Show me someone who advocates looking for a job by the seat of your pants and I will show you someone who is unemployed.  Gentle reader, a game plan doesn’t have to be a complicated flow chart or something constraining.  A simple agenda is all we are talking about.  The means which people use to find their next job will be as varied as the people themselves. What works for Bob may not work for Ann, however anything that helps both Bob and Ann keep their head on straight and objectively plan and implement their job search will work for both of them.

I work with a lot of job seekers and I often advise them to work with  job listings and recruiters first.  Most people are not used to writing or even looking for a job for that matter. This is the reason that I advise them to, initially, work the job boards. They have to get in the groove of selling themselves and that like many things this will take practice. While networking is touted as the best means of getting a job, it is better to make a mistake/faux pas on your job search in the anonymity of cyberspace than it is to make a mistake networking with your next door neighbor.

The recruiters will serve as pseudo-career coaches because when you meet with a recruiter, that recruiter can give you a lot of advice on honing your resume and helping you sell yourself. Granted, a cannot recruiter provide the comprehensive feedback that a career coach can provide. However, when you work with a recruiter you are, so to speak, their product, and they have a vested interest in helping you convince employers that you are the candidate of choice. Recruiters are battle hardened professionals and they have much to gain by helping you get a job offer.

After job seekers prep their skills with job boards and recruiters, I encourage them to start working their network. They will be much better at selling their qualifications after getting some exposure to recruiters and job boards. Planning/implementing your job search is important.  Write down, how many jobs you will apply to on the job boards.  Commit to sitting down face to face with recruiters in an effort to get their feedback on your marketability.  Beg them to shoot straight with you  if you have to – just get the facts. Come up with a plan that allows flexibility to create more resumes and tweak each one depending on the requirements solicited.  Schedule time to meet with your networking groups.  Finally – and this is so important – review the plan and change it.  You know, like wash, rinse, repeat.

Show me someone who advocates looking for a job by the seat of your pants and I will show you someone who is unemployed.

As job seekers work with different channels, their job search skills need to evolve and get stronger. They need to build upon a foundation and pay dividends. The job search for most job seekers is a crap shoot where you put your chips on the table and roll the dice. As the job search progresses they think they are becoming better job seekers, but in actuality they are just becoming better gamblers. It is still a losing game and is leading job seekers down a path of dejection and despondency. They can’t see that because they have no plan nor a record of a an implementation to give themselves or a mentor/career coach an objective view as to what they have been doing.   Write down your goals, write down your agenda, and stick to it until it is time to reevaluate it.

John Coffey is the President of JobTabs, LLC.  Through JobTabs Job Search & Resume, thousands of job seekers have taken control of their destiny in finding new and fulfilling careers.  JobTabs Job Search & Resume motivates job seekers by making the job search easier by a huge order of magnitude.  John Coffey can be reached via his website at JobTabs Job Search & Resume, by email via jpcoffey at jobtabs.com, as well as by phone at 404-255-0248.

Employ a tool when job searching. You can google “job search software” or go to download.com and type in “job search” to evaluate packages as there are lots of them out there.  We suggest keeping the following key points in mind when weighing the value of different packages.

MS Word. A first rate tool will be seamlessly integrated with MS Word or employ a word processor that will create MS Word documents.  In addition to making you look more professional, many employers prefer resumes in MS Word format.  You should make this a consideration a priority when looking for a tool.

Manage Resumes. As you pursue different opportunities, there will invariably be some shade of gray of the job requirements that you will need to include in your resume.  The likelihood of finding a job that mirrors your experience exactly will be few and far between.  A professional caliber tool will be able to manage all of the different resumes you have created to qualify yourself for different positions.  A tool that will keep a history of each resume as it changes over time will be an added plus.

Employ Templates. We firmly believe cover letters should be tailored to each and every job.  However, do you really want to type your salutation, address and closing paragraph every time?  The repetitive nature of the job search can sap job seekers of their motivation and you should consider a tool that will allow you to side step any work that smacks of repetition.

Jobs. Whether you find the job on the web or through your professional network you will need to capture every detail you possibly can – permanently.  If the employer gets enough resumes and they pull the job posting off of monster.com will you be able to remember the details of the listing?  Consider a tool that can capture listings and save them permanently.

Details. If you are serious about your job search, you will want to have a copy of every email you send anybody during the course of your job search.  This should include notes of every conversation you have as well.  You should be able to catalog all of your research on each employer and have it at the ready as well.

