3 Reasons Not to Use a Creative Resume Format

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Hi Everyone! It’s a “two-fer” week, with a video blog as well as a written version.  Choose the format you want and enjoy!

When it comes to creative inspiration, I love Pinterest. It’s one of the greatest apps ever. Ever.

There’s a category for everything, from weddings (a no-brainer) to cooking to home decorating to fashion and more. The best part is that instead of keeping stacks of dog-eared magazines lying around the house, we can de-clutter by keeping multiple boards filled with pins of our favorite things. All saved for future use. Or simply to dream about.

Very crafty. Very Inspirational. Very Creative.

So many wonderful new ways to spin old favorites, which is great.

Except when it comes to resumes.

As a career coach, I’m going out on a limb here in saying that I’m pretty sure the super cute, super fun, super creative resumes – while they are ALL of those things – are not necessarily the best for your job search.

I can tell I’ve burst your Pinterest bubble.

Being creative is good, yet maybe this is not the best time to bring out the glue gun.  There are literally hundreds of creative resume formats on Pinterest and they seem to fall into these categories:

The Colored Paper Resume
Really, colored paper? As much as I love stationery, it can come across as a bit juvenile. Seriously, it can be hard to read your information on colored paper. The biggest issue is that colored paper does not work well in an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) – you know; the electronic system that sucks up our resumes when we apply for jobs online? Which we all have to do, by the way, even if we know someone inside the company. Why run the risk of your information being garbled?

The Head Shot
Never put a photo on your resume. Ever. Seems like a no-brainer, with the potential for age, sex and race discrimination. Yes, there are other ways for a potential employer to learn this information but why provide it yourself? Not to mention that your photo is not going to fair well when scanned in the company’s ATS.

The Infographic
I appreciate a well-done infographic for its ability to simplify a difficult concept. Really, I do. I’ve yet to see a well-done infographic resume. Usually it takes a simple concept – the resume – and turns it into a cute yet confusing document. In some cases, the result is childish. And once again, the format does not mesh with the ATS.

3 Reasons Not to Use a Creative Resume Format:

1.Graphic treatments, color and other creative designs don’t work well with the Applicant Tracking System (ATS)
2. You may open yourself up to discrimination
3. Your creative attempt may come across as confusing or even childish

A simple, clean design is the best format when it comes to your resume. Lots of white space on no more than two pages. A basic font such as Arial, Calibri, or Times Roman used throughout. No cursive or mixed fonts.

Remember, the goal is to get your information through the ATS to a human being who will decide whether or not to bring you in for an interview. If the format is too much for the ATS to handle and your information becomes garbled, there’s not much of a chance for an interview.

If you want to use a more creative resume format once you’ve secured an in-person interview, have a second version ready. But see my points above.

Resumes Are Weird; You Must Network to Find a Job

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When it comes to picking a movie, who do you trust more: your friend or an online movie critic you’ve never met?

If you picked movie critic, perhaps you need new friends. Just sayin’.

In most cases, we trust the opinions of our friends over strangers.

Our friends know us and we know them.  We have grown to value their opinion. They have our best interests at heart and would tell us the truth.

We believe them when they tell us we would enjoy the film.

The same principle is true when it comes to hiring new employees.  We believe our friends and trusted colleagues know us well enough to suggest good candidates for job openings.

This is one reason networking is crucial to your job search.   You must use your network to provide personal recommendations when it comes to securing a job.  

This video by Domics Animation is a clever demonstration of why networking is so important.  He’s right: hiring managers tend to hire someone based on the recommendation of a trusted friend or colleague over hiring a stranger.

The creator is clearly not a fan of resumes, stating “Resumes are weird”, although I believe a good resume is necessary since most of the time we all have to apply for jobs via the company’s website.  May as well make it the best it can be.

And I disagree with the author that young people don’t have networks to help them find their first job.  Even kids in high school have classmates, teachers, and friends of their parents to tap into to help find a job.

Remember: Even with a recommendation you still need to bring you’re A-Game to the interview and to the job itself.  With privilege comes great responsibility; you need to prove your worth.

The important point is to build your network and use that network when searching for a job.

