Resume Writing: Lay the Foundation for Building your Career

Write a person’s resume, and you will help them get a job. 

Teach a person to write a resume, and you will help them build their career.

Over the last three and a half years, I have reviewed, refined, and rewritten literally hundreds of resumes.  The process could be tedious, especially when I used it as a teaching moment, as was the case with the many resumes that crossed my desk in the Career Office of a business school.

Learning to write a proper professional resume is a rite of passage for an MBA student. We spent a lot of time and resources on it because, being a career-driven degree, a primary measure of the program’s, and a student’s, success is post-MBA employment. (If you are reading this blog, I don’t need to explain the importance of employment to you.) A well-written, visually pleasing resume is still important in this day of electronic media. It is your primary personal career marketing piece.

My perspective is, when you teach a student how to write their resume, you are giving them a life skill.  When I say, “how to write”, I mean more than just giving you a template to use and telling you what font to use in what point size and how wide the margins should be. (BTW, you should always use a basic serif font, such as Times New Roman, never smaller than 10 pt., and margins between .5 and 1 inch…just sayin’.) I mean, how to say what you need to say, and why you need to say it. Yes, you can pay someone to write your resume for you, but you are your own best advocate. No one knows you better than you do.

This brings me to today’s Sign Post: 

Write a person’s resume, and you will help them get a job. 

Teach a person to write a resume, and you will help them build their career.

(Yes, I borrowed a little bit from an old adage, but it's appropriate, don't you think?)

Following  my basic “resume rules,” below, will help you formulate a strong resume and primary career marketing document.  If writing is not your strong suit, I suggest that you get help from someone who can edit your spelling and grammar.  Use a resume template or format that is plain, easy to follow, and leaves plenty of white space on the page. 

Linda’s Resume Rules:

1. Resumes don’t get jobs – they get interviews. The purpose of the resume is to give the prospective employer information that will entice them to call you for an interview.
2. Be honest. Speak the truth and only the truth. Do not embellish. If you’re thinking, “who’s gonna know,” I’m sure that Yahoo’s former CEO has a few minutes to explain the consequences of resume-padding to you.
3. DON’T use an “objective” paragraph at the top of the resume. Frankly, an employer doesn't care what your goals are. It goes without saying that your objective is to get the job to which you’re applying. (Duh.)
4. DO use a “profile” paragraph at the top of the resume. This is a short paragraph that summarizes you as a professional. Think of it as a written elevator pitch – you know, as if you had a 30-second (or in this case, 3-line) elevator ride to tell the prospective hiring manager about yourself.
5. Always list in reverse chronological order. When listing jobs, education, or other activities, list in reverse date order because employers are most interested in your more recent experiences.
6. Write in results-oriented statements. When you are describing a previous position, discuss your work in terms of the results you produced. Your would-be boss wants to know how you can benefit his/her organization, not what your daily to-do list was at your last job.
7. Be brief. Less is more. It’s a resume not a memoir.
8. Tweak it for each position to which you apply. It will be worth the extra 15 minutes to match some key words or phrases in the resume to some from the job description. It connects your skills and experience directly to the position – and HR’s word recognition software will pick your resume out of the googillion resumes in the big black hole where resumes go after you click “Submit”.
9. A resume is a living, breathing document. It grows and changes. Therefore, you are never finished writing it. (Sorry about this one.) Take it out and dust it off periodically; make sure it’s up-to-date with your most recent skills, experience, and education.

What resume tips can you share? Please feel free to post questions, below, as well.

A Tale of Two Bosses: How I Learned the Importance of Organizational Culture

Organizational culture matters. “Fit” is as important to your success as your skills, education, and experience.

Starting at the age of 22, and for the next 13 years, I had the good fortune of working for a young CEO who immersed himself in the art of managing people.  And, boy, was he good at it. I’m pretty sure his success was a result of good self-management. When he spoke, he always came from a position of credibility.

He loved to educate himself and then share what he learned with his staff.  We were expected to do a lot of personal and professional development.  For a young woman who was struggling with her identity, introspection was scary and painful. My initial reluctance was met with a kind of tough love. “You need to work on yourself,” was the message.  It wasn't easy, but I did it.  I’m a better person for it, too; thanks to that young CEO.

Of the many things I learned about myself and about working with other people, the most important lesson was about the standard of behavior of the organization itself. It is a maxim that defined me as a professional, and one that this young CEO created and still embodies today. It is what you can count on from the organization when he is at the helm: “integrity, fairness, and fun”.

• Integrity woven through all internal and external business activities and relationships 
• Fairness and impartiality applied to all people at all levels of operation 
• Fun – “work” does not have to be a four-letter word

This simple, yet powerful philosophy provided an even playing field, or as close to an even playing field as human nature could allow.

