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Finding a New
Position:
How to Get
started
By Laura D Lewis
Excerpt from:
Laid Off Now
What
PRINT
Nobody likes
to look for a new job. Let's face it, it's frustrating and when the economy is down
like it is today, the task is twice as
difficult. But there are some tips you can use to shorten the time and improve your
prospects.
Step 1: Update Your Resume.
It doesn't matter if you are applying
for a minimum wage position or a senior executive position. You'll need two formats and
possibly several versions: The formats you'll need are Text Only and Document.
Text Only is a non-formatted document that you can copy and paste into an
e-mail or online job board resume postings. This means no text boxes, graphics,
fancy punctuation like bullets and numbering, bolding and italics. Just straight text and
paragraph breaks and a common font like Courier, Arial, Times or Times Roman.
This version
forms the
foundation of
your online
social media
profile on
Linked In, Plaxo,
Dice or Xing.
Document is created in a word processing program like Microsoft Word or Word Perfect. This is the resume you hand the interviewer, drop off or mail. You want this to look crisp, professional and organized. If you have less than 6 years experience, your resume should be only one page.
If you are management or executive level, no more than two pages. Print on high grade white paper because most companies will scan your resume through a computer and colored paper makes this difficult.
The key elements you need to cover in
your resume are:
Contact Information:
Name, Address, Phone, e-mail. Note if you are willing to relocate.
Include a link to your LinkedIn, Plaxo or Xing profile.
-
Experience: Dates
employed (use years if possible) Name of Company, Size and location of company, URL, Your
Position and a brief description of your duties. Include this information on positions
relevant to what you are looking for. Note at the bottom of the page unrelated
positions. Don't waste space if they are not relevant.
I.E.: In college I held a
variety of jobs in retail and food service.
-
Education: List your
last school attended if no degree and only colleges and universities where degrees were
obtained, unless you attended an Ivy League School or other prestigious university.
If you went to college, leave off your high school. It's not
relevant. Many
companies now use computers to scan resumes and they typically look for Ivy League
schools, abbreviations like BA, MBA or Ph.D. Leave off the year graduated to
prevent age discrimination and GPA. Do state if you graduated with honors.
In 20
years, nobody has ever asked or cared what my GPA was. Outside of college, it's rarely
relevant.
-
Skills: List
software programs or special training you have that relates to the position. Include
any other languages. Words like C++ Programming, JAVA, PowerPoint are also actively sought
by computer scanners.
-
Awards: Any awards
you've received for work. If none, don't list.
-
Associations: List
any professional associations that are relevant to the position. If none, don't list.
-
Hobbies: Only put
these on if they enhance your ability to get the job. For example if you sail and
are applying for a position with a boat manufacturer, this is relevant.
Step 2: The Cover Letter
If you haven't looked for a job in the past
5-10 years, things
have changed. Most online job services do not attach a cover letter to your resume
or don't allow you to do one that is customized to the specific job. On the human
resources end, especially at big companies, the resume process is automated. This
means computers decide based upon key words in your resume, whether or not a human being
ever sees your resume. You'll find many of the key words in the ad posted.
For the resumes you send in via snail mail or drop off
though, the cover letter is very important. The cover letter is where you go into
detail about how you can be an asset to the company. The object is to tell the
company why they should hire you, not how wonderful you are. What can you do for
them?
Concentrate on quantitative information like, "As the manager of the sales
department, I increased sales among the associates by 60% in my first six months" or
"By learning a new building technique in a seminar, I saved the foreman and my team
three days of additional work".
And here's a real edge. Early in my
career I I discovered the
Knock 'Em Dead
series and once I adapted my cover letters
to the Executive Summary format, I received response on 40% of my resumes,
(those mailed directly vs those posted online). Prior to
that, I was lucky to get 5%, which is still better than direct mail. Martin Yates, the author,
also does a Knock 'Em Dead book for resumes and
one on interview questions. Both are well worth the
investment.
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AMAZON
REVIEW
This Book Put ME Back in Control!
Reviewer:
A reader
from
Aloha,
Oregon
October
30,
2003:
"This
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Off Now
What"
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Assemble Examples of Your Work
Have you designed anything...forms, ads, reports, presentations? Do you
have pictures of projects you've built, worked on or created? Have you written an
article, published or not, that relates to your experience and can be used to teach others
your area of expertise? Do you have copies of reports you've submitted, proposals, letters
or memos you've written, promotions you've created or executed? If you worked in a
service industry, do you have pictures of what the environment was like, who your
customers were or better yet, one of you helping a customer?
