Posts tagged: Resume format

Showing Your Experience On a Resume

Question: What is the best way to show forty years of experience on a resume and still keep the length to two pages?

I recommend showing in chronological order your last ten to fifteen years of experience. For experiences prior to that simply list your companies, job titles and dates. For most candidates their most recent experiences are what recruiters and hiring managers are interested in. Let’s face it your experiences forty years ago should not be all that relevant. I hope in that forty year time frame you have grown. You should question whether this is the right position for you if the company’s decision is based on what you did forty years ago, when compared with the last fifteen years.

There are exceptions to this, if you believe some experience forty years ago is important to the new role, I recommend expanding that relevant experience in your resume.

To download the free chapter on Conducting an Effective Phone Interview from our book “This Is NOT The Position I Accepted” CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resources link.

How effective is your job search?  If you are not sure, download our free 8 Matrix Job Search Self-Assessment Scorecard. CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resources link.

I welcome your thoughts and comments.

Brad Remillard

Four Things Candidates Do To Shoot Themselves In The Foot While Conducting A Job Search

As the job market begins to pick up, more opportunities for candidates will arise. For those candidates who have been looking for some time this may be your chance to land the job you really want. Here are the four things that I find that candidates continually do to mess up a good opportunity:

1)    Conducting your search the same way you did it the last time. Candidates  seem to think this is 2006 or 2007 and all they have to do is the same things they did back then to find a job. WRONG. It’s not only 2012, but the market and the tools are completely different than they were back then. Candidates need to come up to speed quickly. It is not unusual for me to meet candidates that wasted the first three months of their search.

To adapt to 2012 you must embrace social media. You must become an expert on LinkedIn and then leverage this tool, with groups, updates, postings and connections. Instead of sitting in your pajamas searching the job boards you now should be leveraging LinkedIn.

2)    Resumes and cover letters are another problem area. A one size fits all resume will not cut it. Companies are seeking very specific skills and experiences that more often than not a generic resume doesn’t address. It is acceptable to use this generic resume to post on the job boards, but if you are targeting a company, responding to an ad or attempting to connect with a recruiter for a search, you must redo the resume so it targets the specific issues they are seeking like a laser beam.

A cover letter is not a resume. You cannot just write a nice cover letter with these updates and attach it to the generic resume. What will happen if your cover letter gets separated from the resume? Then what? Take the time to update your resume.

3)    Interviewing is much more than explaining your background. It is about connecting with the interviewer. For most interviews, you wouldn’t even be there if the interviewer didn’t believe you met the basic skills and experience. So rule number one is listen, hear and answer the question asked. Do it in a way that connects with the company’s culture and the interviewer. For example, if your background is in very large companies and you are interviewing at a small company, constantly emphasizing how you managed a large staff and had a budget that was more than the sales of the company, is probably the best way to communicate that you need a large staff and a lot of resources to be effective. This is something a small company doesn’t have. You made the fatal error of not adapting your experience to the company. Think about your audience and what they want and need.

4)    Networking too often burns people out because they aren’t focused on the purpose of networking. Over the years people, especially candidates, have come to believe that networking is all about meeting a lot of people. Get a lot of first level contacts on LinkedIn. The one with the most contacts wins. Nonsense. Networking is about the right contacts not the number of contacts. The one that has the ability to take a contact and turn it into a connection generally wins. It is far better to have one hundred strong connections, than it is to have 1,000 contacts that don’t know you and forget you within twenty-four hours of meeting them.

Stop going to every networking meeting in Orange County. Instead, target three or four that really make sense for you. I suggest one in your functional area, one in your industry, one at a peer level, and one with the types of advisors that connect with the people who will hire you. Build strong relationships with the members of these four groups and it will do more good than running to all the other networking groups.

To download the free chapter on Conducting an Effective Phone Interview from our book “This Is NOT The Position I Accepted” CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resources link.

How effective is your job search?  If you are not sure, download our free 8 Matrix Job Search Self-Assessment Scorecard. CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resources link.

I welcome your thoughts and comments.

Brad Remillard

Is Your Resume Too Long?

