blueskyresumesblog

Beating the Computerized Systems

A reader writes:

I recently bought your book and reworked my resume per your excellent suggestions.  I thought all of your advice was spot on.  Here's my question: I submitted my resume thru a design firms web portal for the position of Director - Client Partner. (Known in my parlance as Account Management)  I was shocked to see that my resume didn't match with that position...instead it got a score of 609 as a match to Jr. Creative Director.  I'm quite sure an actual human would see that 90% of my resume matches with the job description in the listing. 

With so many sites running some program before a human being will look at your resume (Itzbig is prime example), I'm flummoxed.  Should I take exact words from the listing so I get higher match scores, or should I just not worry about it too much?  I'm in a smaller market (Austin), but if the computer program is not matching my actual skills and experience, what can I do to get a higher matching score?

This is really a two-part answer. The first is YES! If the company is using a computerized screening system, then that system can only screen resumes in one of two ways. It will either ask you a series of questions which are designed to screen out non-qualified candidates OR it will scan your resume for keywords to see whether you match the position.

Therefore, it's critical to include the keywords from the job description in your resume. Don't just add a section for keywords - this will annoy the humans who eventually see your resume. Instead, scatter them throughout the document as part of the resume text.

One important caveat: Do not say anything that's not true. If you don't match the qualifications, the job isn't for you.

The second part of my answer is that, wherever possible, you must do more than simply submit your resume to the computer system and wait to hear back. These systems are just not a reliable way of finding the best candidate. (What they are is a time saver for harried HR departments.)

So, submit your keyword-filled resume, and the start doing some research to find out how you can reach a real person at that company. Try to find managers in the department you're applying to. Start with a site like LinkedIn. you'll have to be a member to contact people, but the site allows you to search by company name and then use your own network to make contact with the employees you find there.

You can also check the company's website and Google to find the names of staff members in the department you want to work in. They key is to find the name and email/mailing address of a real person and then submit your resume to that person with an enthusiastic cover letter explaining that you are so excited about the opportunity, you didn't want to leave anything to chance.

By employing both these strategies, you will greatly increase your chances of success.

To Thine Own Self Be True

We’ve all heard that phrase a thousand times and we know all that it’s good life advice, and yet, when it comes to marketing ourselves, it’s often a lesson that we forget.

I can’t tell you how many senior executive resumes sound exactly alike. Filled with words like ‘results-focused leader’ and “high-energy executive” - everyone is “dynamic” and ‘proven’ and ‘experienced.’  After reading the same thing 30 times, everyone starts to blur together.

Which is really crazy! Because you are totally unique. You have something that no other candidate has. You will add value in a different way. And yet I am willing to bet that your resume doesn’t express  that unique value.

I speak from experience, because for years, I didn’t know how to express my value either. When I first started my resume writing business, I wasn’t sure who my target audience was and why they should choose my company. As the business grew, I started to figure out my unique value (I have prior HR and recruiting experience, which means I know how to get the attention of HR and recruiters). As I figured this out, my marketing messages became clearer. But I still knew I wasn’t getting to the bottom of what made my business different. And very recently, I was hit over the head with the realization that we have a very obvious selling point – we’ve had it all along but I just took it for granted.

It happened this way. One day, I received a request for proposal from a person in the UK. We don’t write resumes for the UK because frankly I have no idea what works there, so I wrote back to the person and politely declined the project. The same day, I also declined a project from a teacher because no one on my staff has expertise in writing resumes for teachers. The next morning, I had emails from both potential clients thanking me for my honesty and for not just taking their money regardless of whether I could provide excellent results.

And it hit me that we do that all the time – we only take on clients I know we can help. On the rare occasions that we misjudge and don’t get results, we refund money.  Our whole business is built around trust – trust that our resumes get results, and trust that we will treat people fairly. And our resume writing process is also base on honesty – we don’t ‘sell’ what people are not – we help them communicate their authentic unique value.  And yet our branding has never reflected that – at least not as a conscious effort. It should!

If you’re like me, you see other people much more clearly than you see yourself. So when it comes to marketing yourself, you probably fall back on platitudes, or standard ideas of what a good executive does. And the resulting resume is probably flat and boring and not at all reflective of what makes you YOU.

Here are a couple of ways you can fix that right now.

1. Think back to compliments you’ve received from bosses, co-workers or clients. What do they say abut you? What words do they choose? Don’t get stuck on what YOU think ... in fact, forget that for now. Just focus on what other people say.

