes a can’t-miss prospect. If I am not swept away by the cover letter, then reading the resume is often anti-climactic and doomed for failure. — Ron Kubitz, recruiting manager, Brayman Construction Corp., Saxonburg, PA

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Don’t overlook the value of One-Stop career center job search workshops

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The other day I was talking with a neighbor who has been out of work for over six months. He’s a project manager who worked at a medical equipment conglomerate for five years. I asked him how his job search was going. He told me great; he had sent out more than 10 resumes that day on a number of job boards. I cringed—in to the black hole they went.

Find a job

I encouraged him to come down to the One-Stop career center, for which I work, for help with his job search. “The Unemployment Office?” he asked. Obviously he hadn’t been to a career center, where unemployment insurance assistance is one of many services the career centers offer.

“No the career center. We can help you with your job search. We have workshops on all kinds of job-search topics….” I also wanted to tell him that he’d feel very comfortable at our career center. He’d fit in.

Adapting to a Rapidly Growing Professional Job Seeker Clientele

One common misconception of One-Stop career centers is that the only people who attend job search workshops are those who know little to nothing about seeking employment or are non-exempt workers. For a vast majority of people, nothing could be further from the truth.

Increasingly more job seekers who attend workshops are savvy job seekers who come from all types of occupations. Positions like marketing, engineering, sales, pharmaceutical development, document control, manufacturing management, as well as mechanics, construction workers, et cetera.

To better serve the more experienced job seekers, career centers have had to upgrade many of its services. Workshop Specialists (WS) are finding the challenge of serving experienced job seekers to be both exhilarating and mentally stimulating.

They’ve had to up their game and are meeting the challenge. The consequence of not enhancing their knowledge is letting savvy job seekers down and driving them away. Below are some of the more popular workshops that WS’s have developed.

LinkedIn: To answer the demand of the LinkedIn aficionados, many career centers are offering workshops on Intro to LinkedIn and Advanced LinkedIn. The latter workshop addresses the elements that make a LinkedIn profile appealing to employers who are enabling the Hidden Job Market by searching for passive or active job seekers via LinkedIn. Employers are increasingly foregoing the traditional search process and instead using LinkedIn and social media like Facebook and Twitter. Approximately 80% of employers are using LinkedIn.

Advanced Résumé Writing: This is another area of the job search where advanced job seekers expect more than the rudimentary theories on writing this important marketing piece. Many of them have received costly assistance from outplacement agencies and professional résumé writers, so they know the drill when it comes to writing an effective marketing piece. Advanced Résumé Writing workshop focus more on Strategy, Positioning, and Selling one’s skills and experience. Workshop Specialists stress results that are quantified and related to the jobs to which jobseekers apply.

The Interview Process: Advanced jobseekers need to know more about the interview process than simply the etiquette one has to demonstrate at an interview, e.g. steady eye contact, a firm handshake, and good body posture. The importance of researching the job and company comes to no surprise to them, but combining the power of LinkedIn and reading the company’s website for additional details of the job is some food for thought. (The more experienced job seekers have an advantage over the ones who haven’t looked for work in more than ten years.) Behavioral questions and how to prepare for them is often new even to advanced job seekers. Many of them haven’t experienced behavioral questions, and if they have they were often taken off guard.

Networking: There is a clear divide between the experienced and inexperienced job seekers in a career networking workshop. The advanced job seekers have been attending networking groups once or perhaps twice a week, so they’re familiar with organized networking technique. The focus on how networking enables one to penetrate the Hidden Job Market. It’s fascinating to see workshop attendeess’ faces when WS’s talk about today’s hiring process—that 80% of employers are hiring from within, not advertising the very best positions and entertaining only the savviest networkers.

Job Search Letters: Experienced job seekers know the importance of effective written communications, but in this workshop they’re reminded of how important it is to be proactive in one’s job search. WS’s talk about approach letters as a way to network. Cover letters are always sent with a résumé unless instructed otherwise. When asked how many send cover letters with résumés, most don’t raise their hand. Jobseekers are encouraged to go beyond the typical cover letter with the typical first sentence, and write a vivid tagline that grabs employers’ attention. Boring doesn’t win brownie points with employers—it’s simply boring. The thank you letter is the conclusion of the interview process.