Automatic. This final consideration, we cannot emphasize enough.  Employ a tool that automates the job search as much as possible.  In other words, if you have to log every job search activity you do, aren’t you just working with a glorified spreadsheet?  Isn’t that what you were doing before?  If you send an email and you have to make a note of it aren’t you just adding to your burden?  If you change your resume and have to make a note of it aren’t you encumbering yourself unnecessarily?  We emphasize this, because most people are not prepared for the considerable amount of effort they are going to have to put forth to find the job that is going to bring them the happiness they are looking for.  Repetitive, mind numbing work is what so many people dread when looking for a job.  Employ a tool that can do it for you.  Unless you can nullify much of the administrative burden, you are going to be belaboring yourself unnecessarily.  To summarize,

• When you find a job you want to pursue, there should be no cutting and pasting.  You should be able to save it automatically.
• When you create a new resume from an existing resume, it should be added to your arsenal of resumes automatically.  When you change a resume, you should be able to continue your job search without having to record any changes you made to that resume.  Yet you should still have all of the details of the prior versions in case a prior recipient wants to review it with you.
• When you want to edit your resume, it should open up in MS Word or a word processor of that caliber automatically and keep a record of the changes so you don’t have to.
• Every time you send an email it should be logged automatically.  This will allow you to focus on your job search.
• You should have a bird’s eye view of your status of every one of your job applications – based not on your ability to log events – but based on what you have accomplished in  your job search.

Above all else, you should not have to log a single thing, because to do so would be to tax yourself even more.  No doubt this is a tall order to fill, but these tools are out there and they can be had for less than $50.  Our favorite is JobTabs Job Search & Resume.  JobTabs fulfils all of these requirements and then some.  Alternatively, you can google “job search software” or go to download.com to search for options.   Liberate yourself from the administrative conundrum of the job search.  You will be able to apply to jobs more easily, gain more confidence, and ultimately get better job offers.

John Coffey is the President of JobTabs, LLC.  Through JobTabs Job Search & Resume, thousands of job seekers have taken control of their destiny in finding new and fulfilling careers.  JobTabs Job Search & Resume motivates job seekers by making the job search easier by a huge order of magnitude.  John Coffey can be reached via his website at JobTabs Job Search & Resume, by email via jpcoffey at jobtabs.com, as well as by phone at 404-255-0248.

Dirt bag

Bernard Madoff is one of the biggest dirt bags in history.  He bilked individual investors out of their life savings.  He bilked retirement funds out of money to pay pensions.  He bilked noble charities out of every last dime they had.

I cannot imagine ever learning anything from a low life such as Bernard Madoff.  All the same, when he wanted to be someone’s investor he had no trouble getting the interview and then getting the job.  As a mentor to job seekers, it is incumbent upon me to assess how he was able to get one job offer after another.

1.  Madoff had a track record of success. Consistent returns year over year.  Granted, Madoff was not good at being an investor. The returns were all a pack of lies but in the absence of being arrested or being outed by someone who did their due diligence his track record was accepted at face value.  Does your resume reflect your success in your professional capacity?  Are you making sure that your references are attesting to your talent?  Are you mentioning those commendations you received from management?

2.  Every body knew that Bernard Madoff had the outstanding track record.  Because he blogged? No, Madoff’s returns were public and he paid on his returns as well.  Sadly, he didn’t pay from yields of prudent investments, but paid out using the money of new investors. Our message is that Madoff was visible.  Personally, I had never heard of Madoff until the scandal broke out, but in the investment community he was a well known superstar. Is there something you as a job seeker can be doing to make yourself more visible  Are there articles you can contribute to magazines or online forums that can heighten your visibility as a knowledgeable professional?  Have you considered blogging about your area of expertise?

3.  He networked very well. Madoff did not win new clients with fancy ads on TV or in the newspaper.  Madoff was connected to the people who could help him advance his agenda.  He was a was a member of the Palm Beach Country Club among many others.  He hobnobbed with the rich and famous and he milked his network for all it was worth.  Are you connected to people in your area of expertise?  Are you respected in that network?  Are you helping others as well as asking for help?

4. He exuded confidence. Madoff had the grace and charm of of a pedigreed royal.  People wanted to be associated with him.  He smiled.  He was cool, calm, collected, and confident.  Would that describe you?  Are you crying in your beer or are you beaming with optimism because you are so jazzed about those seven jobs you applied to just yesterday?  Are you helping others feel better about themselves and encouraging them to be positive?  Are your actions and your words in sync?

5.  He did not disqualify himself. Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme, yet accepted billions from investment firms, banks and otherwise prudent business people.  Wouldn’t investors with this kind of money have armies of accountants and financial analysts descending on Madoff’s firm every quarter or at least watching his every move given they had billions invested with him?  Obviously not.  Madoff did not disqualify himself from managing the resources of financial juggernauts even though he was completely illegal.  Assuming you are a law abiding, hard working professional, are you disqualifying yourself from jobs could be applying to?  Are you rationalizing as to why they will never hire you?  Are you disqualifying yourself from applying to jobs you find exciting?  Are you afraid to put your best foot forward and let them know how good you are at doing what you do?

