New Year's Promise: A New Resume is a New You

As you may know, a small part of my consulting practice involves helping people update and improve their resumes. I don't know why, but this is my one, God-given skills. It has always come easily to me and I was good at it right from the start. I'm familiar with the major publications that address job searches and resume writing including Martin Yate's extraordinary book, Knock 'Em Dead and Richard Bolles classic, What Color is Your Parachute? While I learned from both of these books, a lot of my resume writing techniques stem from my own perspective on resume writing, a perspective that is based on my common sense, my understanding of human nature, and my belief that the entire resume is actually a portrait of somebody's life. So, what are my rules for effective resume writing? Below, I'll share with you the rules that strike me as most important. If there is interest, I can share some of the finer points later on.

Pay Attention to the Employer's Unstated Fears

First, you need to think about the real - often unstated - needs of the potential employer. Although they may request that applicants demonstrate a specific set of observable skills, the employers are looking for more than just a list of skills. Above all, they are looking for someone who is manageable, focused, and a problem-solver. They would like to be assured that you will reduce stresses at the office, not increase them. Accordingly, you can present this image through details included in the resume such as cutting out extraneous details, deleting anything which might make you appear odd or eccentric, and playing up contributions where you soothed hurt feelings, created happier customers and led effective teams. Unfortunately, one error that hints at something problematic can be enough to sink your job prospects. Since I occasionally work with the chronically unemployed, I have often experienced positive results by only making minor changes which eliminated obvious red flags in the client's resume. I worked with one fellow who had been unemployed for two weeks. After I took the killer passages out of his resume, he landed a new job in less than a week.

Repackage Yourself to Fit Into the New Job

Second, your resume should reflect the skills you will use in your new job, not the skills you have polished up in your existing job. One of my secrets of success is to collect copies of successful resumes for high level corporate or academic employees including presidents, vice-presidents, treasurers, and so on. From these resumes you will get a much better look at the no nonsense attributes of a winning resume. If you are going for a higher level job, you need to be aware of the skill sets needed in that higher level job including negotiation skills, supervisory skills, public relations skills, financial accounting skills, and strategic planning. Even if you have not held a higher level job, you can still hint at your ability to handle a higher level of responsibility by showing where you have accomplished similar work at your current job. For example, maybe you have made your living as a salesman. You can still set yourself up for a higher level position by stressing moments where you mentored or supervised your fellow sales staff, by highlighting the moments when you participated in effective marketing efforts, or by reminding the reader of your ability to handle yourself well in tense, high-stake situations.

Paint a Picture of Your Happy, Successful Life

Finally, I always view the resume as a quick portrait of a person's whole life. The resume is useful in this regard because its list of previous employers is a no bullshit review of the skills that other people have been willing to buy from you. You may say you are a brilliant intellectual, but if no one has bought one of your published books, then you are just a pretender. Accordingly, I like to tweak the client's resume to show that they have gained and improved their skills over time. This means showing that they supervised more people or higher quality people at each stage of their career. I like to show that they handled bigger deals over time, larger accounts, and took on ever larger territories. If the person has made mistakes, then I like to put the best possible spin on the matter. If you failed at your business, then you might be a great addition to a new person's team if you present yourself as a humbled adult who now understands they work best in the company of others.

If you would like more information about my resume writing services, please click on the link below.

Dr. Drew's Resume Writing Services

In my experience, revised resumes are almost always essential to successful grant application too. This is because people give money to people. Accordingly, in your grant proposal you should strive to present your people's resumes along the same lines as I have communicated above.