Q. Is it acceptable to have a resume longer than two pages?

With rare exception two pages is still the generally accepted maximum length. I have helped thousands with their resume and I can’t think of a time when we couldn’t fit all of the relevant information on two pages.

Remember, the purpose of a resume is to demonstrate to the reader that your experience and background aligns with the position. It isn’t an autobiography. It doesn’t have to include everything you have done in 25 years. It is a summary, usually in a bullet point format. All a resume really needs is the right information necessary to get an interview. It isn’t designed to get a job.

Generally, your experience from 20 years ago or more is no longer critical. If it is one might wonder if it is the right job in the first place. So I recommend summarizing this by simply indicating the name of the company, your position title and the years you worked there.  Save the space to make sure that you list the important accomplishments that align with the company’s needs and will catch the reader’s eye.

I find that if more candidates would customize their resumes to the needs of the position they would get more interviews. Too often candidates make a one size fits all generic resume. Instead of a long resume covering every aspect of your career consider having a two page resume that is specific to the position. This might require more than one resume, but as long as everything is honest there is nothing wrong with this.

To download the free chapter on Conducting an Effective Phone Interview from our book “This Is NOT The Position I Accepted” CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resources link.

If you would like to know if your job search is fully utilized and you are doing the right things, download our free 8 Matrix Job Search Self-Assessment Scorecard. CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resource link.

I welcome your thoughts and comments.

Brad Remillard

Resumes Miss The Most Important Keywords

Q. Are keywords on a resume as critical as everyone claims? I know the job boards use them, but  I have had a lot of different experiences so I’m not sure what keywords I should be using.

There is no doubt that keywords on a resume play an important role for the job boards and for companies with sophisticated resume tracking systems. Too often candidates focus their keywords exclusively for the electronic system scanning their resume and completely miss the most important scanner – the human scanner.

The vast majority of companies don’t have sophisticated resume scanning software. As resumes come in the door they are reviewed by a person. So from a candidate’s perspective the question should be, “Do I have the keywords that will stand out and catch the eye of the reader?” Often the person scanning or reading your resume has certain words or terms they are looking for on the resume. So your resume has to have these keywords properly positioned so the reader’s eye catches them. It is little help having a bunch of keywords for the computer to catch if they aren’t the correct words the human scanner is seeking.

In your specific case, since you have had a lot of different experiences this becomes even more important, as the wrong set of keywords could rule you out. So it is important for you that when you send in a resume, especially to a small to mid-size company, to think about the keywords and terms the human will want to see as they read your resume and make sure those words are positioned to catch their eye.

To download the free chapter on Conducting an Effective Phone Interview from our book “This Is NOT The Position I Accepted” CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resources link.

If you would like to know if your job search is fully utilized and you are doing the right things, download our free 8 Matrix Job Search Self-Assessment Scorecard. CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resource link.

I welcome your thoughts and comments.

Brad Remillard

How to show 40 years experience on a two page resume

These questions are from readers of my weekly column in the Orange County Register. It appears every Tuesday in the business section and on-line at www.ocregister.com

Q. What is the best way to show 40 years of experience on a résumé and still keep the length to two pages?

A. I recommend showing in chronological order your last 10 to 15 years of experience. For experience before that, simply list your companies, job titles and dates. For most candidates, their most recent experience is what recruiters and hiring managers are interested in.

Let’s face it: Your experience 40 years ago should not be all that relevant. I hope in that 40-year time frame you have grown. You should question whether this is the right position for you if the company’s decision is based on what you did 40 years ago, when compared with the last 15 years.

There are exceptions to this. If you believe some experience 40 years ago is important to the new role, I recommend expanding that relevant experience in your résumé.

Q.  Most of my career is in financial services. I want to get out of that industry and into health care. What is the best way to make this transition?

A. Making an industry change in this economy is difficult, unless you have one of those jobs in which the skills required are not industry-specific, meaning your skills and training are easily transferable to another industry. The issue you have to overcome is your competition for an opening will probably include people in the health care industry. Most companies will look at those with industry experience first.

