What is a resume presentation?
In essence, it is a combination of things that
are most appropriately developed based on who you are, what you are looking for,
and what shows off your skills and provides you with the best leverage without
over-playing your position.
Why not just a resume?
Most well-paid positions that open up have more
supply than demand and there is no prize for second place. You want to put
your best foot forward. If the interviewer only responds to 5-10% of the
responses, you want the best leverage that you can get to get that coveted
interview. Without it, you don't stand a chance of getting hired.
This means that you have between 5-10 seconds for your resume to make a positive
impression. Words are not enough because in the first cut, they probably
won't even be read. It's all about first impressions.
A presentation is not advisable for all job
applications but the more lucrative the job and the more competition there is,
the greater need there will be for "the edge". You have to make
the first and second cut to get to even compete for the third cut.
What is a scannable resume?
Many offices are moving to a paperless
office. Large companies may have hundreds of positions available but may
receive hundreds of resumes each day too. In such cases, your resume won't
even be looked at by an HR associate but will probably be scanned using OCR
(optical character resolution) and stored in a database.
When it comes
time to pull viable candidates, the HR associate then types in
"keywords" to come up with a list of potential candidates. You
could be wonderfully qualified for the position, but if your resume doesn't have
a high percentage of those keywords, your resume might not even get seen.
The more keywords that it does have, the more likely it is that it will be seen
and that your resume will rise to the top and get seen first.
What are some special things I can do to get
my resume seen AND read?
Think about it like a salesperson making a
cold-call. You have but a few precious seconds to get seen, a few more to
catch the attention of the reader, and a few longer ones to make that first
impression. Botch up the first impression and you probably won't get the
chance to make a second one.
When Burger King creates a commercial, they
don't grab one right off the line and stick it in front of the camera.
They don't have your hunger at the moment and they don't have the advantage of
you smelling the food. They can only do it with pictures. They spend
days making that hamburger look the best that it can be. The lighting and
the rest of the surroundings look great too.
Think of the content of your resume like that
hamburger. You want to polish it, perfect it, and put it in the perfect
setting before you present it for public inspection. The interviewer has
many choices and you want your resume to stand out as the best. If putting
these finishing touches on your resume isn't something that you can do well,
then consider hiring a professional resume writer. You can usually get a
great job done for several hundred dollars. While that may sound like a
lot of money, consider how much additional money you will make by getting a job
one or two weeks earlier.
If you can't afford to have this done
independently, then plan days or weeks to get that resume perfect.
Remember though, it's not your opinion that counts. Have your friends and
relatives look at it, especially those in business and preferably those that see
many resumes. Look at other resumes if you can to get ideas of different
styles.
Use conservative paper. No powder-puff
blue resume paper allowed. Stick with white, ivory, eggshell, or at most,
a very light gray.
Give a career summary statement. This is
a great tool to let the person reading it know if there is valid content beyond
the first two lines. A summary statement should be no more than one to two
sentences.
What goes in a cover letter?
If you are pulling information from online,
determine whether there is a job number or other identifying mark that would
identify what position it is that you are applying for.
Place the job number somewhere near the top
like under the Re: tag and list the location that you found the job. This
is appreciated by the person receiving the information because they don't have
to try and figure out which job it is that you want. Large companies can
have hundreds of positions open every day and tracing which resume goes to which
job and which HR person can be a nightmare. They also want to know where
you found the job for marketing purposes. (example Re: Job posting
#154671 - Customer service agent found on SeniorJobSearch.com)
First, know the person that you are writing
to. "Dear Sir/Madame:" or "To whom it may concern:"
simply do not accomplish the same thing as "Dear Ms. Walters:"
Use the colon as shown in the previous
paragraph rather than a comma. When addressing a woman, married or not,
use "Ms." rather than "Mrs." or "Miss", even if
you know her marital status. It is considered a proper business salutation
and you eliminate even the smallest risk of trouble.
Always conclude your cover letter with
"Sincerely," followed by your name and telephone number, even if
it is written elsewhere. If printed and sent via mail, your signature
belongs between "Sincerely," and your typed name. Use your
formal name here though middle initials are optional. Never use nicknames.
Before you determine the middle part of the
cover letter, do your research. Know what they do, who their competitors
are, market position. Use this information to determine what you can do
for the company. This isn't where you negotiate
benefits.