In closing, Bernard Madoff is a good-for-nothing crook.  If he had been legal he really would have been a superstar investor.  The scrutiny that the media has put on him shows exactly how he would have attained that success.  If you are good, everybody knows you are good, you are well networked, you exude confidence and you do not disqualify yourself; you can be a superstar in your area of expertise.

John Coffey is the President of JobTabs, LLC.  Through JobTabs Job Search & Resume, thousands of job seekers have taken control of their destiny in finding new and fulfilling careers.  JobTabs Job Search & Resume motivates job seekers by making the job search easier by a huge order of magnitude.  John Coffey can be reached via his website at JobTabs Job Search & Resume, by email via jpcoffey at jobtabs.com, as well as by phone at 404-255-0248.

Billy Mays didn’t write this post, but he serves as the backdrop for resourceful ways to sell yourself on the job search.

There are all kinds of subtleties at play during the process of selling.  You need look no further than the ads that abound on CNN and late night TV.   Personally, I find these ads demeaning.  The sales pitch is so overwhelming it is as if they are focusing on creating a knee jerk reaction on behalf of the user to pick up the phone and buy the product.  The most prolific seem to be these ads featuring Billy Mays, the purveyor of

• Mighty Mendit
• Mighty Putty
• HandySwitch
• Steam Buddy
• and a host of other handy dandy items.

I have studied these ads intently.

What can I glean from these ads that would help the taberatti (people who use JobTabs) land their next job?

Common to all of these sales pitches, whether it is Billy Mays or someone else, is invariably,

“This product is amazing!”
“If you order now I will double/triple the offer!”
“But wait there’s more, I will throw in this handy dandy gizmo absolutely free!”

If you think about it, these are all resourceful ways to sell yourself on the job front.  Let’s have a closer look.

This product is amazing! The message is that this is a product that delivers solutions.  There are compelling videos of people struggling without their product and then showing satisfied people who are using the product.

Let the value you impart as an excellent candidate be unmistakable.  Here is how you do this.

1.  Present yourself as a problem solver.  Much like the videos, use your resume to paint a picture of problems that were not being solved and how the company was suffering.  Then you came in and solved the problems and everybody was happy.  This is the P.A.R. (Problem – Action – Results) approach to writing your resume.

2.  Quantify the impact you had on the solution.  What percentage did sales increase?  How many dollars did you save?  You don’t have to do a business school case study to get these numbers.  Use the best resources available to you and roll with it.

3.  Sprinkle the commendations and accolades you have received from management to let the person reading your resume know that you are good at what you do.

Be sure you understand the professional demands of the position you are applying to.  There are often challenges faced in one company that have been overcome in another.  Be sure that your exposure in the field is rounded enough so as not to disqualify you from consideration.  Make an effort to research the company and find out what challenges they are up against.  The best thing you can do is put your talent in the context of the specific challenges the company is facing to the best of your ability.

If you order now, I will double the offer. The goal is to create a sense of urgency.

Don’t be afraid to create a sense of urgency.  This can be a powerful motivator for employers to give your candidacy serious consideration now.  It is important to note that this has to be done with tact.  Too urgent could disqualify your candidacy because the administrative process cannot move fast enough.  Not urgent enough, will cast doubt on how urgent all of this really is.  In your cover letter, you can mention that you are getting a great response from companies looking for your qualifications, but working at XYZ Corp. is the fit you are looking for.  Examples,

“The breadth of my hands on experience in the  field has garnered more interest from employers than I had initially anticipated given the economic downturn.  As much as I appreciate their interest, I firmly believe working at XYZ Corp would be the best fit for me.  Simply put, I have the experience to leverage the breadth of the product line to give key advantages to XYZ customers that competing firms cannot offer.  As confident as I am that I could deliver results for XYZ, I would not want any delays in the hiring process to impact my candidacy with other employers who are more forthcoming with their interest.    If we could meet this Friday . . . “

“My success at delivering results has garnered more interest from employers than I had initially anticipated given the economic downturn.  As much as I appreciate their interest, I firmly believe working at XYZ Corp would be the best fit for me.  Companies want increased sales and that is what I do best.  I would not want any delays in my candidacy for this position to be construed as ambivalence by other employers who are ready to move more quickly.    If we could meet this Friday . . . “

“My ability to think outside the box and deliver innovative solutions has garnered more interest from employers than I had anticipated given the economic downturn.  As much as I appreciate their interest, I firmly believe I can lend the most value to XYZ Corp.  While every company needs structure and deadlines to succeed, XYZ Corp has long had a reputation for fostering innovation and creativity and this is an environment where I thrive.  As confident as I am that I could have a huge impact at XYZ, I do not want to put off any employers who have made their interest in my innovation and creativity readily apparent.  If we could meet this Friday . . . “

But wait there’s more, I will throw in this handy dandy gizmo – absolutely free! The message is that if you buy this product, you will get more than what you pay for.

