Posted by ResumeHelp on March 5, 2010
As if the dreaded R-word wasn’t already making the job hunt tough, applying for work online can feel like you’re tossing that carefully crafted cover letter and résumé into an abyss of HTML. After polling experts in human resources and career development, we gathered a few tips for separating yourself from the other online applicants.
1. Use position-relevant keywords: “Most recruiters today do not look at each individual résumé that comes in. They perform searches on electronic résumés by keywords,” says Allison O’Kelly, CEO of staffing firm, Mom Corps. “Therefore, it is critical that you make sure that you have keywords in your résumé that you would expect a recruiter to use in a search.”
2. Label your résumé clearly: “If you are e-mailing your résumé directly to an employer, you can name the document “Full Name’s Résumé for Name of Position Applying to,” says Tara Malone, assistant director of career development at Purchase College.”
3. Use the appropriate subject heading: “If sending via e-mail, the subject line must clearly state “who” you are (for example, sales associate- pharmaceutical industry) or the position for which you are applying,” says career consultant Wendy S. Enelow.
4. Don’t use “helper words”: Jane Goldner, president of the Goldner Group, adds that words like “assisted” and “coordinated” emphasize that you’re less of a doer and more a passive helper.
5. Try the FedEx trick: “A candidate sent FedEx envelopes to each hiring manager with a short note telling us that the best candidate we could hope to see was about to present her résumé and that we should be ready,” says David Lewis, president of a human resources outsourcing firm, OperationsInc. “A few days later, another FedEx arrived with the résumé. She got the interview. She was as advertised, and we hired her.” Click here for more ideas like this that really work!
http://www.metro.us/us/article/2010/02/28/22/4724-82/index.xml
Posted by ResumeHelp on February 13, 2010
What should you do if you need a career tune-up?
An awful lot of people will wait until their career crashes and burns before they seek the guidance of a career counselor or coach, and even then they want to make sure that they can’t fix it themselves first.
What would happen if you met with a career counselor before your career had a breakdown, before being laid off or before you became so discouraged that you are ready to throw in the towel? Let me suggest that you would be well on your way to a better, doing something that you love to do job instead of dreading to go to work every day.
Does this sound too good to be true? It can happen by developing a the right career plan.
Career counselors and coaches do not have all the answers for you. They aren’t magical. They can’t answer the question “what should I be when I grow up?”. However, they can guide you on a journey to help you discover the answer for yourself.
The most common issue that most job seekers have is resume development. Most people start with a resume, without having a clue what they want to do, what their skills and talents are and where they would like to apply those skills. They aren’t creative and only list their jobs without any explanation and thus their resumes are boring.
You must look at your resume as selling a product (you) then define what you have to offer and what problems you can solve. Only then can you develop and implement a plan. Until you understand your “product”, you cannot define who needs your product or who is willing to buy it. This will take some time and some work. You will be the one who decides where you want to be and what you want to do, instead of waiting for someone else to make those decisions
What if you have already been laid off or expect a downsizing? A career counselor or coach can help you here as well. If you need quick results, you will need to work smarter, not harder. Career counselors and coaches can put together a plan to help you to develop job search strategies. They will develop an effective resume first and then use all available resources to unearth job openings.
However, not all career counselors are equally effective. You need to find a career counselor or coach that you can work well with. One who will help you to identify any career gaps, and who is astute enough to generate solutions and suggestions that will help you move forward.
The difference between a career counselor and career coach is how they approach your needs. Both career counselors and career coaches will work with you to identify your strengths, goals and of course interests. Of course they expect you to take responsibility for your outcome. In other words if you think this is a magic pill, you are mistaken. Your coach will be direct, will push you, and will probably schedule check-in calls. A career counselor will let you set the pace, encourage you to call when you need help, and expect you to report in at agreed upon times. Which is better? Only you can tell. How motivated are you? Either approach will move you forward. You decide which approach will work best for you.
Exercise caution when selecting either one. In some states they are licensed, in others not. Therefore it is your responsibility as a consumer to do your research. If licensing is required in your state they should have a have a graduate degree in counseling or a related field, have a solid track record of helping individuals be successful in their career pursuits.
The career counselors we offer on our website are credentialed and are genuine.
Before making your first appointment, you should interview your potential career counselor or coach over the phone.
| 1 |
What are his/her credentials? |
| 2 |
What time-frame should you expect in order to resolve your issue? |
| 3 |
What is their level of experience and track record? |
| 4 |
How much do they charge? |
| 5 |
How accessible are they? Can you call anytime or do you need an appointment? |
| 6 |
How familiar are they with using the Internet? |
| 7 |
Are they able to help you create a resume that will be read and meets the demands of a rapidly changing marketplace?
