Re: Resumes - writing your own

["Susan W. Gallagher" <sgallagher -at- EXPERSOFT -dot- COM>]

Sue Ellen Adkins wrote:

>>Each counselor insisted my resume be no longer than one page. That length
>may
>>be fine for new graduates; however, during my twenty years with one
>employer,
>>I had changed jobs every two-three years.  The counselors condensed my
>>experience until I appeared as bland and interesting as distilled water!
>>
>>

And Tom Potter replied...
>I ran into the same problem. After 20+ years in the job market, I had a
>accumulated a varied range of experience. Just summarizing the different
>positions which I was qualified for ran to over five page. The problem is
>that all reviewers (be they harried secretaries or the actual hiring entity)
>looked for buzzwords (a human scanner, I suppose). I was forced to reduce my
>resume to three pages, and I'm sure I lost some positions because of the
>deleted material.


I think the best resume advice I ever received was in "What Color
Is Your Parachute?" Paraphrased, it went sumpthin' like this...

Use your resume to *raise* questions in the reviewers' minds, not
answer them. If you tell them everything they'll ever need (or
want) to know about you, there's no reason for them to contact you.
If, however, you raise a question or two, they'll call you for the
answer. Once you have contact, once you've got their attention, you
can take control... "I'd love to show you that -- when can we meet?"

And, you know, it *really works*!



-Sue Gallagher
sgallagher -at- expersoft -dot- com