As we said in our previous post, When a potential employer looks at a resume, they are looking at a snapshot of the things you have done in the past and trying to make a judgment about your future and if it should be with their company. We propose that a resume should also be a testament to where you are going. Currently the resume uses the objective to accomplish this, but as far as we can tell most of the objectives that are written are completely useless.

Here are the portions of a resume and how we think they should be utilized.

Education:
If you have a formal education you should list it here, but what you should really be highlighting is the things you have done to continue your education after your formal schooling. We like books and a lot of our employees read frequently to increase their knowledge in the areas of their choice. Some people like to take classes. Whatever you are doing, let your future employer know how you are continuing to educate yourself. List the important books you have read. List the classes you have taken. List the relevant things you are doing to make yourself better.

Experience: Work and Volunteer History:
This is where you list the list of things you are doing with your time. You could have been going to school full time, or you could have been working at the gas station. What an employer is looking for here is the type of experience you have so they can determine if you are a good fit for their needs. If your experience doesn’t match up with your education, there should be a good reason why. Once again, this doesn’t have to be limited to the things you have done to make money. You may be amazing at fundraising for your favorite non profit, a skill that is very valuable and most likely doesn’t pay. Putting this at the bottom of your resume or leaving it out all together leaves out a very important part of information about yourself.

Skills:
From your education and your experience comes your skills. The first thing you should know is that in this list, and probably at the top of it, should be “easily learns new skills quickly and is willing to do so”. Why should this be there? As your job grows and the world grows you will most likely need to grow. An employer hates having to find someone new when they like the people they are already working with. If you have a great team today, that team needs to grow with the marketplace. If the rest of the team grows and you don’t, you could be left behind. So make sure you are willing to grow and your future employer knows it.

That said, your skills should be the product of your education and experience. Most people list here the types of software they know how to use (and some that they don’t) and that is all fine and dandy but we recommend breaking these out into three categories: Ones that are required for the job, ones that are above and beyond and skills that aren’t relevant to the job at all. We feel the most aware of your skills you are the better and listing them all honestly will let your future employer know you are honest with yourself about your abilities.

A note about backing up your claims:
We have to say one thing about backing up your claims. If you have a skill that has to be seen to be believed (like breaking boards with your forehead) and that skill is needed to get the job, then you should attach proof of that skill to your resume, or at least leave instructions as to where that proof can be found. In the creative world this is called a portfolio. You can look at our’s here. You don’t have to prove every skill, but make sure you back up your claims when it depends on you getting the job or not.

My Social Accounts:
Here is one that is not traditional, but we feel is a good addition for the future. Most people who are up with the times have social media accounts and most employers who are up with the times are trying to find yours and look at pictures of you out partying with your friends. To save them time, make sure your public presence is readily listed on your resume. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or whatever you use. Even if your accounts are all listed as private, let them know where they can find you. There are a few reasons for this:
1. That way they actually find you, not the other party animal with your name.
2. An employer can see how you act in public and know if you are an asset or a liability. If a company has 10 employees, then you are a good percentage of the face of that company. If you list yourself as employed at Company X, then you are contributing to the social media brand of that company. A good company will want to make sure you aren’t going to make them look foolish on the internet.

References:
Here is our beef with references: people can’t really say anything negative about you and you wouldn’t really list people who would say something negative about you so this section is useless UNLESS you have a large amount of people here. Let’s say that number is 10 and the title of the section is: Here are 10 people that will say that I am awesome. Also, make sure the people you list are relevant to what they are saying about you. Your friend Chuck will say you are an awesome computer programmer, but unless he has used you for a huge project or works in the industry he is probably useless as a reference.

To sum things up, your resume is a list of your education, experience, skills with a little bit of social proof to back that up. Our last point is transparency. We feel that the more honest you are about who you are, the more likely you are to get a job that you like. If you are going to have a core value conflict with your employer then its better to know that up front. Don’t apply at places that you would hate working and be open enough with your resume so that your employer doesn’t have to hire you if they won’t like you. We realize that its against the law to discriminate based upon creed and what not, but thats not your problem. The reality is people judge others for stupid reasons. If you let people know the truth up front, you can avoid people trying to back out of a decision because they are biased. Just be honest about who you are and the rest will take care of itself.

Lastly, this is not a resume designed to make you look better than you are. If you are lame, this resume will be lame, so make sure you are awesome and this resume will get you a job. Need to make it look better? Check out this article on fontografist about designing your resume.

The resume was designed to let an employer know your qualifications so they can make a decision about whether to hire you or not. It lists your objective, your education, your work experience and your skills. You attach a cover letter to let the employer know you have writing skills and the dance begins. If the interview process is a dance, then the resume is the first step. But you know this, so we aren’t here to tell you how to write a better objective. We’re here to suggest some ideas on how you can improve the resume itself.

What does this have to do with advertising? Getting a job is all about advertising yourself, and you can use creative tactics to let people know you will be an asset to their company. We also want to throw up the disclaimer that we are a creative agency, and if you take our suggestions we can’t guarantee it will help you get a job. It might even hurt your chances. The goal of any resume should be to stand out from the crowd and let the user know that you are worth talking to. With that in mind, it’s up to you to take our suggestions and make it work.

We look at the resumes that come into our office and sometimes get quite frustrated. It’s hard to tell if the person is a good fit from a piece of paper or PDF that has a list of things someone may or may not have done. Luckily, we can look at a person’s portfolio and see if they have the drive and skill to fit here. This may not be the case for the job you are trying to get, so we are going to suggest a general content improvement that you can use to land a job. But first, we have to say a few things about strategy. For the general formatting of the resume, you can read about resume design on the fontografist blog. We suggest three strategies:

Strategy One: Research the company you are submitting to.
The person reading your resume will know if you have submitted to 50 companies in rapid fire fashion, or if you spent the time to request a position as a specific company. We realize if you need a job really bad you may see yourself having the time to research, but if you submit to 50 companies that you researched and followed strategy two then you will be out of work for much less time.

Strategy Two: Customize your message for the company you are submitting to.
Your resume is about you and you don’t change right? Your resume is about how your skills would be a good fit for the company you are submitting to. From your research you can develop the message of your resume, so there is no doubt in the person who is reading your resumes mind that your are worth calling for an interview.

Strategy Three: Deliver on the content of your resume.
The first place you are going to have to deliver on the content of your resume is the interview, and if you get the job you will have to continue to deliver. We shouldn’t have to say this, but too many times people beef up their resumes to get an interview and either waste the interviewers time or worse get past the interview and miss on the job. Don’t be this person. If you only have a few skills, make them sound really awesome. If your only skill is learning new skills quickly then make sure that your resume says that and that only.

In short, know your prospect. Research them and then make sure when they read your resume they get an accurate picture of who you are. In our next blog post we will talk about the content of the actual resume and how you can customize it for the job you are trying to get.