The best way to make an industry change is through networking. You need to build relationships with people in the industry. To do this, consider attending professional associations, joining networking groups in health care, attending trade shows or conferences and connecting with health care people in your local area via LinkedIn. As they get to know you, they will be able to determine how your strengths outside the health care industry can apply to the problems they need solved in their company. Recruiters and submitting résumés via ads are long shots.

There are some barriers you should think about overcoming when changing industries, assuming your skills are not easily transferable. The first one is compensation. Chances are you are more valuable in the financial services industry than health care. Therefore, the position will probably be at a lower level and so will the compensation. Secondly, some additional training and education may be required.

I welcome your thoughts and comments. If this was helpful please forward to your network and connections on LinkedIn or facebook.

Brad Remillard

Why The Last Seven Resumes I Reviewed Failed

Sometimes I just don’t understand what candidates do or don’t do. This is frustrating because so many times I’ve heard from candidates, “I already know that.”  The problem is that candidates think they know it, but in reality either don’t know it or just don’t do it.

Let’s take the example of resumes. Not necessarily my favorite topic, but one that is important. I often review resumes for candidates and I do this strictly from a recruiter’s perspective. Most of the resumes I review are for senior-level executives, many with graduate degrees. I am so often amazed that these senior-level executives expect to be hired, especially in this economy, when they can’t even put together a resume without errors.  Why in the world would a CEO or president expect them to put together a board presentation? The CEO or president would be completely embarrassed.

The following are some common mistakes that I see on a fairly regular basis. I know you don’t need to read these, because these would never happen to you, so consider reading them for all of the other people that need help.

1) Spelling errors. I’m not referring to the obvious ones that a spell checker picks up. I mean the ones a spell checker doesn’t pick up and require proofreading by someone else. Words such as grow not grown, its or it’s, to or too, you’re instead of  your, using the instead of that, using and instead of or, and finally, a lot is two words.

2) Grammar, punctuation or formatting errors. Common problems are overuse of commas, no periods at the end of sentences, capitalizing some words and not others, capitalizing too many words, inconsistent format, phrases that just end, mixing plural verbs with a singular subject, and punctuation marks should go inside quotes and outside parentheses.

3) Incorrect use of words. Neither and nor, either and or, accept and except, lose and loose, a and an, are some mistakes I commonly find.

As a recruiter, I would be embarrassed to present these resumes to a client. What does this say about the executive if they can’t put together a resume without common errors? Don’t they have these proofed? What kind of presentation would they make, what would their reports look like, and how many errors would be in a white paper? One has to ask themselves these questions when reviewing a resume with these types of errors.

I am by no means an English major, and I sure have made many mistakes writing articles. I know this because people seem to get pleasure out of pointing out my mistakes. I have learned a lot from these comments. However, a blog article is not a resume. There is a big difference in the two. If I were submitting this article to Fortune or the WSJ, I would pay to have it professionally edited.  Like it or not, a resume has to be perfect. That is the standard. I didn’t set the standard, I just live by it and you should too.

    Please help yourself. Take the time to have others proof your resume. Invest in a professional to edit it. Don’t DOUBLE check your resume, TRIPLE check it, and then check it one more time just to be sure.

    Remember the golden rule, when in doubt check it out. Here is an excellent site to use to check http://www.grammarbook.com/english_rules.asp

    Since all of the people reading this article never make these mistakes, one has to wonder (not wander) why I wrote the article.

    One final point, these same principles apply to cover and thank you letters.

    I hope this helps all of those other people that make these mistakes.

    I welcome your thoughts and comments, even those that will surely point out errors in this article.

    If this was helpful to you, please help others by posting it to your LinkedIn groups, Facebook page or Twitter.

    To download the free chapter on Conducting an Effective Phone Interview from our book “This Is NOT The Position I Accepted” CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resources link.

    If you would like to know if your job search is fully utilized and you are doing the right things, download our free Job Search Self- Assessment Scorecard. CLICK HERE and then click on the Free Search Resource link.

     

    Brad Remillard

    You Passed The 10 Second Screen. You May Still NOT Get A Call. WHY?

    After the storm of controversy I created with the article, “How Recruiters Read Resumes In 10 Seconds or Less” (Click here if you haven’t read it), I thought it would be appropriate to follow up with what candidates, that pass the 10 second screen, can do to get a call from a recruiter.