We are hardly suggesting that you work for half price.  We are suggesting that you stress the extra value you are bringing to the table above and beyond what they are looking for.  Remember, it is not incumbent upon the employer to draw the conclusion that you are bringing a lot to the table.  For example, if you have a Masters Degree in Management don’t count on your employer saying, “Hey, this candidate has a Master’s degree.  This will provide a better foundation for her judgement.” It is incumbent upon you, the job seeker, to tie the extra value you are bringing to the table with what they are looking for.  Sell it. For example, in your cover letter for a Product Manager position you can say something like,

“My immersion in Boston University’s  M.S. in Management program allowed me to understand organizational behavior and the signposts to look for as a product line evolves.  In addition to leading the product team more prudently, I will be set able to set realistic goals as well as avoid pitfalls that have beset lesser companies.”

In closing, getting a job is going to require some level of salesmanship.  While we readily discourage the use of any knee-jerk, impulse buy sales tactics, there are some subtleties in this approach that you can use to improve your candidacy for the jobs you apply to.  Give your candidacy an edge and sell yourself.  Did I miss any other part of the sales pitch?  Let me know and I will fill in the gaps!

Alison Doyle from About.com

Randall Hansen of QuintCareers.com

Susan Joyce of Job-Hunt.org

Some people are obviously paying attention.  We have seen wonderful examples of well written resumes that incorporate our basic recommendations as well as the recommendations of other professionals.  Sadly, for many, for all of the effort that has been put into writing the resume it manages to read like a military specification for a lug nut.  Our last article in this five part series covers selling your self as a competent professional who is appreciated by his subordinates, peers and management.  Glow.  Bring your resume alive by taking the following cues,

Make it apparent that you do your job well
Read the bullets from your most recent job and ask yourself one extremely important question, “Could some guy who got fired for doing my job badly say the same thing?” Really, look at your resume and ask yourself that question.

To illustrate our point, let’s look at some of the bullets that a SEC Auditor of Bernard Madoff, LLC could put on his resume,

• Audited the books of major Wall Street investment firms for trading irregularities.
• Investigated investment banking compliance with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and FTC trading regulations.
• Conducted detailed investigations based on transaction anomalies and whistle blower reports.
• Monitored trading transaction streams for key variances that would point to a breach in normal trading behavior.
• Worked closely with federal agencies to include the Department of Commerce, Office of the Treasury and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
• Apprised upper managements of audit schedules and resolutions.
• Oversaw a staff of nine accountants.

For those of you unfamiliar with the case, as of this writing Bernard Madoff is accused of having masterminded the largest Ponzi scheme in Wall Street history.  He emerged unscathed from as many as four SEC audits all the while bilking investors of more than $50 billion dollars.  Yes, that is ‘b’ as in boy, $50 billion dollars.  That Bernard Madoff is a crook is of secondary importance.  What is of primary importance is that the SEC auditor of his books can’t possibly profess to have done a decent job yet can still put together a respectable resume even though the biggest crook in Wall Street history waltzed right under his nose.

Don’t be afraid to sprinkle some color to let it be known that you do your job well.  For those subjective issues which you cannot quantify, you can complete bullet points with statements such as,

“Commended by management for demonstrating a clear understanding of regulatory procedure.”
“Received a non-periodic raise for performance.”
“Evolved as the go to contact for all issues pertaining to database architecture.”
“Mentored junior sales associates on working within the system to accomplish their professional goals.”
“Conducted workshops for peers on advanced programming techniques.”

A common approach to let the reader of your resume know that you perform your job well is the Problem – Action – Result (PAR) approach.  This acronym varies from CAR (Challenge – Action – Result) to SAR (Situation – Action – Result) but the emphasis is still the same.  Describe the Problem, the Action you took to fix it and the benefit that Resulted from that action.  I will cover this in greater detail future blog posts.

Come across as a person who is easy to work with.
Remember, if your resume bores the reader, then they are not going to be able to appreciate your accomplishments.  Add some color which brings you out as a person and and draws their interest.  Consider,

“Oversaw the United Way fund drive for our division.  Raised over X dollars by . . . . .”  Suggests you have a heart.

