This is a story I wrote back May 2022 as the COVID pandemic began. You may have already read it on my LinkedIn profile.
Like many of us, I have been stood down due to the COVID cutbacks. A great role I secured after the summer break didn’t materialise into the long-term opportunity it was meant to be. It was a real pity as it was with a great team, in an good location, and had real potential.
Now is the time that I normally say “such is life” with a non-chalant flip, but these are far from normal times. We’re in the middle of a pandemic, everything is shut down, shopping has to be planned with military precision, and any previous cautions about social media have been thrown out the window as we desperately seek any social connection we can, even if it means the upteenth Zoom call for the day!
Like many of us, took the downturn, as an opportunity to re-connect with the family. I breakfast with the kids everyday, helped with home schooling, walked the dog at least once a day if not more, and tried to keep fit and healthy while the world closed in around us.
To keep my mind active, I even started a Masters at a local university to keep me busy in the early mornings, and watched another Vikings series with my son in the evenings to round out the day.
But now the fun is over: the kids are back at school, I’ve cracked the first unit of my Masters, and the dog is starting to groan when I pick up the leash! It was obvious it is now time to turn my attention to getting back into the workforce.
And so I turn to LinkedIn and Seek. Both are awash with interesting jobs, many with new and perplexing titles that tell you very little about what is required. (Just what exactly does a Customer Success Manager do?)
Job descriptions are not much more helpful: reading between the lines might shed some light. Calling the recruiter is a better option, but even they sometimes do not know what exactly is needed. “Just send me your resume, and we’ll add it to our database anyway” the all to common refrain goes.
Which brings me to my resume which has been born and reborn at least a dozen times as I “tailor it” to be match fit for whatever current job advertisement I am scrolling through. I talk to friends, read a few articles, join a couple of webinars. Each time, I cut and recut my resume, tweaking it here, trimming it there, or adding a more detail, as I struggle to make it stand out from the crowd.
For that is what we need to do. Stand out from the crowd. Makes ourselves unique and special so that we are noticed by recruiters and employers who want to employ us over the many others clamouring for their attention.
It sound might sound hard at first, especially if marketing yourself is not your forte, as it isn’t for me.
But as I went through this process of cut and re-cutting my resume, a friend showed me his resume that was very different to the button-up-your-shirt style of so many of the generic corporate templates I had been looking at. His template was short, sharp, interesting to read…. and… (wait for it)… personal!
Yes, that’s right, it was a personal, he had included a whole half page in which he talked about some of the things he was doing in his personal life and how it blended in with and informed his work. Most of us relegate this stuff to a few bullet points under an “Interests” or “Hobbies” section at the very end of our resume, just above the “Referees available upon request”.
These scant few lines are meant to give an employer a feel for the type of person they are about to employ to spend up to eight hours a day working for their organisation. Somehow they are meant to glean from those few pithy words how you will fit their corporate culture, how you will get along with other staff, and the nature of your jokes come company Christmas party! And we wonder why so many people end up in the wrong jobs working with people they don’t get along with, and for companies that they don’t agree with!
So I took the plunge, started from scratch, and completely revamped my resume. The content is all the same, I am still the same person, but my resume is now short and punchy. It starts with a just three core competencies that I know I can really nail, and then showcases four examples of key outcomes.
I have summarised my roles down to only those components where I really made a difference, instead of trying to include a bullet point for every single thing I have ever done: heck I’ve forgotten half the things I’ve done anyway, so trying to recollect them from a resume is bound to fail in come interview time.
I have played with the layout to break it up. Resumes are not meant to be War and Peace so why to they so often look and read like a novel? Mine now has chunky layout, lots of while space, and even a splash of colour here and there. And I’ve even gone over an beyond and used a company’s logo to show who I have worked for, instead of just listing their name next to my role and the dates I worked for them.
I have also now included a Personal Profile section in which I talk about some of the stuff I have done outside work, but that is just as important to me. The stuff that makes me get out of bed on the weekends, or stay up late in the evenings, or that draws my attention and time on social media and the news.
I talk about my house renovations that still keep me busy most Saturday afternoons, the car club I joined so I can learn to car for my car and the environment when I go off-road camping with my kids, my work with Scouts that allows me to be a leader in a context outside work, as well other volunteer work that gives me connection with the community I live in.
I also included a few pictures that bring these activities to life and make me a real person, not just a collection of skills and experience on another four-page resume that will join a hundred others within five minutes of any job advertisement being posted online.
It may or may not land me my dream job anytime soon, but it has certainly helped me tell my story. And if I entertain a few recruiters, and hopefully a few employers at the same time, it will be time well spent.