    Whether you like recruiters or  hate them, they are a necessary part of the equation in a job search. Some will fight the system, while others will embrace it. My only goal is to help educate candidates that want to understand how recruiters work. I do this to help candidates, not hinder them. I believe the more information you have about how we work the better it is for you.  Together we can then help each other.

    Recently I calculated approximately how many resumes I have reviewed in 30 years as an executive recruiter. It is close to, and probably exceeds, 1 million. That is a whole lot of resumes. That number scared me. After 30 years of doing anything, one should get a feel for what works and what doesn’t.

    So before you send me a nasty comment, I’m going to take the position that I’m as good at what I do after 30 years, as you are at what you do after 20 years.

    By doing the following and including these few things on your resume, I believe you can dramatically increase your response rate.

    1) NEVER use a functional resume. PERIOD. Before you come up with reasons to justify it, the key word in the sentence is NEVER.  I have never, ever met a recruiter that reads them. In addition, I very rarely have talked to a hiring manager, CEO or HR person that reads them. Why fight this battle? Even if 10% read them, that means 90% don’t. Which side of that equation do you want to be on? Considering that 100% read chronological resumes, you don’t want to fight this one. Join the 100% club and use a chronological resume.

    2) The format is not as important as the content in the resume. My experience with speaking with candidates is that they spend a lot of time on the format; what should go on top, where should I put the education, do I need an objective, how long should the summary be, etc.  Spend more time making sure the content communicates to the reader what they think is important. I have yet to meet anyone, who told me, “I sure like all of their experience. They are really qualified, but they put their education in the wrong spot on their resume, so they are out.” The article, “Resumes Are About Substance Over Form” gives a lot of good information on this topic. CLICK HERE to read it.

    3) Help us help you. All recruiters need to know certain things to make a decision to call you. The very basics include:

    a) Some information on the companies you have worked for such as, size, number of locations, industry and products. This can be done in one sentence or less. Just the name of an unknown company is worthless when screening. You want to stand out from the rest.

    b) If you are in management, a little about your organization such as, number of people you manage, are any of them managers, titles, and are they all in the same location.

    c) If you are in sales, who are your customers? If not by name, at least what industries you call on, are you selling B2B or B2C, product description, territory size, and average size of the sale. I am constantly amazed that most sales people exclude this information. As a salesperson what you are selling is pretty darn important for the reader to know.

    d) For technical people, what technologies are you working with? What language are you programming? If in engineering, is it a highly custom engineered part, are you working on a system or a component, are you designing nuts and bolts or toys? Seems important to me.

    d) Include quantifiable results in the accomplishments. If you don’t, these are meaningless and most other resumes will read the same as yours.

    The first comment I get from candidates when I suggest these things is, “My resume will be too long.” No, it won’t. I have prepared thousands of resumes and I can get all of this on two pages. In fact, in our book, “This Is NOT The Position I Accepted” (CLICK HERE to review)  there is an example of a two page resume that contains all of this information. The person has over 20 years experience, so it is very doable.

    Getting in the “A” pile is your responsibility, not the reader’s.

    I wish more candidates would help us help them. All you have to do is give us the information we need to call you.

    Contrary to what you may think, recruiters want to fill the position just as badly as you want the position.

    For a FREE example of a cover letter CLICK HERE.

    For a FREE example of a Thank You letter CLICK HERE.

    For many more FREE resources and articles, join our Job Search Networking Group on LinkedIn. 4,300 people have done this. CLICK HERE to join.

    I welcome your comments and thoughts.

    Brad

     

     

    2 Types Of Resume Key Word Searches You Must Get Past

    There are two types of resume key word searches. It is my opinion after having spoken with hundreds or maybe thousands of candidates that the vast majority focus on the wrong type. The result  is they rarely get a call back.

    The two types of resume key word searches are (starting with in my opinion the least important):

    1) The automated key word search. The most commonly thought of when most people think of key word searches. It is used by resume management systems. This is the type used by most job boards like Monster and Careerbuilder.

