A career resume is a summary or overview of an individual’s employability. Functionally it is an appetizer, a teaser if you will, intended to whet the appetite of the recruiter by giving them an idea of what you have to offer, which will contribute to their bottom line (make or save them money). You want to tell them just enough to stay in the running but leaving enough to the imagination that they are induced to call you in for an interview to learn more.
Clearly, no job has ever been won solely on the merits of the career resume; one still has to pass the interpersonal phase of the hiring process. Think of the job search as a test comprised of written and verbal presentation components: career resume and interview.
From an employer’s perspective, they can separate the wheat from the chaff and finally reduce the field of many candidates to a more manageable and select few based on the career resume; then, they make their final choice based on the interview outcome.
From your perspective, it gives you a chance to review and familiarize yourself with your qualifications, marshal your thoughts, know your shortcomings and refine your verbal presentation so that you can expand on your career resume highlights during the interview.
WHAT PURPOSE DOES A CAREER RESUME SERVE?
Unlike a job application, the purpose of a career resume is not to catalog and memorialize every boring detail of your autobiography but rather to provide the reader with a snappy overview or extract of your relevant background over the last decade.
As a marketing tool, a career resume has to “sell” you to the prospective employer. It must speak on your behalf in your absence since you are not there to defend or amplify anything that is written. It’s not enough to have the education and credentials if you can’t convey your value to a potential employer.
Without an impressive career resume and cover letter, you don’t stand a chance to get a toe-hold in today’s competitive marketplace. In point of fact, when well written, it is an asset, working for you; if poorly written, it is a detriment, working against you.
Career resume writing is an intellectually provocative construction process. The better the career resume, the more it reflects time, effort, and precision by using a straightforward layout as the foundation and solid facts as the framework. Refrain from creating a work of art decorated with excessive graphics, borders, and similar frills because this is not going to hang on the wall in a frame. Moreover, an employer’s first glance at an overly “artistic” career resume may erroneously lead them to believe the artwork was an attempt to camouflage the lack of substance. Even if your field is in graphics, the art belongs in your portfolio. Feel free to include your link at the end of the career resume, e.g., “Portfolio available through xxxxx.com.”
WHO IS GOING TO READ YOUR CAREER RESUME?
The audience you are selling to is the “employer,” a term that encompasses the single or collective human resource element of a particular firm that screens, reviews, culls, cuts, and ultimately selects the chosen few for an interview and invitation to begin the hiring process.
WHAT ARE THEY LOOKING FOR?
Ideally, employers want someone who:
- Is at the top of their game and has functional KSA (knowledge, skills, and abilities);
- Has customer service/relationship building/people skills; can get along and work well with others (interpersonal);
- Is reliable, punctual, disciplined, hardworking, and can work with minimal supervision (work ethic/habits);
-Is detail-oriented, observant, meticulous, results-driven, (quality conscious); - Is able to set and/or meet priorities, doesn’t waste time, doesn’t procrastinate, pitches in to help co-workers when the personal workload is light, doesn’t shirk responsibility (consistently productive);
- Welcomes learning new concepts, procedures, and technology quickly and hits the floor running (cross-trainable);
- Has demonstrated leadership potential, is a problem solver, and is flexible, unflappable under stress, and progressive in their thinking (promotability).
This is someone who offers the most value for the salary. They know what to do, how to do it when to do it, and reliably do it without being constantly prompted. In today’s vast and highly electronic job market, you can no longer just walk in and say, “Hi, I’m a job applicant, and I want to work for you.”
First, except for a few instances, the job market is no longer a small community controlled by whom you know.
Second, most employers have trimmed the workforce so drastically that they don’t have the manpower to stop and talk to you. Time is money and listening to the idle conversation is definitely counterproductive. Except for the occasional lowest paying job, show up uninvited and unannounced, and you’ll be unceremoniously shown the door and told to send your career resume. Nowadays, almost every position from porter to president requires a career resume.
Third, the global hiring process in the 21st century is largely computerized and needs hardcopy to scan into vast databases. By plugging in select capabilities, the computer will search through the qualifications of hundreds of applicants and pick the top few to be actually interviewed. Recruiters need to see chapter and verse in writing—thus, the career resume!
