Resume Revolution And Why It Needs To Happen

Resume Revolution And Why It Needs To Happen

Look, let's be honest. You and I have both tasted it...

We've been there. We know it. We don't enjoy it one bit. And yet, we are probably more professional at it than we are in our own fields by now - though there is no use in it once you do get a job.

Resume writing... should really not be such a polished, precious and widely advised-on skill.

Can I confess something? The biggest piece of lie I've ever written was my resume. Frown all you want, but judge me dare you? I am supposed to tell you in an A4 format of all of my experiences, education, duties, achievements, interests, aspirations, in a readable font, nicely bullet-pointed, and manage to make the impression on you within the first few lines that I was born for working at your company. Or, most likely, I'll have to make that impression on your secretary, or, hopelessly so, on your computer system, designed by a guy you likely never met and whose sanity you cannot certify.

Employers and recruiters are in no illusion about the "relative truthfulness" of the resumes they receive. They, by contrast, do not tend to take the resume half as seriously as you do your very starting line. So, why are we all doing it this way again?

Because the concept is convenient. Inefficient, long and consuming. But convenient. "I'm saving my time for doing other things," thinks the employer stacking up the resumes to read each for approximately 20 seconds before he takes the next one. "I'm sure one of them will call me, if I apply to a 20 different ones," thinks the candidate, putting 20 recruiters in the hidden copy in the Outlook, as he sends them out.

Employer appoints the interviews only for the first few candidates whose resumes had that key bullet points they were looking for ("computer literacy", "working in fast-paced environment", "passion for XYZ"), and never bothers to read the rest of it. Or he does, but they all start to look the same. The result is the same. The candidate, meanwhile, is overlooked because he is "overqualified", as he has obviously wasted too much time crafting just the perfect interview, and too little time "prioritising".

It is indeed one sad story of an unsuccessful job romance. But would I be presumptuous to say this is much more common scenario, than that of a successful match in the contemporary resume culture?

See, I was never successful in my job applications. I followed every resume advice on the planet, and I also unfollowed them all; I've lied and I've been honest; I've been brief and I've been detailed - and I've sent applications by dozens a day. Still, I only got my jobs through personal connections, and once I was there, I would find it easy to have a promotion after promotion dropping on me through doing the actual work.

Neither have I ever hired anyone from outside, by a resume. No one who could remotely do the job, anyway. I hire only by recommendation now, or if I've met the person face to face before and had a nice general impression of them. Either way, I would not risk putting the future of my child - my company - into the hands of someone who can put their work skills in 10 bullet point!

Do resumes have to go altogether? No. But the recruiting culture needs to revise its dependence on them. Otherwise our culture's systematic unemployment will increase, and the professionals who could contribute the real value, will find it easier to start a business of their own, than get through to you to help build yours. First hand experience...

Dal Jeanis

Splunk Data Consultant | Complex Things, Told Simply

9y

It would seem like if a company knew the top 1 or 2 success factors for a job, and the minimum set of competencies required, then after those minimums are met, you're basically just looking for a personality and culture fit. Letting an ideal image of perfection obstruct and poison your selection process between the good and great candidates is a recipe for mediocrity.

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Dagmar Ueberfeld-Lang

Contracts Manager - Sourcing Execution at TD Bank Group

9y

but until that happens (the dependency on it) employers will demand that that job seekers submit their resumes through the company's designated website, a keyword search program will toss out about 80% of them and unless job seekers know someone who knows someone who knows someone, they will waste precious time on tailoring their resumes over and over and over, but getting no where. ALL my last jobs came through head hunters or recruiters (or, in the new lingo: talent specialists) and my success rate with getting some tractions using the traditional way is less than 1%. Most definitely time for some serious re-thinking.

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this is the top fact .... " Still, I only got my jobs through personal connections " .....you have nicely stated many aspects of a "band-aid" process , perhaps time for a brand new approach ....

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George Lewycky

Application/DB Programmer ▪ Researcher/UV Spectroscopy Atmospheres ▪ Writer ▪ Ecotourist/Naturalist ▪ Celeb Photographer

9y

What about the relative truthfulness of the job, description, culture, hiring manager?

Rebecca Buckwald

Customer Service and Artist

9y

Sending out resumes is some sort of punishment and I not just in my professional life. Since moving from NYC in 2000 to NC with my then IBM husband (now divorced) I am lucky to find a retail job. Something has got to change especially for us forty something's... Ok, close to 50. Bottom line is that I am, along with most, a lost soul with plenty of punch left. Without a network or change STUCK is my future.

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