2. Looking back over your career, what themes keep re-emerging? Are you always the person brought in to tackle the most challenging problems? Or have you always found new ways to cut costs?

3. What is your management philosophy? Write it down – don’t worry about spelling or grammar or finding the perfect words – just write whatever comes into your head.

Reviewing all this information will help you determine the answer to the most important question of all: “what make you unique?”

Once you have that answer, you can rewrite your resume, you can prepare for interviews and you can create your ‘elevator pitch.’ All based not on what executives are ‘supposed to be like’ but on who you really are.

Half Right ... Half Wrong

Seth Godin is one of my favorite bloggers and but in this post about resumes, he's only 50% right.

Seth's looking for an intern and he doesn't like the resumes he's seeing. They're bland and boring and they don't tell him why these candidates are remarkable. Well, that means they're like 99.9% of all resumes out there (which is why people like me get paid to write the other 0.1%).

Seth goes on to say that he wants evidence of what makes a person remarkable.

If you don't have a resume, what do you have?

How about three extraordinary letters of recommendation from people the employer knows or respects?
Or a sophisticated project they can see or touch?
Or a reputation that precedes you?
Or a blog that is so compelling and insightful that they have no choice but to follow up?

Some say, "well, that's fine, but I don't have those."

Yeah, that's my point. If you don't have those, why do you think you are  remarkable, amazing or just plain spectacular? It sounds to me like if you don't have those, you've been brainwashed into acting like you're sort of ordinary.

I absolutely agree that those things are important - that's why I often include glowing LinkedIn testimonials when I write resumes. It's why I advocate for those clients who are good writers to start blogging. It's why I create only portfolios where people can show off their extraordinary work.

That's the 50% that's right.

But it's wrong to advocate for people to scrap the whole idea of a resume, just because the resumes they are writing are ineffective.  For better or worse, almost all hiring managers want to see a resume. Seth might not, but he's unusual and most people won't thank you for mailing in 3 reference letters and a blog URL when they asked for a resume. It'll just make you look like you're too stupid to follow instructions!

Instead, you should look for ways to communicate all those great things that make you special via your resume. You should include quotes from former managers (or peers or employees or clients). You should post the link to your blog and/or Squidoo page and/or web portfolio. You should focus the entire resume on showing how you have made an impact at former employers, how you've shaken things up, what you've contributed ... above all, how each company is different because you worked there.

It's not the resume that's the problem - it's what's on the resume that Seth doesn't like.

The Right Way to Use the Web

I often talk about the ways in which the Web is changing job search, but I don't think I've ever seen a better example than Tijs Vrolix, a Belgian web developer who is currently looking for work.

Tijs is asking site visitors to help him find a job by letting him know of any vacancies that might suit him. In exchange, he's awarding an iPod Shuffle to the person who ultimately helps him find a new job.

So instead of just relying on his own contacts, and on the jobs he finds himself, he now has hundreds of people searching on his behalf. And because his site is elegantly designed, he's also showcasing his web design skills at the same time.

This really is personal marketing at its very best and I hope it's inspiring to anyone who's frustrated with applying to online ads and rarely receiving a response. Take some time to brainstorm ways you could use the web for more than just posting a resume.

Don't Stand in the Doorways Don't Block up the Halls

Morgan Stanley's contest to choose an Intern (part of the "Ultimate Internship Contest") brings home just how much Youtube and sites like it have the potential to change job search.

Let's face it, a resume is a highly imperfect way for a company to choose whether you are the right candidate. A resume tells the employer more about your writing skills and ability to sell yourself than it does about your ability to do the job. So it's not surprising that companies and job seekers would explore other means of making a match.

Now Morgan Stanley, along with other major companies such as The Gap, Yahoo! and NBC, is running a contest to select an intern based on videos they submit. You can watch the videos here.

Now, I hate being filmed. I hate the way I look. I hate the way my voice sounds. I avoid cameras like the plague, sometimes trampling women and children to avoid having my picture taken, so my initial reaction to the idea of using videos for job applications goes something like this:

"It'll never work because video resumes will favor people who look and sound good on video, not necessarily people who are best for the job."

Sound familiar?

The Internet is changing everything (my mantra these days!) and video resumes are just an example of that. And there's never any point of standing in the way of change - it's inevitable that people will start to use video to communicate with potential employers.

That said, I think the question for you as a job seeker is whether video will work for you. Are you comfortable on camera? Can you be engaging or funny or thought-provoking? Can you impress other people with your presence? If so, why not incorporate video into your job search now? Sites like Youtube and Gofish make it possible for anyone to create a video message for potential employers.