Fast-forward several more years into my career.  I’d had a lifetime of experience and accumulated knowledge.  I’d learned a lot more about myself and was comfortable with the woman I’d become. I was working in a different organization and had just started working for a new boss, a/k/a "The Manager".

I never knew how "The Manager" felt about himself, or the people with whom he worked, only how he felt about the tasks at hand. He was impersonal, moody, and curt. A void in the manager-employee relationship was opened, and my expectations for how it should be filled had been set many years before by my experience working for that young CEO.

How did the latter situation compare?  I’d call it a culture clash of extreme proportions.

Integrity? "The Manager" once copied text from a competitor’s web site and tried to pass it off as his own work. Fairness?  I once received a full-page disciplinary email message, followed by a half-hour long phone discussion on my inappropriate use of the word “anxious”, instead of “eager”, in a broadcast email. Fun on the job?  No. “That’s why they call it ‘work’,” was a common quote.

This was a situation for which there was no easy solution.  My attitude suffered, my work suffered. I was miserable.  Don’t let this happen to you.

The young CEO created a culture that made his staff feel important and valued.  He knew that doing this not only benefited the employees, but would also generate their loyalty and commitment.  "The Manager" didn't care about the staff, only the work. He did not generate loyalty or commitment, but bred contempt and suspicion.

All things being equal, as I look for the next position in my career, I know I will be more successful working in an environment like the one created by the young CEO, than in a culture-void like the one created by "The Manager". As you look for your next opportunity, be sure you know in what type of working environment you fit best.

Here’s today’s Sign Post:

Organizational culture matters. “Fit” is as important to your success as your skills, education, and experience.

When you are considering a new position, be sure that you include research into the culture of the company, division, department, team or group – depending on the size of the unit – in which you will be working.  Know, as best you can, what type of working environment you will be entering.

For more ideas, here’s a great article from the HBR.com Blog Network about the importance of organizational culture in your job search and in your success on the job:  "When Choosing a Job, Culture Matters", by Bill Arnett.


What are your thoughts on the importance of organizational culture?

Must Read! "What They Don't Tell You at Graduation" - WSJ.com

I just had to share this insightful article written by Charles Wheelan, which appeared in the April 28th issue of the Wall Street Journal:

"10 Things Your Commencement Speaker Won't Tell You"  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304811304577366332400453796.html?mod=WSJ_Careers_CareerJournal_4

Mr. Wheelan is funny and smart, and dead-on in his wise words to those of you who are about to embark on your first career change - from student to member of the workforce.

Congratulations to all the Graduates in the Class of 2012!

What are your thoughts on Mr. Wheelan's 10 "things" left unsaid at commencement?

With A Little Help From My Friends

“.. a friend is someone who inspires, who challenges, 

who sends you in search of some truer sense of yourself..” 

- Steve Lopez, journalist and author

I like to write.  What I really like is writing for a living...in public relations: in-house, writing for an organization and connecting it to its public.  So, in  the immediate aftermath of my unfortunate higher education employment displacement (wink-wink), I immersed myself in all the PR info I could find in cyberspace...my own form of post-employment stress disorder therapy. One of my best sources is PR Daily, a news feed that comes to my inbox every afternoon.  A recent article, “8 people you need in your network”, by Becky Johns, about building a network for your professional life, was so interesting  and pertinent, I thought I would share it here on my blog.

This brings me to today’s Sign Post: 

“.. a friend is someone who inspires, who challenges, who sends you in search of some truer sense of yourself..” – Steve Lopez, journalist; author, The Soloist: A Lost Dream, an Unlikely Friendship, and the Redemptive Power of Music

Cultivate a broad network of professional "friends" for the unique qualities they possess and bring out in you, just as you've developed personal friendships with people from different times, places and significance in your life.

In her article, Becky Johns identifies 8 different “people” (“friends”) that you should have in your professional support system to help you stay focused and sane:

• The “Cheerleader”: will always be there “to root for you” and will “gather support for you from others.” 
• The “Geek”: will “always know about the newest technologies, the emerging digital trends”, and “what’s next”. 
• The “Peer”: is “like-minded…understands where you’re coming from.” 
• The “Mentor”: can “recognize your potential and help cultivate your talent”. 
• The “Protégé”: who can “look to you for advice will make you feel responsibility toward the success of another.” 
• The “Influencer”: is a “rock star” in your industry. 
• The “Weirdo”: or as one commenter called it, the “artist”, is “a crucial source of inspiration” who can “fuel your right brain”.
• The “Hater”: or as a dear friend of mine referred to himself, the “devil’s advocate”, “won't be afraid to challenge you.”

During my career, I've played many of the roles described above, but, by nature, I am the Cheerleader. What roles have you played? Which one comes most naturally?