Cheap and Quick Resume Blog

Many job seekers find the job posting boards enticing because they appear to be an effective method of search and the opportunities posted seem plentiful. But the reality is that a meager 3-5% of candidates in search find their positions through the posting boards. While we don’t recommend spending countless hours on-line scanning the boards, we do recommend leveraging the information you gain from the postings to create a more efficient and strategic search plan. Here are a few ways to accomplish just that.

·                Only post your resume for the positions with a real match. Don’t expect “I’m a fast learner” to work when you’re competing against a large applicant pool.

·                If you find a good match on a posting board, don’t just zap your resume out into cyberspace and hope for the best. Go directly to the company’s website to see if you can post there as well. Review all open positions to see if you can identify growth trends or other changes within the company.

·                Review job postings to gain perspective on the compensation for particular positions. Validate the information you gather by comparing it to information from recruiters and colleagues. Having this knowledge will make you a more effective negotiator when it is time to discuss the compensation associated with a job offer.

Check out this post at CollegeRecruiter.com that lists the companies that undergraduates would love to work for. Are any of your favorites on the list?

Salaries for recent college grads continue to rise according to a recent survey by NACE. Starting salaries for financial, technology, and engineering positions range from the high 40s to close to $60K. Entry level salaries in government and the social sciences are on the rise as well, ranging from the low to mid 30s.

You’ve got an amazing resume. Your interview strategy is top-notch. But what happens when a recruiter or hiring manager calls you and gets your voicemail? Do you have an outgoing message like “Yo, dog, leave a message” or a “cute” message featuring your two-year old? If someone is answering the phone for you in your absence, do they have a strong command of the English language and are they capable of taking  a detailed phone message? Paying attention to these details is just as important as  making sure your resume  has no typos or  your interview suit is pressed. Audit your voicemail  and phone procedures today to make sure you get that interview tomorrow!

Thank you letters are more than just a simply courtesy. They help remind the interviewer of your unique capabilities and value add and they allow you to reconnect with the hiring manager and deepen the relationship. If you interview with several people at one company, send each person a thank you letter and be sure to write something different in each one. You will quickly lose credibility with a hiring manager if you send the same letter to multiple recipients. A strong thank you letter can help you get to the next level in the interview process. so make sure to extend your appreciation to everyone you interview with.

Here at Cheap and Quick Resume we see a lot of resume templates. Using a template is the fastest way NOT to get your resume noticed. Here are a few reasons why we hate templates.

1. Too Generic. Thousands of job seekers use templates to create resumes every day. That means that your resume looks like everyone else’s. Ho hum!
2. Difficult to Read. Many templates format the candidate’s contact information using a font under 10 points. Unless you expect a hiring manager to whip out a magnifying glass to figure out how to contact you, don’t use a template.
3. Too Much Wasted Space. We usually see templates that place category headings on the left and information on the candidate on the right. If you have more than a few things to say, it’s going to be challenging to fit all the information in that tiny area. Every spot on the resume is like valuable real estate. Use the space wisely!
4. Irrelevant Information. Often templates have a section for “Hobbies” The information most candidates include in this section is irrelevant at best and in the worst case scenarios innappropriate or just plain wierd. Don’t leave the reader thinking “Did I really need to know that this candidate reads tarot cards and belly dances?” Stick with relevant information that rounds out your candidacy, such as your affiliation with a professional or volunteer organization.

Recently, one of our staff writers saw a panel presentation with five college recruiters from five of the country’s top employers. Hands down, their biggest pet peeve when it comes to resumes is typos. Many recruiters and hiring managers agree that having a typo on a resume is the fastest way to get placed in the “no” pile. It can be hard to review your own resume. By the time you finish it, you are so close to the situation that it can be hard to spot errors. Here are a few suggestions for catching those pesky typos.

1. Use spell-check wisely. Spell-check is a great tool, but supplement spell-check with several human rounds of proofreading.
2. Read the document backwards. Doing so forces you to slow down and pay attention to each word rather than skimming the sentence.
3. Ask a friend or trusted colleague to proofread the document. It’s amazing what a fresh set of eyes will spot.
4. Get an 8th grade English teacher to read your resume. OK, maybe they are harder to come by, but if you know one, grab them. They will know it all when it comes to spelling and grammar.

Over on the Evil HR Lady blog, there is a post that discusses how being chronically late can hurt a career and she references a recent article on the subject from The New York Times. One situation where being late will definitely hurt your career is the job interview. When you arrive late for an interview you enter the conversation with a strike against you and it will be difficult to recover ground after that. If you are interviewing in a part of town that you are not familiar with or do not commute to regularly, do a test run to the location the day before your scheduled appointment. Check out the building and the security procedures and if they are somewhat elaborate, factor that into the amount of time you will need to reach the actual office where the interview will take place.

Check out Fortune Magazine’s list of the 20 Top Employers for Recent College Grads. Top employers include Lehman Brothers, EA, PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Microsoft, Hyatt, Citigroup, Intel, Sprint Nextel, and Loreal.

Want to get the inside scoop on what it’s like to interview at Microsoft? Check out this post from a recent new hire.