Take a look!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ4NdEtc29o

5 Ways to Improve Your Resume In One Hour

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smart-watch-821557_1920If you’re anything like me, quite often you wish for more time. More time to finish a project, go to the movies, take a vacation, go to the gym, or spend time with family and friends.

You might say “falling back” with Daylight Savings Time is like receiving the gift of an extra hour. Despite my desire for more time, I have a love-hate relationship with this particular extra hour.

Love it because I get an extra hour once a year and the sun shines earlier in the morning so I’m not trying to pry myself out of bed in the dark. Hate it because it’s dark by five o’clock and it feels like midnight when I’m eating dinner at my usual hour.

Honestly, I will spend the next five months counting the days until we switch back and I lose an hour. I love the daylight that much. Not to mention I love warm weather. Hate the cold.

Right now, we’ve got an extra hour and we should use it to our advantage. Here are five ways to improve your resume in one hour:

  1. Add Social Media Links. Include a link to your LinkedIn page, as well as your website and other relevant social media accounts.  This is a good time to personalize your LinkedIn address too – www.linkedin.com/firstnamelastname. Reminder: make sure any links are live and connect to the correct page.
  2. Update Your Personal Statement. At the top of your resume should be your personal statement that tells the hiring manager who you are and what you can do to solve their problems.  If the top of your resume still says, “Seeking a job in X industry”, it’s time to start over.
  3. Highlight Career Wins. Show hiring managers what you bring to the table by sharing quantifiable success stories from each of your jobs. “Reduced operating expenses by eight percent in first quarter” or, “Developed and executed consumer program resulting in ten percent sales increase”. Show the hiring manager you mean business.
  4. Add New Skills or Awards. Did you take a course? Earn a certificate? Receive an award or other recognition?  Be sure to include any new skills, education or awards.  Remember, though, it must be relevant to your career.
  5. Out With the Old. There comes a time when our first job(s) need to be removed from our resumes. Same for irrelevant information such as street address (list only city and state), the words “cell phone” or “home phone” (simply list the number, preferably your cell phone), hobbies, personal information (age, height, political affiliation, etc.), anything related to high school, and the phrase, “references available upon request”.

The Five Minute Resume Update

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When was the last time you updated your resume?

Some of us keep an always-updated resume close at hand. Many of us – more than likely, the majority of us – update only on occasion, usually when we need the resume for a job interview.

Updating a resume can be time consuming.  In our busy lives, who has time to creatively weave a great one or two page document about our achievements?  It’s not something that any of us truly like to do either.

“If we could only find time, then we would update our resumes”, we tell ourselves.  Somehow I don’t believe us.

What’s the old saying: How do you boil the ocean? One cup at a time.

For anyone who has not updated their resume in at least a year, all it takes is five minutes to make a quick review and resume update.

The Five Minute Resume Update

  1. Review the top of your resume, including your name and contact information. Your name should be in larger font than the rest of the information. Remove your street address; include city and state only. List one phone number; no need to label it as “Cell” or “Home”. Be sure to include any social media links such as LinkedIn or your website.
  2. Review your opening statement. If it still says something like “Seeking a position as….” time for a change. This statement should tell the reader who you are and what you want to do. Example: Marketing Director with proven success integrating social media and traditional marketing campaigns to drive consumer traffic.
  3. Review the end of your resume. Remove any reference to college GPA and related activities, personal factoids, including hobbies or family information, and the phrase “references available upon request”. If you are forty or older, time to remove college graduation dates as well.

That’s it; The Five Minute Resume Update. It’s not an overhaul by any means. But it gets us started and moving in the right direction.

Interview Musts

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There are certain things that are considered “musts” when it comes to interviews.  An early arrival, manners and basic hygiene top the list, followed closely by breath mints.

To me these are all part of SOP – standard operating procedure.

It’s been brought to my attention that the younger crowd is not up on all of the SOP’s.  They may get the manners and hygiene, but I’ve noticed that many fail to bring copies of their resume to interviews.

I guess they think hiring managers are mind readers.