If you're like me, and you're pretty sure that a video would be hurtful to your job search, don't go there! But take the video idea and run with it. How else can you leverage the new web 2.0 sites to improve your job search? Perhaps you could do something with Squidoo? Or MySpace? Perhaps you could use a photo site like Fickr to create an impressive slideshow that tells a story of your career.

The times they are definitely a' changin' and you can win if you figure out a way to capitalize on that change.

Great Example of Blogging for a Job

Kent Blumberg gets it.

Over on Career Hub I posted about the importance of blogging as a way of building a personal brand. Like all good bloggers, Kent knows the value of comments. He left one on my post and I went and checked out his blog.

Now just imagine that you are a recruiter or a senior company executive and you come upon Kent's page. What is your impression?  Mine was one of expertise. In what? In the areas of "leadership, strategy and performance." It says so right under his name!

The impression made by this blog is completely different from the impression made by a resume. One says I am an expert sharing my knowledge. The other says "I need a job."

Kent wrote this on Career Hub:

I've been blogging on leadership, strategy and performance since late May. Before I began, Google turned up only a few, relatively old references to me. Now, the great majority of results on the first couple of pages are links to one of my blog posts, or to comments I have made on other posts.

Better yet, my blog came up in a recent interview. One of the interviewers had googled me, and then read my blog and my comments on others' blogs. About half her questions were related to those links. Since I blog about areas that I believe are my strengths, it gave me a great chance to reinforce what makes me different.

Blogging also helps show that I am up-to-speed on the latest technology and not stuck in the old economy.

I don't know if Kent is actively job searching right now, but I do know that he's building a personal brand online that will ensure he is seen as a leader in his field. What better way to make sure you never have to send another resume again?

While I'm on this subject, on the Simply Hired blog, CM Russell lists 7 suggestions for blogger job seekers. They're all excellent, so check out his post.

The End of Resume Spin

The Internet has changed everything about marketing because it gives power to the consumer. The cable company can advertise their great service all day long, but one customer can ruin it all by posting a video on Youtube. Sites like Youtube, Flickr and MySpace, along with blogs and forums allow consumers to find the truth, so that it's no longer enough for Chase Manhattan to claim "the right relationship is everything" - they actually have to do the work of building the right relationship. (So far all evidence is that they don't mean what they say. It just sounded good in a marketing meeting.)

The same is happening in job search. You can say what you want on your beautifully presented, well-written resume - if a Web search of your name brings up damaging information, then you can kiss that great job goodbye. And what happens if you don't appear in a Web search? At all. Do you exist?

People are looking for you online - recruiters, HR Managers, potential business partners, new friends, new bosses, colleagues, clients, even people who don't like you very much! And the number of people using Web search to research other people is rapidly increasing every day.

The good news is that this shift helps the good guys. It rewards those who really are out there making a difference. If you take a leadership role in your industry or field, you will leave a trail on the Web. And this doesn't just apply to senior-level executives. I recently wrote a resume for a young guy who was looking to get into video game programming at the entry level. Although he didn't have direct work experience, he had lots of evidence of his passion in the form of articles he had written for web publications and volunteer work he was doing as an Internet forum moderator. Because of this, the Internet helped him to tell his story.

When I started my resume writing business, life was much easier. I knew that the resume I wrote would be the only information employers had about my client before the interviewed him. And after the interview they would call the references provided by the client, who of course would validate his story. Now, the resume and the references are just one piece of the puzzle, and as more and more recruiters move to online research, their importance will shrink.

If you are serious about your career - whether or not you are looking for work right now - this means that you MUST start building a positive Internet presence. Not by "spinning" (see: Manhattan, Chase), but by actually taking an active role in your field or industry. By writing a blog about your area of expertise. Or by joining an internet forum centered on your profession and then helping others who have questions. Or by writing articles for publication on industry websites. Or by maximizing your LinkedIn presence. Or by any number of other ways available to you because of the Internet.

Use any of them, use all of them, just don't let the opportunity pass you by.

Harry Joiner on LinkedIn

Harry Joiner tells you why you should be using LinkedIn and how to do it effectively.

Harry points out that one of LinkedIn's strongest features is the ability to collect testimonials from other people. The system doesn't allow you to manipulate testimonials, and because each quote is linked back to a real person who also has a LinkedIn profile, they have great credibility.

