Are you lost in a resume abyss…
OK, career writers are always telling people to target their resumes, really focus what you’ve accomplished and your background on the particular job that’s being advertised.
But folks, this may not be enough in today’s economy.
Today, I write about the growing resume abyss in my MSNBC.com column and there’s some shocking information in there. Turns out you could be the perfect candidate for a job and still no one will ever call you for an interview.
A job search executive did an informal experiment where he sent out a bunch of perfect resumes to job postings he knew the companies were desperate to fill and only one in five even got a call back.
Those are crummy odds for the rest of us out there that might be not exactly the perfect candidates.
So what the heck should you do?
Send a stink-bomb letter to a prospective employer. That will get you noticed.
You guys know I’m kidding right?
But, the tactics you do adopt should have a similar impact — make you stick out from the crowd.
When I was a young reporter trying to break into the big time, or at least the little time, I printed my resume on bright red paper, and I would stop by newspaper or magazine offices to present my resume in person.
I didn’t make it to the big time because of the red resume, but I did get some calls back and some of the editors I spoke with actually gave me invaluable advice that eventually helped me get to the big time.
Bottom line, be creative. My column offers some advice, including using networking sites. These sites are a godsend. How else would you be able to find out the names of a hiring managers friends, or find groups of workers from a particular company all part of a networking group at Linkedin, or Facebook?
It’s hard to make that first step and email a friend of a friend of a hiring manager you want to get your resume to. But people, what do you have to lose? If you don’t do this someone else will.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:32 am
While printing the resume on red paper may not be a wise move, you could sheath your resume in one blank page of colored paper (perhaps with some simple line on the final fold like “Resume of FirstName LastName”). Hey, don’t people still do something like that with wedding invitations?
Otherwise, I’m a firm believer in working the network and learning to whom you need to direct your correspondence. I typically avoid addresses and addressees listed in ads, research the real (non-HR) company address, and make sure the intended recipient is actually the person who will make the hiring decision. Even doing that, I find that response rates are often less than what I would hope to see (is it that hard for a company to let applicants know if they’ve found someone else or decided not to hire at this time).
As to the resume itself, unless you are moving into academia or another field that prefers a portfolio approach, do everything you can to keep it short (one page seems best), and really work on the cover letter. I have found that, in most of the interviews I’ve had in recent years, there’s usually been some key line, concept, or phrase in my cover letter that piqued the interest of the interviewer. Write professionally, but also write personally, and make sure your letter reflects your personality!
A final note–don’t give up. Before entering my current position, I interviewed for five different positions in the same business area over a period of three years (on two occasions, positions were filled or eliminated due to internal restructuring). I interviewed with the same person four of those five times (his position was actually the first one for which I had applied in the business area). One thing became very clear: I was doggedly determined to get a job on that specific team. In the end, that was a major factor in his finally deciding on me for my current position. It was the longest three year period of my life (at least of my work life), but the wait was well worth it.
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:39 pm
There was a time in the early 90’s our company needed a CFO. Our former CFO was having medical difficulties and was unable to contimue. Since I was an executive Sales Manager, and according to our owner a very good judge of character, I was given the opportunity to place the advertisement and and establish more criteria for this position. This may have seemed unusual.
I knew the former CFO very well and he said it is because I was such a good salesman that is what made sense to him as far as why I was in this position. We advertised for the position in Business papers. Some did have multiple city editions. The old CFO and I established not to reveal our company. We did no ‘word of mouth’ advertising. The starting salary was his salary $55000, which was his salary after 23 years with the company. Education requires any college degree or business school certificate. We wanted at least 10 years similar experience but not necessarily CFO experience. We asked for a complete work history. We asked for personal and professional references.
Of the 400 plus resumes we recieved We broke it down by age(very few gave this info voluntarily, mostly we simply looked at high school or college grad dates) and location. We bored ourselves to tears reading swiftly some of the qualifications. We disguarded the colorful, bubbly, documents to go resume…the CFO said if they have time to create this, they do not work very hard. We disguarded those who were unemployed…the mind of a salesman said there has got to be a bad reason for being unemployed and at these wages, this was for people who know how to keep a job…We disguarded those with too many jobs listed at a corproate level and those that did not include menial jobs….this was tough to distiguish, however we asked for complete work histories. Of the 400 resunes, after 5 days of scrutiny, 10 were selected. Of these only 7 were willing to committ to a date for an interview within five days. The best candidate we interviewed was the one who I chose wothout the 100% backing of the CFO. He liked him much more after the interview, we both did somewhat because he reminded us of Wally Cox, and I initially liked him because of the 400 plus resumes, he was the only one who said he can operate a cah register, computer, telephone and a calculator. The CFO passed away a few years later but he said that was so simple only an idiot would overlook such great qualifications of a CFO. Wally as an excellent man for the job and our owner thought he was brilliant to have make a salesman and CFO make a decision like that. Wally man is still doing that for an even larger company and I see him often at Pittsburgh Pirate games(I go to at least 30 a year) and we greet each other with a ‘ca-ching”….KEEP IT SIMPLE