Since college students are in full interview mode right now, for either internships or full-time jobs, here is a brief list of Interview Musts:

  • Bring plenty of copies of your resume. Never assume that everyone you meet will have received a copy. In fact, some managers may have only been given five minutes’ notice that they will conduct an interview.  So make it easy for them and present a copy of your resume.  They will appreciate it.
  • Bring your business cards. This is a nice addition to your resume.  Also helps if you meet so many people that you run out of resumes.
  • Dress for success. Even if the firm is casual, you should be dressed for business.  Shoes should be clean and polished. Clothes ironed. Ladies, don’t carry too many bags.  If you carry a tote, then have a small handbag.  No need to look like you’re moving in with so much luggage.
  • Be prepared! Have your quick “About Me” speech with a memorable story ready to go so that it rolls off your tongue in a conversational manner.
  • Show them how you are the best candidate for the job and that you can solve their problems.  If you could only tell the hiring manager three things about yourself, what would they be?  Avoid things like, “I’m dedicated, hard-working, passionate and I’ve always wanted to work here”.  Use succinct stories that show examples of who you are instead of fluffy words.
  • Always be “on”. From the time you walk in the building to the time you get back to your car, be in “interview mode”.  Everyone you meet is judging you as a potential candidate.  If they take you to lunch, they are interviewing you whether it seems like it or not. They will watch to see if you speak about relevant topics, if you are too quiet or talk too much, if you talk with your mouth full, etc.  I’m not kidding.
  • Thank Them.  Thank each person after each interview.  And follow up with hand-written thank-you notes mailed either the same night or the following morning at the latest.

This list of “interview musts”, while not all-encompassing, is a great reminder for all of us to be prepared for interviews. Now go get ‘em!

Curate Your Resume

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Curate: a verb.

It’s an interesting word. By definition, it means “To pull together, sift through, and select for presentation, as music or website content”.

I often think of a museum curator, who must sort through hundreds if not thousands of paintings by the great masters like Da Vinci or Picasso, choosing only a handful for patrons to view. The purpose is to select the best of the best; to curate the collection down to tell a story in a limited space.

What a difficult job!

Right now I am trying to “curate” my personal belongings in an attempt to keep the best of my best.

Not because I need to tell a story with my clothes; simply because my goal is to keep everything in my closet in the bedroom.

I started out with the simple stuff: Hubby’s things. It’s easy to curate his personal belongings. After all, no one needs the 100 thing-a-ma-bobs I found spilling out of his tool chest.

Most difficult? Trying to curate a woman’s shoe collection. Ten pairs of black pumps may all appear identical at first glance yet upon closer examination it becomes clear that, much like snowflakes, no shoes are exactly alike and each serve a different purpose.

Hubby is shaking his head. This from the man with 100 thing-a-ma-bobs in the garage.

Curating my belongings is hard. I guess I’m just sentimental since each time I try to rid myself of an item, I remember when I purchased it or who gave it to me and I just can’t bear the thought of losing that memory.

Here’s another curating challenge that I bet many of us struggle with: the resume.

Our tendency is to over-tell our story. To share every detail of each job and sometimes to list every job we’ve ever had, which is too much itself.

Like too many clothes in the closet or too many thing-a-ma-bobs in the tool chest, too much information on the resume is not always the best form of presentation.

The key to being a good curator is to look at a collection with a critical eye; select only the best work and being strict enough to say “no” to the rest.

When it comes to our resumes we should do the same. This can be super-hard because it’s personal. This is our story of our hard work, and we want everyone to see it.

Plus, it’s difficult to determine what to keep and what to eliminate. The key is to remember that the resume is just one tool in the job search process, so use it to focus on the highlights; key points of interest that may entice the hiring manager to bring you in for an interview.

Some thought starters:

  • Review everything with a very critical eye, looking for the most important information you want to share
  • Hone your best success stories for inclusion on the resume
  • Say it with fewer words wherever possible
    • Even career veterans with a long work history should keep a resume to two pages; those starting out should have only one page
  • What are the three things you want the reader to know about you?
    • Start writing with this information; make sure each is clear and not cluttered with unnecessary information

Using these thought-starters, write your resume. Curate your information to provide a succinct presentation of your story.

Just like our closets and drawers become overstuffed and we need to curate our collections, our resumes can become overstuffed with words and information as we hang on to all of our work examples and stories.