Are You LinkedIn?

Seth Godin's Alexaholic shows LinkedIn growing in popularity.

Seth is tracking traffic to the new generation of websites that allow people to collaborate, share contact and network online. Sites like youtube.com where people can share videos, MySpace, where they can share personal details, and Flickr where they can share pictures, are all part of this growing phenomenon which is sometimes termed Web 2.0, to denote the supposed next generation of the Internet.

LinkedIn went from 134th six months ago to 17th now. Pretty impressive. If you're not LinkedIn already, you should be!

A Change is Coming

I'm really enjoying Spherion's new blog and Don Boone's post about blogging caught my eye because he's writing about the same thing I've been thinking about for a while - the different ways in which technology is changing recruitment, and therefore job search. As Don says:

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that blogging may just change the very way we look for job seekers. I've never seen a tool with such potential power for candidates seeking career advancement and for recruiters to not only find qualified candidates, but learn more about them before ever speaking to them.

I agree, and it's not just blogs that are changing the way things work and opening up the possibilities for job seekers. I have been guest blogging recently on various recruitment blogs, and I've written several posts on where technology is taking us. I am fascinated by the impact of blogging, as well as sites such as MySpace, Squidoo and LinkedIn because this new transparency offers incredible opportunity (and also carries incredible risk). On Jim Stroud 2.0, I talked about the uncertainty all this brings for job seekers and people in my profession:

The first wave of job boards, which simply moved our existing processes onto the Internet, is already on the way out. We're at the very beginning of a huge sea change in the world of recruitment and HR management, and while those changes are being discussed on some blogs (like this one) and by some industry leaders, for the most part they're happening around us while we carry on the way we've always done things.

And on Job Syntax, I explained what I think all this means for job seekers:

I do think that the days of controlling your own image are disappearing fast. With all this information online, it’s just not going to be possible to neatly package and present yourself with a well-written resume or a nicely designed web portfolio. Because employers know they have access to unfiltered information about you, and they will assume that unfiltered information is more accurate than the pre-packaged stuff you gave them. In the end, more openness benefits one group of people – those who don’t need to spin their background because they’re doing a fabulous job. If you love what you do, and write a blog about it, or create a Squidoo lens, or answer questions on forums, or write articles, or play a key role on high profile projects, or speak at conferences, or take a leadership role in a professional group, or do any of the things that make you a leader in your field, you will be less likely than ever to lose out to someone less qualified just because they wrote a better resume. But if you don’t take an active role in promoting your self every day, a great resume alone won’t protect you for much longer.

What Does ZoomInfo Say About You?

ZoomInfo calls itself "the search engine for discovering people, companies and relationships."

You can register for free to create your own profile, but if you don't create a profile, ZoomInfo creates one for you, by pulling information from other websites that mention you.

Today I received a request for a service proposal from a senior executive who has the same name as a well-known and very controversial figure. I looked up my client in ZoomInfo and sure enough, his profile contains information on him, along with information on said controversial figure. A stranger would not know that they are not one and the same person.

Sites such as ZoomInfo worry me for this reason. Very few people even know they exist, even fewer have created a profile, and yet recruiters and hiring managers may well be drawing conclusions from the material they find there. If you're looking for a job, it's a very good idea to create an accurate Zoominfo profile that displays the information you want employers to see. At the very least, go and do a search to see what's there.

Your Online Persona

Probably the hottest topic in recruitment right now, is the whole issue of online networking and what it means for job seekers. I blogged about this as a guest writer for excelera8ion  and my post came at about the exact same time as this post by Todd Hilton, a Microsoft software developer who was guest posting on the Hire Calling blog. Todd writes:

You might consider the persona you present online to be personal and none of your employer’s business, but you also need to remember that your personal actions reflect on you as a whole. At Microsoft, it’s an important part of the hiring process to make sure that candidates are compatible with our company values. Anything you put online about yourself has the potential to influence this process, whether or not that is your intention. I want to leave you with one final thought. Remember that whatever you post on the internet will live a long, long time...maybe even forever! Public forums, web sites, blogs and newsgroups are archived by several companies (i.e.: Google) so before you hit that “Submit” button keep in mind that whatever you just wrote will still be available in 1, 2, 5, 10 years.

That's really good advice and I think everyone serious about managing their career effectively should frame that last sentence and put it near their PC!   

Your Online Presence

I just helped a senior-level client update her profile on Execunet. At which point she also asked me to help her with Netshare, Blue Steps and a number of other online sites requiring profiles.