As previously discussed, everyone needs a career resume no matter how elementary their jobs and education. By circumstance or design, you will undoubtedly be progressing to more responsible jobs and acquire more education (on or off the job). The career resume is a good way to journalize the odyssey, detours, and all.
WHEN DO I PREPARE MY RESUME?
You should start your first career resume before you embark on your first job search and update it every six months thereafter so that the instant you need to approach a new employer, minimal edits will be necessary to make it current. A big problem we see is clients who cannot remember details of jobs from a few years ago. Under pressure, they draw a complete blank and consequently omit important information.
Lastly, if for no other purpose, it can be used as a personal map to show you where you’ve been and what obstacles you need to overcome to get where you want to be. This is an excellent opportunity to answer the proverbial question. Where do you see yourself in five years? Your strategy has to be one of marshaling your thoughts, resources, and skills and developing a plan of action.
Change is the single constant in life. It is not what has or has not happened to you in life, but rather how you dealt with it. In the face of adversity or a career rut, if you are not ready to regroup and move on, you will languish and perish.
The world is constantly in a state of flux. Nothing bears witness to this better than the economy and resulting employment market. The primary driving force is evolving technology which places us all in the vortex of a continual industrial revolution.
For example, receptionists have been replaced by voice mail, assembly line workers yielded to robotics, transcribers are outmoded in the face of voice recognition software, and on the list goes.
The workplace culture has changed as well. The idea of a young person starting at a firm as an apprentice, enjoying progressive promotions, and staying until retirement with the proverbial send-off luncheon is now considered prehistoric. Changing jobs every few years is more the norm.
The corporate environment is no longer familial, rewarding loyalty through the long haul of thick and thin. Consequently, loyalty is relative to the short duration, and the employer and employee are free to bail on the “marriage” at the first sign of dissatisfaction.
Now the imperative is immediate and instant gratification through bottom-line improvement: yours and theirs. In other words, don’t unpack your personal effects right away—you might not be there that long. As an employee, the atmosphere and non-monetary perks are not as important as the compensation package. An implicit message is, “You can keep the corner office and title; just pay me well—if you don’t, I can and will jump to the next best offer.”
How high you set your sights will drive the focus of your career resume. How well prepared you are will determine the impact and outcome.
SO WHAT'S NEXT?
The following is a recipe for your appetizer:
- Establish your goals – What do I want?
- Evaluate your qualifications (KSA) relative to that goal – What can I offer?
- Choose a corresponding format and layout: How can I best portray my value?
- Pick categories, start skeletal outline—not artful, just factual and brief – Barebones! Flesh out the skeleton – Meat on the bones! Read, rework, type/print – Garnish! Reread, edit and print final – Plate & serve!
- Maximize strengths and minimize weaknesses; emphasize positives and redirect negatives.
- Put the greatest emphasis on what you do best.
- Put moderate emphasis on what you have exposure to. Put the least emphasis on what you don’t want to do.
- Remember, the more you have to offer, the higher your value. You never know what intangibles the employer is looking for, don’t try to second guess them.
- You may choose to write in longhand first or input it directly to the computer, which saves time.
- The whole process should take a few hours.
DIFFERENT CAREER RESUMES FOR DIFFERENT FOCUSES
Usually, if you use an open objective and list a chronological history of employment and education, as well as all business-related skills and strengths, only one aesthetic career resume is necessary. However, if you have a diversified background and wish to skew your information in a particular direction for more than one industry (radio broadcasting and retail marketing and nursing) or level of responsibility (worker, supervisor, manager), you could have several functional résumés.
DOCUMENTS YOU NEED TO FOR THE JOB SEARCH PROCESS
You should have the following, if applicable to your situation, to be kept on hand and released only if specified in an advertisement or requested during an interview:
- List of References
- Salary History
- Letters of Testimony
- Writing Sample
- Portfolio
- Credentialing Certificates/Licenses
- Copies of Published Articles, etc.
Additionally, you should have a cover letter ready to accompany your career resume.