The Modern Resume

We live in a very unique age. There is very little privacy in this era of shared personal information. There is quite a bit of electronic information about each one of us on the internet.

We also watch a lot of television and movies, all of which are very high quality. We are inundated by attention getting advertisements from all sources.

Newspapers and magazines are changing dramatically. They shout out to get our attention with big headlines, they provide bits of information and expect us to go on-line to read the rest of the story.

We are challenged to write a resume that is attention getting, but not all of us are good writers. We may spend countless hours trying to wordsmith our resume to make it interesting. The end result is often not very interesting, in fact often it is boring, and worse it may be poorly written. In frustration we post what we have with a vague hope that it will be good enough.

I suggest a resume strategy which borrows from what the newspapers and magazines are doing: use less words and provide just enough information to arouse curiosity. Try to get the reader to call you to learn the real story.

If you ask for opinions on your resume from your colleagues and mentors you are going to get lots of opinions. I suggest that the only opinion that matters is your own. You need to be content with how you have positioned yourself, confident in the content, and your resume needs to be productive in terms of getting interviews. If potential hiring organizations are not contacting you nor researching you on-line, then the primary purpose for your resume is not being met. It is a marketing tool and it’s purpose is to create demand for your services.

How can we get the attention of hiring manager with our resume?

The absolute best way to get the attention of the hiring manager is to have a friend give your resume and a personal endorsement to the manager. The next best way to get the proper attention is to get someone you barely know to walk your resume into his office. You can get people to do this using your winning personality and the fact that they can earn a finder’s fee for their effort.

If your resume starts off with a Summary or Objective which is boring or bland, you may ruin your relationship with the inside connection. The person willing to walk your resume in, might take one look at your resume and refuse to cooperate. Let’s face it, most resumes are boring and are not well written.

I recommend that you do away with trying to wordsmith an opening that starts off describing your, personality or personal characteristics. Simply give your resume the job title that you are applying for. It is the “Headline” for your resume. The reader know immediately what the resume is about.

Follow the job title with a line about the most important thing that you want the reader to know about you. Let’s say that you are a “Sales Engineer” and an expert in certain types of technology and territory. You don’t have to spend a lot of energy crafting some clever statement about your expertise. Use bullets to identify your expertise. Follow your claims of expertise by giving 3 to 5 concrete examples of top accomplishments in your career; examples that prove that you are an expert or prove your competence.

If you are like most people, recalling your top accomplishments gets more difficult as time passes. I give an assignment asking for 20 accomplishments from any period in life that the person is proud of, enjoyed and did well. This starts a process of remembering important events where obstacles we overcome and problems were solved. The process of remembering takes a couple of weeks. I ask people to carry a spiral notebook with them and just jot notes about accomplishments as they go about their day.

It helps to break down accomplishments by period of your life: pre-teen, teenager, Junior High, High School, College, Military, and accomplishments by job. Once your list starts to grow, it sort of takes on a live of its own. It grows and grows.

It is these stories of accomplishments that add interest and set you apart from others seeking the same position. They give you material to answer questions like “tell me about a time when you had to deal with a difficult co-worker?” “When did you fail on a project and then turn around the situation and succeed?”

You will have plenty of material handy for answering behavioral questions.

By listing top accomplishments and expertise, relating to the position you are applying for, at the beginning of the resume you get the reader’s attention – and he or she needs to talk with you to learn more. This is the whole purpose of the resume: get the reader’s attention and an interview.

Most people list their job positions chronologically and give their duties and responsibilities. I copied the list below from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for “Sales Engineers”:

• Prepare and deliver technical presentations explaining products or services to customers and prospective customers
• Confer with customers and engineers to assess equipment needs and to determine system requirements
• Collaborate with sales teams to understand customer requirements and provide sales support
• Secure and renew orders and arrange delivery
• Plan and modify products to meet customer needs
• Help clients solve problems with installed equipment
• Recommend improved materials or machinery to customers, showing how changes will lower costs or increase production
• Help in researching and developing new products

Can you imagine if every resume they got said much the same thing? This is very bland and doesn’t set the job seekers apart. It is much better to list the top sales accounts and competitive wins. They would then see you as a producer, someone that can bring in results.

The best action to take is to come up with a story that proves that you are competent with each of these duties and responsibilities. So let’s take the first bullet:

“Secured a multi-million sale with CVS with a technical presentation to their board proving the value of a bar code ordering system”

A statement like that under each job position gets the reader’s attention and they begin the interview asking questions about your top accomplishments. There isn’t a better way to start an interview.