Her profiles were horribly inadequate and I realized that many people are probably losing out on great opportunities because they don't know how to make sure they get noticed. If that's you, please take some time to navigate your way around these sites and understand what's required, as well as what's on offer (my client had not taken advantage of a free resume review offer, for example).

Some tips:

1. Make sure that your headline and experience summary contains lots of keywords that will help to sell you for the type of work you're looking for.

2. Be sure that your headline and summary are focused on the employer's needs and not yours.

3. Be sure to complete all sections of the profile form. My client had omitted to complete the networking section of the profile, which was excluing her from a lot of recruiter contacts, some of which may turn out to be valuable in the future.

4. If you're on a subscription-based site, spend time exploring the site to see what free offers are available. Make sure you're taking advantage of everything that's included in your subscription.

Ask Not What Employers Can Do For You

Yesterday I spent some time online looking for a consultant. I went to one of those websites where freelancers advertise their services and began to search the profiles.

Each consultant has a headline and about 25 words to make users want to click through and learn more. (This is very similar to what recruiters see when they log on to Monster.com and other online resume databases.)

I looked for 15 minutes and didn't see one headline that made me want to learn more. Not ONE! Think about that.

I have a need for help and I have money to spend and yet <em>no one</em> used that small introduction to show me what they could do for me. Almost all the users had introductions that focused on their experience - things like "25 years experience working with F500 companies" or "expertise in branding, positioning, messaging and advertising." They all blended into one because they all focused on experience rather than on my needs. (The only exception were the people who didn't even bother with an introduction - just posted their name as though that would be enough!)

I'm not even sure what I was looking for, although I would have known it had I see it. Perhaps something like "I help small businesses increase sales by an average of 20% through a proven step-by-step process" or "Are you looking for a marketing consultant who really listens?" Something that acknowledged that MY needs were what mattered to me, not their pedigree.

Of course, experience is important and I would have reviewed that before choosing a consultant, but it wasn't what I was looking for right upfront.

I tell you this because this is exactly what happens when a recruiter logs on to any online database. He or she has a problem or a need and they are looking for a solution. Make sure that your introduction clearly shows that you understand that problem and can solve it. You'll see an exponential increase in responses if you do.

Is MySpace Hurting Your Job Search

<a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/401069p-339405c.html" target="_blank">The New York Daily News</a> reports that the popular social networking site, <a href="http://www.myspace.com/"target="_blank">My Space</a> may have cost a freelance TV producer two jobs. Why? A silly picture and caption posted by a friend.

<blockquote>"A friend of mine posted a picture of me on My Space with my eyes half closed and a caption that suggests I've smoked something illegal," says Kluttz.

While the caption was a joke, Kluttz now wonders whether the past two employers she interviewed with thought it was so funny. Both expressed interest in hiring Kluttz, but at the 11th hour went with someone else. </blockquote>

I talk about this all the time, and I've blogged about it on many occasions. Online research is now a fact of job search life and you can't just worry about your online profile when you're ready to start looking for a job. By then it may be too late.

One Way to Stand Out

Australian blogger Edwin of Entreplist sent me his innovative approach to getting the attention of one of his target companies.

Edwin is holding the company's Art Director hostage. Well, actually he isn't, but he's created a fake ransom letter designed to grab attention. He says he doesn't know if it's a good idea and frankly, I don't know if it will get him this position. But I do know that this kind of creativity will get attention, and for that reason alone it has to be better than filling in an online form.

Hub Pages

I've written before about the value of blogging for executive job seekers. I think that a blog gives you an excellent way to demonstrate your expertise and build your brand online. But blogs are limited in so many ways, so I'm interested to learn more about Hubpages,a new tool about to enter Beta. According to the founders:

Here at Hubpages we want everyone to share their passion to benefit others. Whether it be traveling right, tweaking your engine, or finding the ultimate deal, we let you share your genius with the world and enjoy the expert advice of others.

Just pick a topic and use our simple publishing tools to create a great looking website with rich functionality. Hubpages takes it from there. The site is designed to continually sort out the most useful pages, helping to build traffic and revenue for our highest quality authors.

Yes revenue! Although knowledge is its own reward, we thought you might also like cold hard cash. So, if your readers generate revenue by clicking on an ad, buying a product or generating a lead, you will earn a share of the profits.</blockquote>

Revenue is nice of course, but I think it's much less important than the opportunities a tools like this one and Squidoo give individuals to build their own personal brand online.