“Mentored junior peers on succeeding in the organization by working inside the system.”  This is a subtle way of making you look like a kinder, gentler employee as well as allaying any concerns that you will be an organizational anarchist if you do not get your way.

“Received non-periodic raise for outstanding performance.”  This suggests that you work hard, get results and please your superiors.

These are our examples, but you get the picture.  Whatever you have done that would instill confidence that you are a nice person who works within the system will do wonders. These are the testimonials which can vault your candidacy to the top of the resume stack.  Whether you got the interview via a network connection, a recruiter or by knocking on doors, chances are there were plenty of candidates to choose from.  Once you can prove you are qualified, the next concern on everybody’s mind is whether or not you are going to do your job well and fit in.  This is just as important as having the right credentials.  The right credentials is only the first hurdle; the assessment as to whether or not you will be a valuable and respected member of the team is a much larger hurdle.

John Coffey is the President or JobTabs, LLC the makers of JobTabs Job Search & Resume.  Working as an IT Contractor for over fifteen years, he has the distinction of having been a professional job seeker.  His success in the job search process and the computer program he wrote to manage his job search became the basis for JobTabs Job Search & Resume.  He can be reached at jpcoffey@jobtabs.com or the JobTabs website at http://www.jobtabs.com.

Allow us to illustrate.  Let’s say someone in HR is looking for a self-starter, capable of working independently for an engineering project.  If they typed in “self-starter” and “works independently” they would belabor themselves with sifting through the resumes of every former nursery school teacher, grounds keeper, sous-chef, and Phd candidate who would describe themselves in the same way.  However, if they were to use the nouns which would unmistakably confine them to the genre of professional they were looking for – which is exactly what they do – then they would have much more pertinent results.

Nouns like that describe job titles work well.
Integrated Circuit (IC) Design Engineer
Quality Assurance Engineer

Nouns that describe constraints work very well.
“. . . in compliance with MIL-STD-9858 and MIL-SPEC-2207.”
“. . . in compliance with Sarbanes-Oxley.”

Nouns that have acronyms as well as the acronym spelled out.
“Designed Printed Circuit Boards (PCB) to modulate . . . .”
“Designed Unmanned Vehicle System (UVS) to explore . . .”

Nouns that describe tools.
“Developed solution using MS Visual Studio C# to . . .”
“Utilized the Fabius GS, and Narkomed 6400 gas machines in operating room . . . .”

Not only do you need killer nouns you need lots of them.  Once the search engine finds the keyword it will typically sort resumes in order of relevance.  Computers qualify poorly, but quantify magnificently.  This means they can’t read, but they can count.  Therefore, which ever resume has the highest number of keywords is the most qualified candidate for the search terms.  That seems like a pretty inefficient way to find the best person for the job, however that is how it is done and until something better comes along this is the constraint you have to work within.

To make the best of the situation, do what you can to have plenty of the right words in your resume without ruining ease with which it can be read by people.  This is tactful repetition and tactful repetition is a good thing.  One way to do this is to summarize keywords at the bottom of your employment period with each employer.  You can do this by listing the tools you used, the technology you were exposed to, or the constraints you were in compliance with.  Again, the emphasis here is to move your resume higher in the search results so that they will look at you more closely.  Just make the information you summarize pertinent so as not to bore the reader or waste valuable space where you can sell your accomplishments.

This is a resourceful way of making sure you get enough of the keywords to make you a more relevant candidate.  Another way of doing this is to simply have a summary of keywords at the end of your resume for the explicit purpose of making it easy for search engines to find you.  Be careful.  Some recruiters will strip these lists out under the impression that you are trying to game their system.

In closing, the right nouns are there to raise your visibility.  Above all else your resumes need to show you doing your job and doing your job well.  The final piece in our five part series is the importance of bringing your resume to life.

• Pick up a can of WD-40®, a common household lubricant, and you will read, “Stops Squeaks”, “Protects Metal”, “Loosens Rusted Parts”, and “Frees Sticky Mechanisms”.
• Pick up a box of Ziploc® sandwich bags and you will read, “Keep your sandwich fresh by…”, “Use sandwich bags to decorate cakes. Fill the bag with icing…”, and “Fill sandwich bags with….”
• Pick up almost anything under the kitchen sink and you will read, “Cleans, Disinfects, Polishes, Shines”.

While these products have little to do with each other they all have one thing in common. They define their qualities with proactive verbs at the beginning of the sentence. These are facets of salesmanship that are all around us yet they are so subtle we rarely take notice. JobTabs makes it easy for you to leverage this same form of salesmanship in your resume to convey yourself as a can do candidate.

