Tips for Job Seekers

You should have a standard resume and cover letter that you can use at a moment’s notice, so if you meet someone you can provide it, or you can send it out immediately if there is a quick turn-around time.  However, if you have time, you should tailor your standard resume to meet the advertised position. For example, if the position is for a civil engineer with a municipality and you have only worked for engineering consulting firms, then indicate in the resume the number of municipal projects you completed as a consultant and describe some of those projects in your cover letter. Your cover letter should also be tailored to use some of the words in the advertisement or recruitment brochure so they know you have done some research about the position or company.

Sometimes adding another page that addresses the specific position—that’s called a tailored resume—may be helpful. For example, when I applied for a Risk Management Position, I created a tailored resume that highlighted all the risk management projects I had completed during my career. They were not tied to a specific job, but listed diverse risk management projects. My resume already indicated that I was a certified risk manager and had the function of Risk Manager in a few positions, but did not go into detail about my risk management responsibilities. The tailored resume provided that extra information.

Too many candidates list all types of personal information on their resumes.  As a recruiter, I want to know about your professional and career experience. You do not need to tell that you are married, have 3 children, are a hiker, a fraternity member, a gardener or a piano player. All of this information can easily be used against you, consciously or unconsciously. How? Recruiters may think: “Oh no, she will have child care issues” or “A gardener and hiker must be a nature lover and will want to take lots of time off” or “A fraternity member must be a drinker” or “A piano player must be into classical music and won’t fit in.” The only time these personal interests help is if you know the person looking at your resume is interested in the same thing.

However, if you are a volunteer with the Boys and Girls Club, that would show your community participation or may be helpful if you are applying for a non-profit position. Services organizations are usually appropriate if they demonstrate community participation or other organizational skills. Political activities should only be listed if applying for political type positions.

Some companies are very well known—Wal-Mart, IBM, or Aetna Insurance, for example—but most are not. You will need to indicate if the company is a computer or manufacturing firm, and describe the type of computer firm (software or hardware) or products manufactured. Indicate the size of the organization, total staff, and whether it is a local, national or international firm. How this information will be received by a recruiter will depend on the position you are seeking. If you work for a local firm and it is a small office that may be very attractive to another small firm. On the other hand, a recruiter may be impressed that you have experience in a mid-size or large corporation.

If you were in charge of a division or department, indicate the size budget you handled. Especially if you are applying for financial positions—from Bookkeeper to Chief Financial Officer—the size of funds handled is a good indication of your responsibilities. Municipal budgets indicate the size of the town, city or county and are also helpful to the recruiters.

Some titles don’t make it clear that they have management responsibility, so you need to add that to the description of the position. If a position title says you are a Supervisor or Manager, remember to indicate how many people you supervise or manage—even if it’s only one person. You should also describe your management or supervision responsibilities to demonstrate your level of supervision or management.  Indicate if the employees are union, non-union, skilled workers, administrative workers or professionals or other managers.

Tell if you conduct performance appraisals of your employees as well as your ability/authority to hire and fire employees. An added bonus is descriptions of any team management programs or special leadership programs in which you participated.

List your position titles and general responsibilities, since not all those reading your resume will be familiar with all titles, and titles vary for different careers. For example, the title “IT Coordinator” in one firm could mean managing or directing IT, while in another firm it could be the person in charge of only the web site. Also, some titles do not reflect the extent of responsibility if they use terms like Assistant or Associate. An Associate Vice President is very different from a Research Associate; either one could be more influential than the other, depending on the industry. Or a Bookkeeper in one firm may only handle accounts payable, while a Bookkeeper in another firm may handle accounts payable and receivable, bank deposits and reconciliations, journal entries and petty cash.

That is why it is important to provide a brief description of the work you did under a specific title.

Dates are important because they provide valuable information to the recruiter:

• Dates indicate how many years of experience you have in your field.
• Dates indicate your longevity in each position and whether you have a habit of job-hopping.
• Without dates, the recruiter assumes you are trying to hide something.
• If your volunteer work is appropriate to your expertise, add it to your resume, with dates to show your dedication to your area of interest.
• You do not have to list month and year of hire and month and year of departure unless you only have a few positions or a few years of experience. The year started and year ended is sufficient for those who have more than 5 years of experience.
• If you are a student or recent graduate, then using the month and year is important to show your work experience while attending school.

Explain breaks in service:

• Make sure you indicate why if you have a break in service. This can be addressed in your cover letter by indicating you took off time to care for an ill family member, to travel, to attend school, or due to a layoff.
• You do not have to go into a lot of detail about the break in service—don’t tell a whole sad story, just give a quick statement. If the reason is complicated, then discuss with an advisor first to see how to express the issue simply.

You want to catch the attention of the recruiters so they will continue to review your resume, so highlight the most relevant experiences first.   It is important to list your most recent positions first.  If the most recent position is not as relevant as the previous position, then keep the information short on the most recent position and go into more detail about the previous position. That way you highlight the appropriate experience. If a position you are applying for is with a non-profit, then highlight your work with non-profits or your volunteer work.

Many people put together resumes that highlight their experience/skills first and forget to list the various positions they held.  It is important to catch the attention of the recruiter with a list of appropriate experience and skill, using the jargon of the position. But you must also let the recruiter know the titles of positions, date of positions and brief description of each position. The recruiter needs to know if you have longevity at positions, along with the types of firms you worked for and titles of positions in which you acquired your experience.

Use terms like BA, MBA, AS when you list your education, don’t just list the university.  This will indicate that you have a degree.  Also, list your major if it is not obvious from your degree. For example, an MA (Masters) does not need further explanation, unless you had a specific concentration or specialization that would help your application, such as non-profit administration or other areas that relate to your expertise or the position. Listing your year of graduation is not required until you are selected as a top candidate and the agency will want to verify your degree. Listing your year of graduation could have a negative effect if recruiters assume your age doesn’t meet their requirements.

If you don’t have a degree but want to show some college education, describe the types of courses taken and the number of years attended.  If there is a simple reason why you did not finish your degree, you can add that to your resume. For example: accepted a position before you finished a degree, finished all classes except thesis, or something similar. If you have certifications, indicate the type of certification and where you received it, such as Executive Leadership Certification from John F. Kennedy School at Harvard University.

Recruiters may spend only 30 seconds to one minute reviewing your resume to determine if you have the correct qualifications. If the print size is too small and there is no spacing between positions, your resume will be hard for recruiters to read. Besides being pleasing to the eye, the resume needs to be set up so the recruiter can find the important words in your resume such as position title, past employers, projects completed, and the like. If the format is consistent and there is some white space here and there, they will be able to scan quickly and determine if you have the qualifications.

Recruiters also need to see the appropriate words related to the position. For example, if you are applying for a Human Resources Director’s position, they will want to see if you have handled: recruitment, employee relations, labor relations, organizational development, training, employee benefits.  If you are applying for a position in Information Technology, they will want to see your computer certifications, types of software used, whether you handled networks, hardware or software. Your resume must include the key words related to the position in question.

This is important because when Recruiters or Human Resource Directors are working on a specific position, they do not want to wait a few days to receive a reply to their call or email. They have lots of other candidates to contact!  If you don’t return the call or email, they will assume you are not interested and will not contact you a second time.  So if you have sent out a resume, make sure you check your voice mail often and email and junk mail to make sure you did not miss a response.

Some organizations still contact candidates through the mail so your address is also important—although it may not be as important as phone and email in this day and age.  If you think the employer may be concerned about your distance from their location, then you may wish to not list your address during the first stage of the process. Let them concentrate on your qualifications, not the driving distance.