If nothing ever changed, there'd be no butterflies. ~ Author Unknown
One of the many things I have learned from the résumé-writing "school of hard knocks" is this:
Break it down – rebuild it better
Let’s say that you lost your job last Friday and that for 17 years, you have been a vice president of sales for a company, or maybe a customer service manager or a director of widget-making or president of something, or or or ________________ fill-in-the-blank. That job title is about what you were and sometimes, what you were doesn’t connect in any way, shape or form with what you want to be from now on and into the future.
If you are thinking about changing careers and/or going down a new and different career path, then change up your résumé accordingly. By that I mean, build in a “conversion” piece to your resume so that the reader who doesn’t know you, may have a better chance of ‘getting’ you and your story.
The day of presuming that a recruiter, Hiring Manager, decision-maker, (or your Mama) can figure you out has long past, except many job seekers didn’t get the message. Compiling the best résumé in the whole wide world about your past (which has passed) will not bring you a solid R.O.I. if indeed you do not also integrate something about your present and your future -- which brings me to the point of this particular post: does your résumé include a ‘conversion’ section for your reader – the stranger? If it does, that’s excellent! If it does not, perhaps you will consider the line above: break it down – rebuild it better.
In a coaching chat this morning with a client in the southeastern United States, I invited her to do her homework, due diligence, research, investigation – whatever word she desired to affix to the activity of assessing and compiling skills that would convince the reader that she has -- without question -- what it takes to do the job to which she aspires. If she does not build in the résumé conversion component for the reader, sadly for her, in this intensely competitive market, she will most likely go unnoticed, passed up, and passed by.
Whatever your heart’s desire for new employment, especially if it does not connect with your past work experience, do yourself (and your reader) a humongous favor! Build a résumé that delivers a spot-on “wow” message about your credentials and how they align with the employer’s wants and needs.
After you've done a thing the same way for two years, look it over carefully. After five years, look at it with suspicion. And after ten years, throw it away and start all over. ~Alfred Edward Perlman, New York Times, 3 July 1958
posted by billiesucher
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