Is Your Resume Interview Worthy?

The increasing competitiveness of today’s job market now requires a job seeker to be far more assertive in their overall job search, particularly when it comes to developing their career-marketing document – the résumé.

With a window of opportunity often as little as 10 seconds for the résumé to spark the reader’s attention, this demands a well-written document that outlines the candidate’s expertise and overall value offered. Gone are the days of a tasked-based résumé with an inventory of a position’s responsibilities, coupled with a standard list of personal aptitudes. This has been replaced with a results driven document that highlights solid results through examples of achievements and contributions for which you were responsible.

Your résumé is your initial handshake so must be developed carefully and strategically in order to demonstrate your ability to fulfill the company’s requirements while building interest in the benefits and value you bring to the organization.

So what strategies can be followed to create a professional marketing document that promotes your overall value and that demands an invitation to interview?

Here are some tips to inspire your writing:

- Replace the career objective [which concentrates on what you want] with a career profile that summarizes your expertise. Your profile could also include a few accomplishment highlights which are bound to impress the reader as it concentrates on what you can deliver for them, rather than on what you want.

- Incorporate industry-related key words as well as action words that will grab the reader’s attention. For instance:

“Orchestrated, devised, instructed, spearheaded, maximised, led, directed, streamlined, oversaw, managed, motivated, controlled, delegated, consolidated, generated, implemented, proposed, specified” … and the list goes on.

- Identify challenges you overcame; the action or solution you undertook to alleviate the challenge; and the (quantifiable) result, and script this into a powerfully written statement. For instance:

Challenge: Staff turnover high, performance levels extremely poor, with overall costs to recruit and train new staff high.

Action: Developed staff monitoring and incentive programs; implemented staff training programs.

Result: Increased staff knowledge base; decreased staff turnover by 66.7%; increased staff morale and collaboration; increased productivity levels by 77%.

Then by incorporating a number of action words, the above can be written as:

Enhanced staff morale; optimised productivity by 77%; and reduced staff turnover by 66.7% through implementation of strategic monitoring and incentive programs.

Notice the deliberate placement of the quantifiable results at the front of the statement, followed by the method by which this accomplishment was obtained.

- Ensure your document is consistent in its formatting; if you bold a position title, bold all job titles throughout your document. Make certain your overall document is well structured (plenty of white space), and aesthetically pleasing (professional headings and layout).

- Refrain from providing details of every single position you have ever had. As a guide, generally the last 10 years is appropriate (if the position being applied for is relevant to what you have been doing), with a maximum of about 15 years.

- For far greater impact when identifying your professional experience, create a strategically written paragraph outlining your main accountabilities (remembering to incorporate attention grabbing action words), followed by a bulleted list of achievements.

Here is an example of a recent graduate’s impressive achievement gained through the part-time job she held while completing her studies:

COMPANY NAME, Suburb 2009-Current
Sales Assistant (Second in Charge)

Pivotal leadership role in one of the 10 busiest stores in the chain, using strong staff management and sales talent to continually exceed competitive sales budgets. Ensure professionalism and quality service is extended to a diverse and continually expanding client base.

Notable Achievements:
~ Outstripped sales budget by 285% with many products selling out following relocation of stock to prominent store positioning and through developing eye-catching displays to capture and elicit client spend.

- Lastly, edit, edit, and edit again. Then ask a family member or friend to read through the document to ensure your career-marketing document is error free.

This week’s show on CareerCommuniqueRadio.com features a number of special guests covering the topic of resumes. To listen in live go to: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/careercommunique/2009/07/26/Digital-Resume-Databases-and-Resume-Blasting-Services-Whats-in-it-for-Job-Seekers

Author:

Annemarie Cross is a Radio Host of CareerCommuniqueRadio.com, Career Coach, Personal Branding Strategist, a triple certified multi award-winning Professional Resume Writer and Author of ’10 key steps to Ace that Interview’.

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