    Although these play an important role, for the most part they play a much smaller role than most think. Granted for those screening resumes using the resume databases on one of the job boards, the key word search is important. But how many hiring managers, HR execs, CEOs actually spend a lot of time doing this? I have asked hundreds of these and very few claim they even use the resume databases. They are just too expensive. Most just run an ad and wait for the responses. Third party recruiters  and those companies that can afford on-site recruiters will spend time searching the databases, however, this is a small percentage.

    The majority of  hiring is not done by large or Fortune 500 companies. Iit is done by the mid and small size companies.  The fact is most mid and small size companies can’t afford a sophisticated resume management system. This  then eliminates the importance of the automated key word search in the vast majority of hiring.

    It is for this reason, coupled with the fact that most hiring managers don’t spend hours sorting resumes on the job boards, that I believe this is the least important of the two.

    The hands down most important resume key word search is done 100% of the time by every CEO, HR person, hiring manager or recruiter. This is why it is so important. Yet, most candidates show complete surprise when in our coaching session I mention it.

    2) The human eye key word search. This  is done with the eyes of the person scanning your resume. That person is looking for key words or phrases to jump off the page. They want their eyes to latch on to these as they move down the page. Most have trained their eyes to be on the lookout for these key words.

    This is the key word search candidates should focus on. Yet so many candidates have a generic, one-size-fits-all resume that the key words are either missing,  buried so deep in a paragraph or are mentioned only once on page two of the resume, the key words or phrases are never noticed.

    Here are a few suggestions to get past the human eye key word search.

    Do you:

    1) have the key words or phrases embedded multiple times in the body of the resume. Not just at the top of your resume.

    2) have quantifiable results associated with your accomplishments. Don’t write out numbers. Actual numbers stand out more to the eye.

    3) have the key words or phrases listed under multiple positions or companies.

    4) have these words or phrases at the beginning of  the sentence or bullet point so the eye catches them. We read left to right. Don’t bury them in a long paragraph where it is hard for the eye to catch.

    5) have them aligned with the advertisement or job description.

    6) have them listed in your cover letter. You can download a sample cover letter for free that will show you how to do this. CLICK HERE to download.

    7) have them re-enforced in your thank you letter. You can download for free a sample thank you letter that will show you how to do this. CLICK HERE to get yours.

    These are just a few things you can do to get past the most important key word search – the person reading your resume.

    In summary, if you do all the things necessary to get past the human key word search, I firmly believe you will by default have the proper  key words to get past the automated search.

    For more information on building a resume that will get noticed and get you the call back, take a look at our job search workbook. It provides solutions to the most common mistakes candidates make during a job search.   Like this one. We will send it to you for just the cost of shipping ($5 USA only). CLICK HERE to learn more.

    Join our Linkedin Job Search Networking group. Over 4200 people have. There is a wealth of articles and other resources for you in this group. CLICK HERE to join.

    I welcome your thoughts and comments.

    Brad Remillard


    How to Get the Interview and Not Get “Deleted”

    This is about your “digital first impression” and six ways to screw it up. Every recruiter has his pet peeves about resumes and I’m no exception. Like it or not, in this digital, email, on-line world, your first impression as a candidate is often the resume and cover letter you send. (OK, I admit, I don’t read cover letters much. I cut to the resume first. Sometimes I come back and read them, but the resume is what I’m interested in.)

    I’m not going to write about all the strategies and methods of creating a resume and cover letter, I’m just going to tell you the things that will irk most recruiters (or at least this one) so you should avoid them. In no particular order:

    • Size matters: Look at the whole first page of your resume. Would you want to read it or does it look like the fine print on your credit card statement? Don’t cram so much information into it or make the type font so small that people will strain their eyes to read it. I know, we can enlarge it, but it just shows you aren’t thinking about your reader.

    • I won’t believe you can walk on water: A summary of your experience in terms of function, industry and accomplishments is fine, but skip the flowery descriptions. I see “hands-on”, “profit driven”, “strong leader”, “dynamic”, “visionary” in summaries all the time. I don’t read them because I know the candidate wrote them. I’ll decide how “dynamic” someone is when I interview them, not when I read their resume. Save the space for more accomplishments.