The JobTabs word processor provides an action verb dialog, shown to the left, which lists powerful action verbs that can put your resume in overdrive. The verbs, with very little duplication, are grouped by nine cross-disciplinary categories which are,

Communication Skills

Creative Skills

Financial Skills

Helping Skills

Management/Leadership Skills

Organizational Skills

Research Skills

Teaching Skills

Technical Skills

What makes this collection of verbs so special is that they are ideally suited to resumes. Specifically, they are proactive, positive verbs that can easily be understood. What’s more is the verbs can be used across many disciplines. For example, just because you are in the financial services industry doesn’t mean that you have to confine your choice of verbs to the Financial Skills category. No doubt there were times when you had to help others, be creative, or use your analytical skills to solve a technical problem. You can pull action verbs from the respective categories to help you qualify your accomplishments.

For what its worth, we were surprised by the appalling quality of action verbs offered by competing products on the web. They offered a large number of verbs, but didn’t seem to have done anything to make sure they were resume grade, top quality verbs.  For example, one product offered “Abandoned” in their list of action verbs. What proactive, can-do person would ever abandon anything? A proactive, can-do person would have,

• “Optimized resources which increased profitability by 8%.”
• “Reprioritized projects to maximize productivity, by…”

Optimizing and reprioritizing imply that something had to put in the back seat or possibly abandoned altogether, but you would never openly state that you abandoned anything. Always apply discretion to anything you put on your resume or seek the guidance of someone who can help you.

Consider also, that typically the employing managers were not hired to screen and bring in new applicants as an end unto itself. They were hired to manage a team to accomplish something on behalf of the company. While they know that hiring the right people is very important, managers are still likely to regard the process as an administrative burden.

Your resume needs to cut to the chase and instill confidence from the get go. The employing managers would really like to get back to work with as much peace of mind as you can give them.

Let’s say we have an auto mechanic who excels at working on transmissions. He is applying to a job at the Mercedes dealership for a Transmission Specialist. Let’s consider the bullet points he could use to sell himself. First read the bullet points below in their entirety, then read them again. They do an adequate job of presenting his skills.

Transmission Specialist – Original Bullets

• Successfully repaired transmissions of domestic and foreign manufacturers.
• Generated additional business by calling customers with vehicles on recall and offering to do the repairs.
• Conducted training seminars on BMW transmissions to the local BMW Enthusiasts club.
• Received training from a wide range of vendors on the particulars of their products to include body repair, power train products to tire balancing.
• Repaired alternators for Range Rovers by learning to read complex wiring diagrams specific to Range Rovers.
• Completed all work within the allotted man-hour requirements of the company 97% of the time.
• Completed advanced transmission instruction at DeVry Technical College.

Now read the bullet points he is using now that he is using JobTabs.

Transmission Specialist – JobTabs Bullets

• Successfully repaired transmissions of Mercedes, Porsche, BMW, Volkswagen, and Audi among others.
• Participated in the fuel pump replacement recall for the Daimler 123SE.
• Conducted training seminars on BMW transmissions to the local BMW Enthusiasts club.
• Received training from Bosch on the specifics of clutch degradation and the materials manufactured by Bosch to prolong clutch life.
• Completed training from Heinrichs GMBH on the variations of transmission fluids and the considerations for using each type.
• Completed all work within the allotted man-hour requirements of the company 97% of the time.
• Completed instruction on the new Advanced Overdrive Technology pioneered by Daimler Chrysler in an advanced transmission training class at DeVry Technical College.

As an aside, the reference to Porsche, BMW, Volkswagen and Audi among others adds value of the mechanic’s experience. The nature of automobile manufacturing is very nepotistic in that manufacturers on each continent by and large procure from manufacturers on that continent. Just as US automakers procure from US manufacturers, the European automakers procure from each other, e.g. it is unlikely any of these manufacturers procure spark plugs from any other source other than Bosch.

The JobTabs bullets differ from the original resume on several considerations. The JobTabs bullets intimate the mechanic to the needs of the Mercedes automobile. While the mechanic is not misrepresenting himself on either resume, on the JobTabs resume he is clearly intimating himself to all things Mercedes and downplaying a connection to anything else. By doing so, he is much more likely to appear as a Mercedes transmission expert. Clearly gone is any reference to Range Rover wiring diagrams. Instead of generalizing the training he has received from vehicle suppliers, he clearly specifies the training he has received related to transmissions or from European suppliers. Even the advanced training class he took is skewed to the demands of his prospective employer.

One of the best articles I have ever read on the importance of tailoring your resume is,

Don’t Make Them Think! from the job-hunt.org web site.

Author Susan Joyce, admonishes job seekers to not make them remember as well.  I agree!