The next time you see someone who is biding his time applying online for jobs, suggest that he visit a One-Stop career center; talk to a career counselor; look into training; and, of course, join as many workshops as possible. Jobseekers of all experience levels shouldn’t turn their nose up to One-Stop career centers that are making a great effort to accommodate the expanding number of experienced job seekers…and often succeeding.

Recruiters and staffing agencies say your soft skills are important too

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Based on two recent blogs I read on LinkedIn Today (a great feature), recruiters and staffing agencies are not only concerned about job candidates’ hard skills; they’re also concerned about their soft skills. And this makes sense. Who would want to hire a dud who brings the operation down with his attitude? Jon Prete, “Who would you hire: Charlie or Ashton? It’s all about attitude!” and Jeff Haden, “The 5 Biggest Hiring Mistakes,” both emphasize the importance of hiring someone who will be a good fit.

This said, how should you prepare for the job search with this in mind? Here are five areas of your job search to focus on.

1)       Be the round peg for the round hole: “The outstanding salesman with the incredible track record of generating business and terrorizing admin and support staff won’t immediately play well in your sandbox just because you hired him,” writes Haden.

Let’s face it; if you’re difficult to work for, you have one strike against you already. Look at yourself long and hard and determine what areas in your personality you might improve. Also determine in which work environments you feel most comfortable. If you’re a demanding person with little tolerance, you might consider an atmosphere with other demanding people…where you can’t terrorize other people.

2)      Show it on paper: Many jobseekers say writing about their soft skills on their résumé and in their cover letter is irrelevant. This is bunk, especially with your cover letter. I don’t suggest that you use clichés like, “hard worker,” “team player,” “dynamic.” I suggest you illustrate these traits through your accomplishments. Show rather than tell.

A Manufacturing Manager who has a team-work approach and leadership skills might write: Consistently met production deadlines through collaboration with colleagues in various departments and providing effective leadership to (formerly) unmotivated subordinates. Result: Products were shipped to customers with a 97% return rate.

3)      Talk about your soft skills while you’re networking: “I hate bragging at networking events,” I’m constantly told. “Nobody wants to hear about my personal qualities.” Yes they do. If someone is going to recommend you to a solid contact, wouldn’t you like to be assured that she will tell him that you loved what you were doing; you were a positive influence on you co-workers? Demonstrate your enthusiasm while you’re networking, whether at events or on the sidelines of your daughter’s soccer game. Instead of saying, “I’m innovative”; say, “I came up with ideas that were often implemented and led to significant cost savings.”

4)      Of course demonstrating your soft skills at the interview is important: This goes without saying. Interviewers today are using behavioral questions to find the people with the right attitude. “If crafted properly,” states Prete, “behavioral questions can provide a glimpse into a candidate’s decision-making process as well as their values. [Leadership Development Advisor, Beth Armknecht Miller] believes that a great majority of employees fail in a company because their soft skills and values don’t match those of their manager and company.”

Unlike the résumé where you have limited space, the interview provides you the platform to tell your stories using the STAR (situation, task, action, result) formula. You may be asked about your ability to effectively discipline subordinates. “Tell me about a time when you were effective in disciplining an employee. How did this help the employee perform better?” Have a story ready.

5)      Seal the deal: The interview is not concluded until you’ve sent a follow-up letter, I tell my workshop attendees. This is another opportunity to emphasize your strong personality skills, making you a better fit for the position than other applicants. Many jobseekers fail to send a thank you note, and some don’t get the job for that reason.

A former customer recently wrote me, “The HR person really liked my hand-written thank-you note; said it was rare.” The message here is that you can stand out as a courteous, professional, and follow-through type of candidate simply by sending a thank-you note.