Take time to curate your resume. You – and the hiring manager –will be pleased with the results.

If It’s Broke, Fix It

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Why do we always say, “If it’s not broken, don’t fix it”?  Seems like that statement sets us up for mediocrity, settling for something that might not be quite as good as it could be.

My guess is that we sometimes follow this path because it’s easy.  Change is hard, man!  It takes work and effort and time.  Not to mention the frustration we all feel during the “improvement” process.

We might not have this old saying if it was easy to come up with something new. Usually there are multiple iterations involved.  If we are developing something new at work, then there are meetings and committees and disagreements and setbacks and more meetings.

Fixing something is a pain.

Despite the pain or frustration of making improvements to something that already works, there comes a time when we must realize that adjustments need to be made.

Take our resumes.  Many of us – myself included – work diligently to get our resumes to a good point. The format is good, the wording is good, and we are comfortable with the result.  The resume has received good reviews from others and we’ve even secured interviews –and jobs – using this version.

It’s tried and true. Why would we want to change something that’s worked so well for us?

Because even tried and true solutions can get stale. 

As a career coach and mentor I’m constantly looking at resumes.  I find inspiration in some of them, particularly in formatting.  Many are in dire need of improvement, particularly the wording or the type of information included.  All of them serve as a reminder that while mine is good, it could always be better.

There is always room for improvement.  Yet it’s hard to get started making a change because it’s not easy.

And this may come as a shock to some, but it’s important that we tailor our resume to each job application using key words that may help secure an interview.  That’s right; a different version each time we apply.

If one version is difficult, multiple versions may seem like a nightmare.

In reality it’s not.  We develop a “base” resume with our information and then create separate versions that focus on different accomplishments.

For example, I have a version that better highlights my marketing skills and experience, and another version that focuses on my PR experience.  The differences are subtle but they are important.

Word of caution: be careful about getting too caught up in the minutiae. The goal is to develop an improved resume quickly so we can use it for interviews, our LinkedIn profile, etc.  It’s easy to get so obsessed with making improvements that we never arrive at a usable version.

Trust me; I know this all too well.  As a writer I’m never quite satisfied with my work and if given the opportunity I will always be editing.  There came a point when I was writing my book, Tales of the Terminated, that I finally had to stop editing and start publishing. Otherwise I would never have finished the book!

I challenge all of us to take a hard look our resumes and if it’s broken, fix it.  For some, this may be as simple as changing the font and/or format. For others it means letting go of some information that is no longer necessary.

The important thing is that we acknowledge that change is scary, frustrating, time-consuming and a pain. But it’s worth it in the end.

Resumes and Meatballs

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I love spaghetti and meatballs. Duh! I’m part Italian; I’d better love it. I think I lose my Italian heritage if I don’t.

My Italian grandmother spent hours making her recipes from scratch.  The aroma from her kitchen was enough to make your mouth water.

Grandma cooked by taste and feel, adding a bit of this and a dash of that until it was just right.  Mom painstakingly translated Grandma’s improvised cooking into recipes with actual amounts so she could recreate these dishes for dad.

Grandma cooked a lot – I mean every single day – and was always prepared. She always had some sauce or meatballs in the refrigerator, ready to go, just in case company stopped by.

As much as I yearn for Grandma’s spaghetti sauce with meatballs, I rarely make it because it is literally an all-day affair.  Quite honestly, who has the time?  And in summer months with outside temperatures reaching more than 100 degrees, I’m not interested in heating up the inside of the house too.

A recent cold wave, combined with Hubby’s sweet request for spaghetti and meatballs, and I found myself bravely attempting Grandma’s recipe. 

Besides, the kitchen was already a mess so I figured it was a great time.

Yes, I procrastinate and make excuses when it comes to this time-consuming recipe.  I love it when it’s done; it’s the process I dread.

Boy, was I out of practice!  The sausage almost burned on the stove while I was sautéing the onions and garlic.  My hand-rolled meatballs looked more like meat blobs.  Just as I was heating the olive oil, I realized one of the meat blobs had fallen on the floor.  Not wanting to waste one of my precious meat blobs, I yelled “Five-second rule!” washed it off and figured any germs would be cooked out by frying.