Visual aids will make you stand out in the interviewer's mind
and show that you take pride in what you do, regardless of what level you work at.
For people in arts, sales, communication and marketing, a portfolio is essential. For
those in other professions, it will surprise the interviewer and give them a better
understanding of just what you are capable of. There is a reason a picture is worth
a 1000 words. An example is worth even more. It's proof positive you not only
know how to do the job, but can.
Webfolios:
The latest job seeking trend with management through C-level
positions is the webfolio. Mine is can be seen
here, (Large file so be
patient while it uploads)
This webfolio is created this with PowerPoint, PhotoShop and
Illustrator.
Webfolios are being used in all fields, not just the
creative fields as proof of what you do, how you think and
tangible evidence of the skills you bring to the table. If
you haven’t seen one before, feel free to use
mine
as an example, though there are many ways to put these
together. Mine is an overall webfolio because I use it for
freelance work. You'll want to create a targeted
version including between 10 and 20 pages for specific
positions. If you
have access to recording equipment, you may want to do a
voiceover and in Flash. If you have copies of TV and Radio
programs featuring you as an expert, embed and include these
as well. Do a search on YouTube
first to see if possibly your segment or a segment featuring
you is already up. You may be surprised!
Even if you don't have computer skills,
GoDaddy.com makes it easy for you to build your own online webfolio with
their 'website tonight package', inexpensively and quickly.
Online Social Networking:
Although employers are just beginning to figure out how to
use this newest manifestation in peer-2-peer marketing,
successful jobseekers above entry-level or retail positions
will tell you, if you’re going to find a great job you
better learn this quick: Social networking, social
networking, social networking.
How
it works:
There are three major professional social networking sites:
Xing®, Plaxo and Linked In. Xing is Europe, Asia and the
Middle East predominantly. Plaxo® and LinkedIn® focus more
on North America, though all are global. Here you post your
profile, connect with people, search for jobs and join
various industry related groups. This isn’t like Facebook®
or MySpace® which are more appropriate for friends and
family. These are focused strictly on business and
connecting professional people.
online job markets:
The two biggest are
Monster.com and
Yahoo!/jobs. I have received employment
through these once. What I've discovered is that since the
Human Resources (HR) Department receives the resumes, they generally stop after
getting 10-20 good prospects. These prospects are vetted
using applicant sorting software. This means unless your
resume has exactly the right words in it, your resume may
never be seen by a human eye. Sometimes the criteria used
supports overt or unacknowledged prejudices or preferences
of the programmer such as Ivy League education, or MBA.
You could be the best candidate for the job, but if you
don't have the right key word, the chances that your resume
will appear are negligible.
Another important fact most job
seekers fail to realize is that HR's primary responsibility
is to eliminate candidates, not hire them. They work for the
company, not for you. This is why I never go through HR if I
can help it. Many times I've submitted
resumes online and later contacted the company directly only to discover
I was the perfect candidate, but the hiring manager never saw my
resume! Use the online markets as one tool. Do not
rely on them as your only tool.
Another problem with
online job sites is false postings. To comply with EOE
requirements, companies are required to post all positions. In
most cases, the position is already filled or they have narrowed
it down to 2 or 3 candidates. The ad is simply for government
compliance. Employment agencies will also post "dummy" jobs to
build up their resume data base. In these they describe
the qualities they are looking for, but the job never exists.
You submit your resume and end up in a database for future
reference. One of the things that frustrates me with online and
print classified ads is that the majority of the positions are
placed by employment agencies, not actual employers. For
the employers, you need to go direct and and speak to the person
that would hire you, not the HR department.
One service does
allow you to scan new job listings on local employers sites
Hound.com, but you must pay to play and this doesn't
eliminate the use of screening software. My issue with
Hound.com is the company does not offer refunds if your card
is automatically charged and you've made an effort to cancel
your subscription. To withdraw your subscription you
must contact the company by phone. It took me four
days to do this and by the time I did, they charged my card
again. I have issues recommending companies that don't allow
you to easily cancel your order or withdraw your
subscription. When you're on a tight budget, unexpected
small charges like this can turn into hundreds of dollars in
NFS fees. The only way around this is to get a pre-paid visa
card that you load with the amount of money you will allow
any company to charge. Use a pre-paid card for
anything requiring automatic billing and automatic renewals.
This will prevent your account from being charged for
services you no longer want or need.
PRINT
Next week's article covers what
works. Access
that here |
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The above is an
abbreviated version of
this information in the
book Laid Off Now What
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