SO WHAT’S STOPPING YOU? CONTACT ONE OF OUR CAREER COUNSELORS TODAY! YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE! DON’T PUT IT OFF.
Ref: promisingfutures.com |
Be sure to visit one of the greatest Christian Article sites anywhere. FireQuill Publications is packed with original short stories and drama
Posted by ResumeHelp on October 2, 2009
I’ve written before that, if you want to find a job in today’s Great Recession, it makes sense to study what got people hired in the Great Depression, when times were even tougher.
So I dug out a job-search book published in 1938.
Titled, “We Are Forty And We Did Get Jobs,” it’s by C.B. Thompson and M.L. Wise, two forty-year-old women who spent 10 weeks perfecting a job-search system by looking for work — and getting hired — in cities across America.
If you’d like to know three actions you can take to get hired today, tested and proven in the worst job market of yesteryear, read on …
1) Root out the defeatist attitude.
Here’s how the authors describe their painful situation, prior to starting their job search:
“One of us had suffered a loss so devastating that the rest of life stretched out as something less than twilight. The other had had, in the midst of an illness almost unto death, the shock of such serious financial reverses that for a time both physical and monetary recovery seemed impossible.”
In other words, they were beaten down, broke, and worried. Sound familiar?
They go on to say “we knew this much: Jobs and a sense of despair do not go together. The defeatist attitude is death to opportunity, and had to be gotten rid of at all costs.”
They reasoned — correctly — that it’s impossible for an employer to believe in your abilities if you are so dispirited you don’t believe in them yourself.
So, how do you regain your self-confidence?
By facing your fears and doing something about them, according to the authors.
Example: Let’s say the worst that could happen if you don’t find a job is you lose your home and have no money for food.
But you can do something about that, because you’ll have to.
Maybe you’ll have to move in with family, pawn your jewelry, or apply for food stamps. Whatever your worst-case scenario may be, if you make a plan to deal with it, that will calm your mind and steady your confidence.
After that, you can …
2) Use all your thoughts to plan and execute your job search.
The authors offer three questions and answers to guide your planning and execution:
Q. Who wants you to work for them?
A. Nobody.
Q. Who wants more business or better service?
A. Everybody.
Q. If you could show that you can provide more business or better service, who will want you?
A. Almost everybody.
You’ll find no qualifying language here. It’s not almost every employer with advertised job openings or almost every employer looking for someone young. It’s almost every employer. Period.
Instead of waiting for your ideal job to appear online, think now about how you can show employers — in clear, convincing detail — that you can give them more business or better service. The job will follow.
To get at those details, ask yourself these Wh- questions about the top three achievements for every job you’ve had in the last 15 years:
· Whom did you do it for?
· When?
· Why?
· What happened?
· How much time/money was saved or earned?
Here’s my favorite “before” and “after” example from an IT resume that worked like a charm.
BEFORE
Cleaned up Microsoft Access database.
AFTER
Helped retain $20-million contract with top client after working 16-hour days for four months to clean up Access database and repair reporting problem using Excel and Crystal Reports.
See the difference?
The world pays for value received. Show your value and you can start getting paid again.
3) Stay on track with two questions.
According to Thompson and Wise, they wrote letters and made phone calls to employers that produced job interviews consistently, once they kept the following two questions continually in mind:
1. What does he or she need?
This question forces you to always put an employer’s needs before your own. “This may sound like the golden rule, but it was certainly to prove the golden key that could open the door to employment,” write the authors.
2. How can I supply that need?
Once you know an employer’s needs, you can quickly examine every resume you send and every word you say, to ensure you communicate only what employers want to hear.
Example: If the employer needs a manager to negotiate contracts with suppliers, you will either revise or delete irrelevant information in your resume, like that bartending job you had last year.
The title, “We Are Forty And We Did Get Jobs,” reflects the fact that ageism was even more rampant in the 1930s than now. And I won’t even touch on the sexism the authors must have faced, apart from noting that attitudes have certainly improved.
So, these two women overcame economic, “ageist,” and sexist obstacles to get hired — repeatedly — for jobs in the Great Depression, and they did it without Google, Linkedin, email, cell phones, or FedEx (I omitted their advice on telegrams).
Why not adopt one of their tactics today, and see if you don’t get noticed by more employers tomorrow?
Article by Kevin Donlin, Co-Creator of the Guerrilla Job Search System.
Kevin Donlin is contributing co-author of “Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters 2.0.” Since 1996, he has provided job-search help to more than 20,000 people.