Jobseekers generally think that recruiters and staffing agencies care only about the technical skills. (After all, recruiters can’t present a zebra with orange stripes to their client when a zebra with black stripes is called for.) But two recruiters are telling you that employers want a great personality fit, as well. Take their advice and sell yourself as an all-around employee from the very beginning.

A Heart-Warming Story

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A blog entry from Martin Yate called Put Joy in Your Life is touching and on the surface seems to have nothing to do with the job search.

But putting aside the fact that Joshua Bell, one of the greatest musicians in the world, is playing merely for fun, let’s stretch our imagination and envision some analogy to the job search.

Maybe a lesson about being unsuccessful because of poor marketing and the inability to sell oneself. Joshua only made a handful of money.

“After 45 minutes of continuous playing: Only 6 people stopped and listened for a short while. About 20 gave money but continued to walk at their normal pace. The man collected a total of $32,” writes Martin.

If we thing long and hard, we could think of some way to relate the story to the job search. The inability to understand one’s audience; as in poorly written or verbal communications.

This could be a lesson on being the most qualified person for the job (the guy’s world famous) but not getting it because he’s playing to the wrong audience. Obvious. 

But I’m sure our analysis of the story would trivialize it and probably make a mess of the message Martin is trying to send.

Read the story on Martin’s blog and you may ask, “Why is it posted on Knock ‘Em Dead’s blog?” On the other hand, it may hit you like a brick and make complete sense…it’s just an awesome story about a man having some fun.

3 Easy Ways to Overcome the Challenge of Resume Writing by Laura Smith-Proulx

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Trying to get your job search off to a strong start – only to be hampered by the resume-writing process?

Do you struggle to articulate the high points of your career and brand – or to sum up the reasons you should be considered over others?

If so, you have plenty of company, especially if your career is at the executive or senior professional level. Many leaders have discovered that it’s easier to actually drive change, improve company operations, or transform revenue performance than it is to write about it.

Here are 3 main reasons why resume writing can be difficult–followed by 3 simple ways to make the process easier:

1 – You’re too close to the subject.

Most executive leaders and skilled professionals are subject matter experts in all types of leadership competencies, from strategic planning to team delegation.

However, when asked to describe their strengths, most of them will resort to tactical or skills-based descriptions, rather than illustrating the ways in which they add strategic value.

You’re naturally good at what you do, but telling your story requires a higher level of analysis—a process that most executives and senior-level professionals don’t think to undertake for themselves.

2 – Marketing copy isn’t your strong suit.

Most COOs spend their time ensuring that costs are reined in and that the company’s infrastructure will support growth, while sales managers are assessing the competition, CEOs are busy forming strategic forecasts, accountants are closing the books, IT Managers are negotiating with vendors, and CIOs are dealing with the rising costs of technology.

Of course, these activities leave precious little time to become well-versed in marketing.

Even if marketing campaigns ARE part of your leadership role, you’ll still find that it’s much harder to create promotional copy when the product is YOU.

3 – You haven’t created your personal brand message.

As with any type of promotion, branding is a key element of marketing. When it comes to job search, your personal brand is basically the value proposition and reputation that you’ve forged throughout your career.

Even if you’re in touch with what your value-add means to your next employer, it’s difficult to articulate it for others to read! It’s even harder to translate your personal brand into the context of a cohesive executive or professional resume.

Now, here are some tips to help with the process of writing about yourself:

• Ask colleagues about what they see as your most valuable accomplishments and proficiencies. What compliments do you receive on your work?

• Consider looking at executive or professional resume examples, which are readily available online, to get an idea of the marketing style that appeals to employers in today’s job market. How does yours stack up?

• Talk to past supervisors to find out the strengths you brought in your job. What were the key reasons for your past promotions?

• After putting together a draft of your resume, show it to others. What do THEY think you’re missing about your own message?

In summary, writing your resume can seem like the most challenging part of your job search. However, don’t give up and just list your duties!

Instead, spend some time figuring out how to frame your most valuable achievements and brandin a way that captures (and holds) employer interest.

 
Posted by Laura Smith-Proulx, CCMC, CPRW, CIC
 
This article was posted with the author’s permission.