This job candidate has an edge. He has worked smarter – not harder. The organizational chaos that would usually result from this level of detail is nonexistent. If this job application doesn’t materialize, at the very least he certainly has a new arrow in his quiver with which he can use to easily qualify himself for new opportunities. To illustrate, if the Volkswagen dealership began canvassing for a new Transmission Specialist how many bullet points would need to be modified to make our applicant an ideal candidate? Only two,

• Participated in the fuel pump replacement recall for the Daimler 123SE.
• Completed instruction on the new Advanced Overdrive Technology pioneered by Daimler Chrysler in an advanced transmission training class at DeVry Technical College.

While the mechanic would have to draw from his experience with Volkswagen automobiles to intimate himself to the Volkswagen job requisition, even these two bullet points are not too far off from what Volkswagen might want.  As we have stated and will continue to state, the more you qualify yourself for new opportunities the easier it will be to qualify yourself for subsequent opportunities. At the risk of being very bold, the job search will actually be fun.

Creating a slew of resumes this specific and being able to readily gather and sell the gist of the resume, would normally be untenable without a tool. While anyone can start out extremely organized, eventually the labor of maintaining that level of oversight for a prolonged period is simply too taxing.  Invest in a tool to help you with your job search – the other people competing for the interview already have.

In this first article we are going to provide a brief overview of the general structure of a bull’s eye resume.  The main benefit of the structure is to let the resume reader know that the search for their candidate is over.  You are the candidate they are looking for.  In the following articles we will go into greater detail as to what you need to do to make sure you are called in for the interview.

Go Funky.  Go Chrono.
Prior to the arrival of the internet, the chronological resume and the functional resume were the predominant format.  The chronological resume listed your professional experience in reverse chronological order, that is from your most recent job to the earliest.  Functional resumes were used to put an emphasis on talent and remove the emphasis on time and often favored by older job seekers trying to avoid age discrimination.

Then the internet happened.  Like a giant meteor exploding into Yucatan peninsula the world was turned upside down and life as we knew it would never by the same.  The one and only resume format we would recommend is the functional chronological hybrid.  Simply put, the internet has opened a floodgate of candidates for every posted job out there.   Employers don’t have time to review your work history and contemplate how that experience will translate into value in their organization.

The functional-chronological  is essentially a combination of both the functional resume and the chronological resume.  The beauty of it is it makes it easy for you to sell the gist of your qualifications in the top half of the first page of your resume thereby making your candidacy relevant.  Done properly, this will invite the reader to read your resume critically and appreciate the talent you are bringing to the table.

The top portion of the functional-chronological resume is made up of the Professional Objective, the Professional Summary, followed by your professional experience.

Professional Objective
Add a Professional Objective statement at the top of every resume.  It has to be a clear statement that is inline with what the employer is looking for.  Do not state the exact job title and don’t feel like you can’t add a little bit extra if just to sound authentic.  If they are looking for,

“Department store manager with strong accounting skills.”

You can still say,

“Seeking a position as a department store manager.  Prefer environment which would allow me to leverage my education in accounting, finance, and audits.”

You don’t want to give them the impression that you typed up your resume in response to their job posting, although that is exactly what you should do for every job you apply to.  Just don’t make it obvious.  Let’s say this same candidate is applying for a similar position seeking different qualifications such as,

“Boutique store manager who understands the volatile world of women’s fashion.”

That candidate would say,

“Seeking a position as a store manager on the cutting edge of women’s fashion.”

The advantage of having a clear and concise professional objective is that it ,

• Presents you as a goal oriented professional.  You know what you want and are going for it.  This is good!

• It invites the reader to critically read your resume.  If the objective statement is inline with what they are looking for, they will read on.

Believe me, if you have all the credentials they are looking for they would rather bring you in for an interview instead of reading the other 497 resumes that are piled up on their desk.

Professional Summary.
Provide a brief summary after your Professional Objective as to why you are so good at what you do.  Remember, when people review resumes they typically have the attention span of a gnat.  Be an in-your-face qualified candidate. This is where you are going to get the most value from the research you have done on the company, the position and the decision maker.  Again, your strategy here is to hit them right smack between the eyes with the fit they are looking for.

A department store manager applying to the position seeing strong accounting skills would probably provide some bullet points along the lines of,

• Successful department store manager distinguished with year over year increases in same store retail traffic.

• Commended for successfully meeting all corporate audits with over 98% compliance for twelve years.

• Outstanding forecasting skills demonstrated by integrating store traffic, mall, municipal and macro economic components.

While our hypothetical department store manager was involved in all aspects of running the store, she knows she needs make the value she can bring to the prospective employer readily apparent.  Even though her forecasting skills are not intimately associated with accounting, they have the analytical slant that will give the impression that she can crunch the numbers when she has to.  Again, anything short of being a stellar candidate is not an option.

