Lindsay Olson

Interesting links: November 20-26

Interesting links for the long weekend reading… Happy Thanksgiving and enjoy!

Career

That Old Feeling rip
• 25 Most Creative Designer resumes you’ll see this year - JobMob
• The You Show - Seth Godin
• Downsized? Fired? Here are the new rules of finding a job - Web Ink Now
• 10 of the toughest interview questions ever - Anita Bruzzese
• 10 Jobs That Make You Realize Your Job Isn’t That Bad - Brazen Careerist
• Job Seekers Bend Ears of Advisers, Recruiters - Wall Street Journal

Business

• 10 ways to jumpstart your creativity - Dumb Little Man
• Everything I need to know about blogging I learned in high school - Copyblogger
  
• You will be misunderstood - Seth Godin
• How to Get What You Want - Gwen Bell
• Productive Magazine - free download
• 15 Tips for Writing Effective Email - ThinkSimpleNow.com

  Love in the Time of Cholera dvd

  Surfer, Dude movie download Bonnie and Clyde video I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer the movie

Top things to never put on your resume by readers

Photo credit: Matias Dutto

Yesterday I listed five things to never put on your resume. By no means was it an exhaustive list. Paul Copcutt, former recruiter and blogger at Reflections of a Square Peg, left some great comments worth sharing.

Here are Paul’s five things to never put on a resume:

• Silly, Funny (usually just to you), or offensive e-mail addresses. Gmail is free and generic - use it!
• An objective (still seen on far too many resumes) - by all means have something to give off a resume but make it a value proposition. Think: What you can do for the employer - not what you want from them? Jennifer Schooley chimed in here as well stating it’s obvious by receiving the resume you are looking for a job, so don’t waste the space.
• No phone number! Yes believe it - when I was in recruitment I did a quick survey once and found over 15% of resumes had no contact phone number. Huh???!!
• Reasons why you left - rarely seen now, but it does happen. Do not eliminate yourself before the interview. Save it for a face to face, or at least a telephone conversation.
• Photos. In recruitment we used to have a ‘rogues’ gallery of photos that were attached to resumes. Again, save it for the interview or web interview. Or make sure any photo is professionally taken for bios and on-line profiles like LinkedIn.

Another great tip from Martin Buckland:

Space Chimps video
• Leave responsibilities out. Build each bullet around STAR: Situation, Task, Action, Result. Tell a short story, max 3 lines, about each accomplishment. These can also serve as a platform for the interviewer to position his questions.

Bill Green added “GPA - leave it off. If you have a 3.8, you have just publicly said you not as smart as someone with a 4.0.”

Jacob Share at JobMob also pointed me to his top 10 unusual resume mistakes. He puts out some of the most useful content in the world of job search out there. If you don’t read Jacob’s blog, it’s a good addition to your daily feeds.

Thank you all for your insight! I’d love to hear any other ideas you would add in the comments.

This part two of a three-part series about what to never put on your resume.

Part 1: 5 things to never put on your resume

Part 3: Make sure your career progression is not mistaken for job hopping

5 things you should never put on your resume

Photo credit: Mike Dumlao

Job searching can be a lonely, frustrating place. It’s time consuming and it rarely comes without rejection. In most cases, your years of hard work are represented on one or two pages and evaluated by someone who has probably never worked in your position. And it’s that step that determines if you are in the “in” interview pile or the “out” pile.

Those two pages of finely tuned words ARE you, until you have the chance to let your personality shine through in the interview. Here are my top five things to avoid putting on your resume.

