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By Hillary Chura
Many candidates believe the job hunt is a numbers game — drop enough resumes, and you’re bound to land
something. But shotguns are for hunting pheasant, not finding jobs. The reality is that recruiters hate wasting
time on resumes from unqualified candidates. Morgan Miller, an executive recruiter at StaffMark, recalls the
security guard who applied to be a financial risk manager (maybe Lehman should have hired him), while Scott
Ragusa at Winter, Wyman talks of the aerial photographer who sought out a position as a tax specialist.
“Sorting through unqualified resumes is frustrating, unproductive and puts an extra burden on staff,” says
Katherine Swift, Senior Account Director at KCSA Strategic Communications in Natick, Mass. “It also makes
it much more challenging to find the right candidate.” So the next time you’re thinking of blasting out resumes
to all 60 of the job listings on Monster.com that have the word “finance” in them , save your time (and that of
the recruiters) and only apply for ones for which you’re qualified.
To stand out amongst the sea of resumes that recruiters receive, yours must speak to each and every specific
position, even recycling some of the language from the job description itself. Make it obvious that you will start
solving problems even before you’ve recorded your outgoing voicemail message. Your CV or query letter
should include a just touch of industry lingo — sufficient to prove you know your stuff but not so much that
you sound like a robot. And it should speak to individual company issues and industry challenges, with
specifics on how you have personally improved customer loyalty, efficiency, and profitability at past jobs, says
workplace and performance consultant Jay Forte. Plus, each morsel should be on point.
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16-Jul-10 What NOT to do: 7 ways to ruin your r…
“Think hard about how to best leverage each piece of information to your job search advantage,” says Wendy
Enelow, a career consultant and trainer in Virginia. “Nothing in your resume should be arbitrary, from what you
include in your job descriptions and achievement statements, to whether your education or experience comes
first [recent grads may want to put education first] to how you format your contact information.”
4. Make recruiters or hiring managers guess how exactly you can help their client
Sourcing experts want to know — immediately — what someone can offer, and they won’t spend time
noodling someone’s credentials. “Animal, vegetable or mineral? Doctor, lawyer or Indian chief?That’s what I’m
wondering every time I open a resume. If it takes me more than a split second to figure this out, I feel
frustrated,” says Mary O’Gorman, a veteran recruiter based in Brooklyn.
Though candidates should avoid jobs where they have no experience, they absolutely should pursue new
areas and positions if they can position their experience effectively. A high school English teacher applying for
new jobs, for example, can cite expertise in human resource management, people skills, record keeping,
writing, and training, says Anthony Pensabene, a professional writer who works with executives.
“Titles are just semantics; candidates need to relate their ‘actual’ skills and experiences to the job they’re
applying for in their resume,” Pensabene says. An applicant who cannot be bothered to identify the parallels
between the two likely won’t be bothered with interviews, either.
A cover letter should always accompany a resume — even if it’s going to your best friend. And that doesn’t
mean a lazy “I’m _____ and I’m looking for a job in New York; please see my attached resume.” Says Lindsay
Olson, a partner at Manhattan’s Paradigm Staffing: “I’d like to know why you are contacting me (a particular
position, referral, etc.), a short background about yourself, and a career highlight or two. It’s important to
attempt to set yourself apart from the competition.”
Reckless job hunters rarely make for conscientious workers. As such, even promising resumes must abide by
age-old dictums: typo-free, proper organization, and no embellishment. Susan Whitcomb, author of Resume
Magic: Trade Secrets of a Professional Resume Writer, says that almost 80 percent of HR managers she
surveyed said they would dismiss otherwise qualified candidates who break these rules. She tells the story of
one would-be employer who, when looking for an assistant, decided not to hire anyone because every resume
she received contained typos.
“With a 6-to-1 ratio of jobseekers-to-jobs in the current marketplace, you can’t afford to make mistakes with
your resume,” Whitcomb says.
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