Friday, June 15, 2007

3 Ways To Tell If Your Resume Sucks - page 4


#3 Reason Your Resume Sucks -
Your Resume Describes Your Experience & Responsibilities


From most candidate's point of view, unless you expect ageism, number of years of experience signifies greater skill. Candidates regularly assume that listing 25 years of experience performing a job function means that you're really good at that job.

Most hiring mangers and candidates don't interpret experience in the same way. In a sense, they aren't speaking the same language. You may have been performing at a minimal skill level for 25 years, or you may have been a guru for 25 years - a hiring manager can't determine how talented you are at a skill merely by the number of years you've been practicing it.

Your next hiring manager wants to see your accomplishments - how you solved problems and provided value to your past employers. Yet, the majority of resumes feature experience over accomplishment.

This goes back to how we were taught to write resumes - as an autobiography. To make matters worse, hiring managers often do not give full disclosure in their advertisements, listing years of experience as a proxy for the accomplishments they truly seek.

Do you really think that the number of years you've performed a job gives an indication of how well you've performed it? Does it tell your reader how much money you will earn the company if they hire you?

Even listing responsibilities give a very different perception than accomplishments. Listing your responsibilities makes a candidate look passive, while listing accomplishments gives the perception that you actively managed projects. Accomplishments look hands-on, while responsibility give the impression that others did all the work while you sat on your butt, pushing paper.

Which way do you think your background looks more desirable?

For more information about how to better incorporate accomplishments into your resume, even if you are a rookie, see (http://recareered.blogspot.com/2010/04/experience-vs-accomplishments.html.


Does your resume suck? Just by changing these 3 things on your resume will make it far more effective, make you stand out above your competition, and help you gain more interviews.

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For access to more information:
Become a fan of reCareered on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Chicago-IL/reCareered/21126045429
Join Career Change Central on Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/1800872

Related Articles:
3 Things Your Next Employer Will Search For On Your Resume
Your Resume's 4 Audiences: Best of reCareered

Email your request to phil.reCareered@gmail.com to enroll in a free group teleseminar "Accelerate Your Job Search - tools you can use".

Source: http://reCareered.blogspot.com

Page: <1> <2> <3> <4>

Like this article?
Subscribe here and have daily tips delivered to your email.
or delivered to your RSS reader.

For access to more information:
Become a fan of reCareered on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Chicago-IL/reCareered/21126045429
Join Career Change Central on Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/1800872

Related Articles:
3 Things Your Next Employer Will Search For On Your Resume
Your Resume's 4 Audiences: Best of reCareered

Email your request to phil.reCareered@gmail.com to enroll in a free group teleseminar "Accelerate Your Job Search - tools you can use".

Source: http://reCareered.blogspot.com

2 comments:

Whitney said...

enjoyed greatly. thanks many for your time, phil. bookmarking and sharing.

best,
whitney

Unknown said...

Great wisdom! Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us!