1. Giving personal data. Your resume should be a business representation of you. Avoid listing your marital status, age, family data, hobbies, etc. You should have hobbies and a life outside of work, but it’s not necessary to include them on your resume UNLESS the hobby or information is relevant to the job itself. Your prospective employer will find this all out anyways on your Facebook or Myspace page (so make sure it’s representative of what you want them to know). Your age, sexual preference, martial status or family information (children, ages, etc.) are irrelevant. The unfortunate truth is that hiring managers may base their decisions on whether or not to interview and hire you based on the information you provide, discriminatory or not. Don’t let them make that judgment.
2. Listing every job since adolescence. The Starbucks Barista job that got you through college isn’t for the resume. If it’s not relevant to your current job search, drop it. Think: Did this job prepare me to be a PR pro? If not, don’t list it. That goes for internships too. If you have more than five years experience your internships are no longer relevant.
3. Going more than two pages. This is a tough one, especially for candidates with lots of experience. You may have the temptation of wanting to list all of your relevant experience, but nobody reads more than two pages. So don’t give in, no matter how much experience you have. Find a way to cut it down. A good way to start is by focusing on accomplishments for each position rather than a long list of responsibilities.
4. Personal pronouns. Writing your resume in the first person detracts from your accomplishments. It adds unnecessary work and wastes space. The same goes for referring to yourself in the third person. Examples: “I pitched business and trade publications such as…” or “Jane has 15 years of experience…”
5. Providing references or stating “references upon request.” You need references, but not on your resume. You don’t want your valued references being called before you have a chance to let them know. If a company requires references, it will ask you for them when you are seriously being considered for the position. Listing “references upon request” at the bottom of your resume is a given and wastes valuable space.

What would you add to the list?

This is part one of a three-part series about what to never put on your resume.
Part 2: Top things you should never put on your resume by readers
Part 3: Make sure your career progress is not mistaken for job hopping

Related articles

CNN - Resumes from Hell
New York Times - Resume Writing 101

Don’t Make Me Click

You have a LinkedIn profile, a blog, an online resume, a web portfolio, a video resume, a YouTube channel and accounts on Twitter, Flickr, Utterz, blah blah blah. Why would you need a traditional resume too?

Shannon Paul wrote a great piece called the Six steps to Resume 2.0. She gives some valuable insight on just how important it is as a job seeker to communicate with the receiver in mind.

Everyday people are starting to utilize these new communications tools, but the truth is that most people aren’t there yet. We still don’t have a clue, so your blog, LinkedIn profile and content on your social networks can’t be the only representation of your skills. Today it’s still absolutely necessary to have a traditional resume.

Social media savvy job seekers often tend to think their LinkedIn profiles and blogs are sufficient. I hear it all the time: “Lindsay, everything is on my LinkedIN profile” or “Send your client to my online portfolio link.”

It’s not enough. Most HR departments and hiring managers prefer tradition. If you’re working with a third-party recruiter, she needs to present a candidate formally to the client company for contractual reasons; links don’t cut it. Resumes also help recruiters and HR departments track candidates in the Applicant Tracking systems for future opportunities.

Here are Shannon’s tips to show off your online presence and still satisfy those traditionalists.

1. Start with a Word document version of your resume since that’s what most people are familiar with, but don’t stop there.
2. Hyperlink all of the information in your resume that makes sense. Your name can link to your blog, and your contact information can include links to your LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Flickr etc. profiles. Make sure that the information on the selected profiles is something you wouldn’t mind sharing with a potential employer.
3. Create an HTML version of your resume and embed it into the body of your email to HR.
4. Write an introduction explaining what you’ve done as if you’re explaining it to your Mom. Let them know why you think this is important. Explain your interest in sharing information about yourself as it exists online and invite them to explore these links to research who you are. Phrase it in such a way that suggests you’re trying to make their job easier.
5. Attach the Word document version of your resume to your message and let them know in the introduction that a Word version of your resume is also attached. A lot of times people just want to save resumes in a predictable way or print them out. (Yes, people still print things out and make notes on them with a pen).
6. Don’t expect them to click on anything. If you’re called in for an interview, don’t start asking whether they read your latest blog post or saw the pictures from your week in Yosemite posted to Facebook. Remember, you sent them an invitation, but that doesn’t mean you should make them feel obligated to check you out on your terms. Just keep inviting people to check out your work and your life online.

Links:

Shannon Paul: Six steps to Resume 2.0

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