In closing surely you are thinking, “Why would this person emphasize their accounting skills on one resume and then her knack for understanding the cutting edge of women’s fashion on another?”  The answer is, it is entirely up to her.  She may have worked her way up to manager because she was so good at moving women’s apparel.  She may have loved working in women’s fashion.  She may have hated the accounting aspect of her experience as a department store manager.  It doesn’t matter.  However, if she wants to apply for a position as a department store manager with strong number crunching skills then she has to sell everything she did in the realm of department store management.  She needs to emphasize her accounting skills and downplay everything else.  Its all about selling yourself.  In our next article, we will cover selling yourself through your accomplishments.

In the summer of ‘02, I was between contracts.  This was a rare thing for me as I usually was able to roll off of one contract and roll right into another.  It was almost like a game to me at times to see how well I could minimize down time between contracts however, in the midst of the dot com bust the IT market was in a state of turmoil.  Some friends of mine from my church were organizing a men’s Mastermind Alliance to serve as a job networking/support group for those who had been affected by the downturn.  I figured the camaraderie would be healthy and fun, so I decided to join them every week.

Wow.  What an eye opener.  It was as if I had been thrown back to my college days when I didn’t have a clue as to what to do to get a job.  The resumes were appalling.  What was worse is the sense of futility and complete lack of motivation.  While there were exceptions, many of the guys honestly weren’t sure what it was they were supposed to be saying.  It was as if their career to date had been some kind of exception and they really weren’t qualified to do anything other than what they had been doing for their former employer.  I was nominated as the group facilitator and quickly set about guiding the group through a regimen of action.  The Mastermind Alliance was so successful that the attrition into new jobs was happening faster than we could find newly unemployed people to take their place.  The Mastermind Alliance disbanded within a year for lack of people looking for jobs.

One of the key elements of my success as a job seeker had been a program I had written to manage my job search.  I was able to log every conversation with every recruiter, employer and networking contact I had worked with since I wrote the initial version of the program ten years prior.  I was able to convert every job I had ever been considered for  into a bevy of inside intelligence.  This even included those jobs that I had been passed over.  Even when I didn’t get a job offer, I was always able to get the names of the people who worked there, the type of project that was being undertaken, the hardware/software environment that was in place, the gist of the company culture, the money they were willing to pay – you name it.  In addition to helping me be a better candidate for future openings, it allowed me to help the other contacts in my network.  The more I helped others the more they helped me.  When my IT contracting peers asked me about this company or that, I could share information that they could never hope to find elsewhere.  Even if I didn’t have any intel on the company I would still jot down which job seeker was interviewing with which company.  By doing this, I would be able to refer my other networking contacts to them to get key information.  John Coffey had the dirt on everybody.  I will unabashedly state that this program was a cornerstone of my success.  Of course since it was for my personal use, it had no help file and had been supremely tailored to my own idiosyncrasies  Fortunately, I had written many applications for clients over the years and the skills I had garnered in that endeavor served me well in transitioning it into a commercial grade application.  The initial release in March of 2005 was focused on IT Contractors as I was keenly aware of their needs.  Before long, regular job seekers started trickling in and soon their numbers seemed to eclipse the IT contractors who had been our target market.  Upon the release of JobTabs 2006, I abandoned any bias for contractors.

JobTabs has been a tremendous success and an endeavor that has allowed me to grow in ways that I never expected it to.  I will expand on what I have learned in future posts.  JobTabs 2006 has evolved into Job Search & Resume 2008 which is a job searching powerhouse.  The job seekers who employ JobTabs Job Search & Resume are collectively known as the taberatti and they are a formidable force.  Think about it for a second.  A typical job seeker is in contention for a job against someone,

• who knows the people on the inside of the company or at the very least knows someone who knows someone on the inside,
• who knows the details of the job beyond what is publicly posted,
• who spent a fraction of the time qualifying himself as the ideal candidate the employer is looking for,
• who is exuding all of the confidence of someone who has more options than this position alone.

Who do you think is going to have an advantage?  The taberatti are evolving as a game changing force in the job search space.  Look closely at JobTabs Job Search & Resume and we believe you will agree.  You can join the taberatti by investing in a license via our online store at,

http://store5.esellerate.net/store/catalog.aspx?s=STR4089852848&pc=

Alternatively, you can download a trial of JobTabs Job Search & Resume by clicking

http://www.jobtabs.com/Download/tabid/56/Default.aspx

Welcome to our world.  Join us as we navigate one of the most emotionally draining endeavors we can expect to go through – the job search.