Just to be clear, I kept that meat blob out of the sauce and ate it for lunch. It was delicious, I might add.

After two hours the sauce was finally ready to simmer for the rest of the day.  The kitchen looked like a food-war had erupted and I smelled like I had bathed in olive oil.  But I felt victorious in my accomplishment and knew my hard work was well worth the effort.

While the sauce simmered I thought about all the other things I dread doing but am happy about once I’m finished.  Cleaning up the kitchen after making meatballs and sauce is high on the list.  So is going to the grocery store, exercising and even going to the dentist.

Career-wise I really hate revising my resume and all the associated job search tasks, such as updating social media profiles.  It’s another one of those things that I’m super happy about once it’s done, yet I procrastinate and make excuses to get started.

A quick poll of my friends tells me I’m not alone here.  Apparently very few of us enjoy this all-important task.

And now that I think about it, resumes and meatballs have a lot in common.  Both are key ingredients in a larger recipe and both take a lot of time to create.

It really shouldn’t be that hard to keep our resumes updated.  Some years ago I forced myself to start updating my resume annually in conjunction with the corporate review cycle.  It’s the perfect opportunity to add new accomplishments while they are top of mind.

Just because I do it doesn’t make it fun.  It still means I’ve got to invest time to think about how to update my information while keeping my resume under two pages.

Social media has added a level of complexity.  We have to update our information on LinkedIn and other sites too.

Yet just like Grandma always sauce and meatballs ready in case she needed them, we need to have our resumes up to date. You never know when an awesome job opportunity might come your way.

Meatballs and sauce in the fridge; current resume on file.  It’s a simple recipe, really.

 

When It Comes To Resumes, Content Is Critical

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Christmas at our house was a big deal when we were growing up.  Who am I kidding?  It’s still a big deal to me and Hubby knows it.  He has a hard time trying to live up to the expectations established by my family, particularly my grandmother.

Grandma always gave good gifts. I mean REALLY good.  We thought she was super rich. Only much later did I realize that she carefully planned her money and preferred to give it to the grandchildren instead of spending it on herself.

What Grandma understood best was presentation; the drama leading up to the gift.  She knew that we knew the gift would be good and she wanted us to work for it.  We had been taught to be so polite that if we opened her gift and were disappointed, we still smiled and thanked her profusely.  That’s when the fun began for Grandma.

Like the time I opened a huge box with a beautiful large bow, only to find a pair of fuzzy socks from the dollar store.  I smiled and thanked her, wondering if she’d lost all her money.  She coaxed me to try them on; I thought she was nuts.  But I did as she asked.  To my surprise, I found a diamond ring sewn inside the toe of the sock.

Score one for Grandma!  She knew the content of the gift was more important than the fancy wrapping and let me discover a true diamond in the rough.

Resumes are a lot like gifts.  They can surprise a hiring manager by presenting a good picture of the candidate or they can disappoint by looking good yet lacking substance.

Throughout my career I’ve interviewed a lot of candidates, as well as helped students and others with their job searches – I have seen my share of resumes.   Resumes on different kinds of paper, with all sorts of fonts and creative interpretations designed to make them stand out in the crowd.  One memorable resume was a on a DVD – talk about making me work for the information.

I imagine most hiring managers appreciate efforts by candidates to be unique.  Believe me when I say that I’m right there with you in wanting to separate myself from the pack during the recruitment process.

The truth is it’s the content of the resume that’s important.  Just like a Christmas gift, the fanciest wrapping doesn’t always yield the best present.

Make sure your resume really tells your story.  Sometimes this is the only piece of information a hiring manager sees in determining whether or not to interview a candidate.

I know; it’s hard to write about yourself but you have to try.  Ask a trusted friend or two to review your resume and edit it.  I’ve done this before and have received great feedback.  Sometimes we are too close to the subject to have an objective view.

There are also certified professional resume writers who do this for a living.  Yes, you’ll have to spend some money, although it’s worth the price if it means finding your next opportunity.

