Recruiters (both HR and agency recruiters) receive tens if not hundreds of resumes a day, each of which must be read, evaluated against current job requirements, processed, clarified and filed.
If you want them to help you find a job, help them do their jobs.
The Common Mistakes
Presented in order of chronology, not severity.
1. Not Following Submission Directions
- Read the directions!
- First Impressions Last
- Email, Fax or Snail Mail?
- Formatted or ASCII Resume?
2. Not Building Personal Relationships
- Develop a personal relationship with your recruiter.
- You want someone who will sing your praises to the next person in the hiring process.
- …especially if you are not an exact match or have some other special situation.
- Plus, when a cool job comes in, who do you think they will call first?
3. Bad Manners
- It’s poor form to mail your resume to 45 recruiters in one email…
- …especially when you display them all in the To: field!
- Keep a log of where your resume has been sent.
- Don’t insult the recruiter. (I’m not kidding – it happens!)
4. Applying When You Are not Even Remotely Qualified
- Don’t apply without considering the requirements.
- Do apply for jobs that are a bit of a stretch, but at least be in the ballpark!
- Don’t do “shotgun” applications.
- Pay attention to the “must have” vs. “nice to have” requirements.
5. Not Summarizing Skills vs. Requirements
- If you are qualified, the recruiter will write a summary of how your skills match the job requirements before passing it on.
- Be pro-active: send a matrix of the job requirements vs. your skills so they don’t have to do it for you.
- If you don’t have one of the needed skills, this is where you say, “I don’t have XYZ, but I do have ABC, which is very similar.”
- Suddenly, you are the recruiter’s best friend:
- They didn’t have to search for the information.
- You typed the summary for them.
- You pointed out important information they may have missed.
- All they had to do is verify the information and pass it on.
6. Misnaming Your Resume
- Remember, recruiters get tens if not hundreds of electronic resumes a day.
- Put yourself in the recruiter’s shoes.
- Would you want to receive 100 resumes a day named “resume.doc”?
- Name your resume so it can be found easily: for example, “Joe Jones.doc”
7. Poorly Writing or Formatting Your Resume
- Your resume is the first sample of your work.
- Managers judge candidates based on their resumes…
- …and will disqualify you if you don’t apply the same standards to your resume that you do your work (attention to detail, “debugging” your resume for typos and inconsistencies, etc.)
- Pay attention to:
- Formatting Consistency
- Readability
- Misspellings
8. Mis-evaluation of Importances
- Highlight your strengths.
- Minimize your weaknesses.
- For example, put the most applicable information, experience or skills near the top of your resume.
- Put less- or non-applicable experience near the bottom.
9. Not Anticipating and Answering Questions
- Recruiters wonder about oddities in resumes, so be pro-active and explain them.
- Examples:
- Gaps in your work history
- Your citizenship or work visa status
- Moving from contract to perm
- Moving from perm to contract (to a lesser degree)
- Need relocation assistance if out-of-state?
10. Not Keeping Your Skills Current
- Not knowing the latest programming languages/authoring tools/etc.
- If you can really just pick them up in a week, how come you haven’t already done so?
- Between user groups, professional associations, conferences, etc., there is no reason not to stay current.
Summary
- Follow submission directions.
- Build personal relationships.
- Use good manners and “Netiquette”
- Apply for jobs for which you are qualified.
- Include a summary of how your skills match the job requirements when submitting your resume.
- Name your electronic resume so it can be identified.
- Make sure your resume is easy to read, free of typos, etc.
- Highlight your strengths, minimize your weaknesses.
- Anticipate and answer questions.
- Keep your skills current.
I’m always happy to hear from my readers, so if you have any questions about how to find a good writer or want to report your successes in doing so, send me an email or call me at the number below!
About the Writer
Jack Molisani has been a project officer in the Space Division of the USAF, the manager of training and documentation of a multi-million dollar software firm, and currently is the president of ProSpring Inc., a technical communication and placement firm, and LavaCon: The International Conference on Technical Communication Management.
He can be reached by phone at 888-378-2333 and by email at [email protected].