    • Attendance doesn’t count: Companies don’t pay you just to do things; they pay you to accomplish things. Resumes that are long on responsibilities and short on accomplishments indicate someone who just ‘showed up’ and are not the top quartile talent that companies are looking for.

    • Osmosis is not my strong suit: Probably the best way to get your resume tossed is to list the name of a company with no description of what it does. This is especially true of middle market companies. (Even if a company is a household name, include what your division, group, etc does!) The reader has no context from which to assess your accomplishments until they know what the company does and its relative size. I automatically toss these resumes. How can you present an executive to a client if they don’t demonstrate this simple piece of common sense?

    • Chronological or functional? No contest here in my book, make it chronological. I want to know what you accomplished and where. If you just list a bunch of accomplishments and a list of jobs, I can’t tell where you did what. You may have the exact accomplishment I’m looking for, but if you’ve worked in different industries or different sized companies, I can’t tell how relevant the experience is.

    • Goldilocks syndrome: Resumes can be too short or too long, and there is a “just right” length. In general, I find one page resumes to be too short to be meaningful, and they don’t “peak my interest”. I don’t want to ask you for more information. Give me what I need to assess your background against my requirements. Three page resumes or more are usually too long. There’s either too much detail or you’ve gone back beyond 10-15 years in your career. Put those older jobs under Prior Experience. The last 10 to 15 years of experience is usually the most relevant to what we’re looking for.

    OK, I got that off my chest. These tips aren’t going to guarantee you get the job, but they should help keep you from being eliminated before the game starts.

    When you land that next job, and start to build your team, check your hiring process first.

    For more, join our LinkedIn Job Search Networking Group. CLICK HERE to join.

    View our 5 minute video, Vital Information Missing From Many Resumes. CLICK HERE to view.

    Download a FREE sample cover letter to go with a great resume. CLICK HERE to download.

    For information on how to arrange for Hagerthy & Co’s complimentary Hiring Process Assessment go to www.hagnco.com/page13.html#HiringProcess.  Mike Hagerthy is the founder of Hagerthy & Co, an executive search, training and consulting firm.

    Vital Information Is Missing From So Many Resumes

    I receive hundreds of resumes daily from candidates in relationship to the searches we have underway. So many of these candidates actually believe they are qualified for the position. Many may in fact be qualified, however, many of these candidates will never get a call from me because basic vital information is missing from their resume.

    I’m not talking about the content of their specific jobs, the accomplishments, or the activities they performed, I’m talking about the basic information the recruiter needs to decide if this candidate meets the minimum requirements for the position.

    For example, I recently tested this theory. I sent out an email to my database regarding a search I was conducting. The total email was maybe 6 sentences. I kept it short so that the things I was looking for would stand out in the email. In the email I mentioned 6 times the words “outsourcing manufacturing,” 7 times I mentioned, “contract manufacturing,”  and 4 times I said, “must have industrial manufacturing.” Given all that in just 6 sentences, what do you think I’m looking for on your resume?

    Not in your cover letter, not in a follow up email, not on the phone interview, but on your resume, so I will pick up the phone and call you.

    For those with an immediate grasp of the obvious you answered, contract manufacturing, outsourcing, and industrial manufacturing experience. Right answer.

    How many of the 188 responses I received do you think took the time to include this vital information on their resume? Note that the vast majority, either in their cover letter or reply via email to me, mentioned how perfect they were for this position. If you answered 2 you scored 100% again. Go to the head of the class.

    This is so important that I put together a short 5 minute video for you to watch that gives you the details on what basic vital information you need to include on your resume. CLICK HERE to watch this video.

    I hope this short video will  help you as you put your resume together. Making sure this information is on your resume will help ensure recruiters and hiring managers don’t put your resume in the trash because it is missing important information.

    For more information on resumes, interviewing, and job search help join our LindedIn Job Search Networking Group. Over 3,500 people participate with great articles and discussions. CLICK HERE to join.

    To help with your resume, download a free sample cover letter specifically designed to align your resume with the company needs. CLICK HERE to download.

    If this was helpful to you, please forward it to your network, mention it on LinkedIn or Facebook so that others can also benefit. Everybody needs to help out in these tough times. Please help others.

    I welcome your thoughts, questions and comments.

    Brad