Worst thing you can do is limp along with a poor resume.  I’ve seen some doozies over the years.  Misspelled words, date errors, including way too much information or irrelevant information, information that indicates age or even includes skills that may be outdated – and those are not the worst errors.

The resumes that are most difficult to understand are the ones that fail to tell me succinctly who you are, what type of work you are looking for and why you are successful.  A good resume helps me understand why you could help solve my problems and intrigues me enough to schedule an interview.

Remember, the resume provides a snapshot of your personal brand to the hiring manager.  While a resume alone won’t get you a job, it may open the door for an interview where you can shine in person.

Your resume can still look good. Just make sure the content lives up to the wrapping.

 

The Headshot: A Visual Introduction To Your Resume

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If a picture paints a thousand words, could a photo be a visual introduction to a person’s resume? 

I started thinking deep thoughts about professional head shots while on LinkedIn, when it suggested three new people for me to add to my network, providing only headshots, names, current jobs and our common connections.

What struck me is that not one of them had a decent headshot.   They might have been fun pics for Facebook or to frame at home. Or maybe that was the only photo they had at the time.  But not for a serious networking tool like LinkedIn.

Here’s what I saw:

  1. In the first photo, the person is smiling and looks happy, which is good.  Problem is that it looks like they have antennae sticking out of their head – sort of like old-fashioned TV rabbit ears. The background leads me to believe they are in a bar or at a restaurant.
  2. The second photo is a bit better, with a nice outdoor background – clearly professional.  Too bad the person’s eyes appear to be closed.
  3. The third photo is the best.  Probably because there is no photo.  It’s one of those LinkedIn “placeholders”, a blue-gray silhouette meme that’s androgynous.  I guess they don’t want me – or prospective employers – to see them at all.

Yikes. 

Even before seeing these photos I had planned to update my professional headshot.  Mine was good, yet with speaking engagements and a website, it’s important to have more than one photo.

Honestly, I don’t like traditional headshots.  They can be too sterile; I want mine to portray some warmth and personality.  If this photo is a visual introduction then I want you to see a combination of business and personality.

After much research I booked a session with a local photographer, someone I had used before.  He suggested I bring some props in addition to clothing changes.

As I entered the studio I suddenly felt a bit intimidated.  Not many people I know actually enjoy getting their picture taken, especially by a professional.  And no wonder!  Our first photography sessions were forced on us as infants and toddlers by well-meaning family.

Many of these photos were taken at the holidays and included sitting on the lap of a scary-looking person in a Santa Claus outfit or Bunny suit.  Sort of counter to the “Stranger Danger” lessons our parents were trying to teach us.

Even the semi-professional school photos were intimidating.  Lined up with the rest of our classmates, one by one we were called forward to sit in the chair as the photographer shouted instructions. “Knees right! Head left! Chin up! Look at me, smile!-click-NEXT!”

Gosh, I hope this photographer doesn’t shout at me.  I am paying him, after all.

I looked around his studio and checked for scary clowns or other stranger danger.  Once I realized it was only the two of us I relaxed.

We worked for almost two hours taking multiple shots while he adjusted lights, props and me to get the perfect picture.  Wardrobe and prop changes added to the fun.  We chatted while he snapped.

Technology helped since he could tell instantly whether the lighting was right, and I could see the images on a big screen which allowed me to make adjustments in my expression.

We carefully went through the list of shots I wanted.  I walked out of the studio exhausted from trying to pose in a relaxed-yet-business-like manner.   That evening I sifted through a couple hundred images.  On a scale of one-to-ten, most were at least in the five to eight range, which is amazing.

I looked for the best ones, the nines and tens, knowing that these photos will be the first thing a stranger sees – my introduction to them and potentially a new opportunity.

More often than not we neglect this important part of our online business profile.  It can be expensive to hire a photographer and quite frankly, many of us simply do not like to have our picture taken.  So we rummage through our photos and settle for something we already have, assuming it will be good enough.

If my first chance to impress is with a stamp-sized photo on LinkedIn, I want mine to be great so potential employers are encouraged to learn more.  Remember: visual introduction.  I’m still sorting through my new headshots looking for the right one.

Yes, a picture paints a thousand words.  Or in the case of social media, it really just needs to make a good first impression.