With national unemployment moving higher each passing month, candidates encounter significant competition for jobs. No matter what career field you are (or were) working in, there is undoubtedly knowledge and skill you possess that could appeal across many industries and fields. Do not limit yourself. Identify those skills and look for them at potential future employers. Following is a list of skill areas having broad application: (more…)
Archive for the ‘resumes’ Category
Identify Your Transferable Skills
Thursday, July 9th, 2009Your Resume Leadership Advantage
Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009Picture this:
You are tasked with interviewing new college graduates for work in a “fast-track” manager training program. The job requires participants to work in each functional area of the company then be assigned to a position in operations. Most candidates are the “cream of the crop” with impressive academic credentials from top business schools. Each of them spent time abroad studying or traveling. They have excellent grades, a fine resume, speak intelligently, and present themselves with aplomb.
But one of the candidates is different from the others. He had “B” –level grades in college, went to a well-known but smaller university, and was employed full-time as a parking lot supervisor for a downtown professional sports stadium while attending school. He worked many nights and weekends, and had responsibility for hiring/managing as many as sixty people. On the strength of the information in this true story, should he be considered for the job?
Education Is Good, But What About Experience? (more…)
Finding the Best Professional Resume Writer
Wednesday, June 17th, 2009Job candidates in this economic recession are frequently turning to professional writers to create resumes that will attract the attention of employers. In today’s labor market, a good resume should help you land the right interview, for the right job, to start work sooner rather than later. With selected industries experiencing major shake-ups, like automotive, financial services, banking, real estate, and others, many people are finding job search time required to find a new position is much longer than in recent years. So why consider a professionally written resume? (more…)
12 Best Practices for a Winning Cover Letter – Part 1
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009The cover letter is often an afterthought. A job candidate sees an ad in the paper or online and scrambles to get a resume in the organization’s possession. The cover letter sometimes is a hastily written, patchy communication that is little more than a hand-off of resume.
This is far removed from the objective that cover letters should achieve. A well-written cover letter introduces you, prompts the reader to want to know more about you, and establishes your credentials. A good cover letter partners nicely with your resume and a strong networking process. Following is a list of the first six best practices that your cover letter must and/or in some cases must not reflect. (more…)