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The Art and Science of the Resume, revisiting a tired, old cliche.

Hi Christian,

My name is XX and I'm XX's friend from Ignatians service org at LMU. She gave me your e-mail address, so I've attached my resume. I graduated from LMU in December 2008 with a degree in psychology and a degree in marketing. I plan on earning a Ph.D. in Industrial/Organizational psychology and becoming a consultant. My general goal is to improve organizations so people are happy at work and businesses are more successful. I enjoy science, technology, sports, socializing, and overcoming challenges. I'm currently living in XXX and am ready to move forward to another city (or country). If you'd like any other information, just let me know. Thanks!

___________________________________________Hi XX,

Thanks for reaching out to me.  Regardless of what comes of our discourse, simply contacting people directly is by far the best way to learn about opportunities and eventually find a great vocation.

Regarding opportunities at google, have a look at google.com/jobs for all of our openings.  Browse around and let me know what you find interesting.

I share your interest in IO since my first three full time jobs have been in HR and clinical psychology research.  This is the field I know best, so I'll try to pass on what I've learned over the past few years.  I've always been on the recruiting/staffing side of the HR department, but I've interacted with Organizational Development and Learning folks as well as HR Generalists.  To discover what entry level position titles are out there, try searching "Human Resources" on indeed.com.  Let me know what you find and if you have any questions.

In the mean time, I have some feedback for your resume.  If you enjoy overcoming challenges, I suggest you conquer the resume!

At first glance, you have an admirable amount of involvement in organizations on top your two majors.  This should be attractive to recruiters, provided you communicate it well.  You also have advanced aspirations to get your Ph.D.  Employers want to see this.

Beyond generally listing your work history, I think recruiters like to see precise descriptions of work experience.  Having done research myself, I've found value in expanding upon the specifics of of my responsibilities, accomplishments and investigations.  If you're aiming for an industry oriented degree and career, you'd be best served translating 'research/science speak' descriptions into the business language you absorbed in your marketing coursework and store management experience.  You might want to have a CV as well as a business resume.

Here are some other tips I've heard from multiple sources:

• quantify your accomplishments, not just daily responsibilities
• "recruited participants" vs.
• "recruited 100 participants through 4 separate advertisement campaigns"
• grammatically, use active voice
• look up Bloom's Taxonomy of Verbs.  
• "Entering survey data into Excel" sounds like the person could be replaced easily
• "Categorized survey results of human subjects research" sounds like the person is adding intelligent value to an organization.

 The next challenge in communicating your valuable experiences and accomplishments is the way in which it appears.  A resume must be structured or formatted to guide the reader through each section. Your resume is fairly easy to navigate.  You clearly differentiate between unique experiences and jobs.  Once you have written comprehensive descriptions that make you valuable to the employer, you must limit the clutter that is common when you put a lot of text on one page.  It's tricky, but including sufficient white space is what makes your resume effective.   A good resume neither sacrifices content for structure nor structure for content.  You can look at my resume as a model.

Finally, I always emphasize the value of Linkedin.com.  From building a professional network, to being visible to recruiters (they use it), to seeing the career paths of successful people in your field, Linkedin is an incredible resource.

Good luck, and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Regards,

Christian Bogeberg

Do companies share black marks from your interview?

An exchange with a good friend of mine:

February 4 at 9:50am

Hey. I was listening to my WSJ podcast this morning and they had a story about black marks from mistakes in previous interviews that follow you throughout your career. Given the years you’ve spent as a recruiter and a recruitee (not sure if that word exists), I was wondering what you know about this. I was 10 minutes late for an interview once and have always stressed over it, and now I’m even more worried about it. It’s only a matter of time before I start looking for a new job, so this might become relevant soon. Do you have access to this applicant tracking stuff at your HR dept?

Thanks

February 4 at 4:36pm

wow, this sounds like some repressed fear of the principals office.

so i've heard about that for the big ibank interviews...apparently they have an inter-firm black list.

i'm not aware that the companies i've worked at share that sort of information about candidates, since we all use our own internal software.

i'll tell you that here we have a record of every job people apply and interview for. but we aren't directed to tattle on the candidates for that sort of stuff. i think being a professional means that you don't judge someone for petty things because you don't know the situation that caused it.

i'd say the biggest risk is just gossip between people who you REALLY offend or screw with.

i got written up for not showing up to work one day and not calling in (i was having a nasty anxiety attack)...i was so worried it would affect my interview here, but no one said a word.

we all have skeleton's in our closets, but they are probably only visible to us; everyone else mostly cares about themselves and thinks our problems/fears are cute/funny/petty.

that wraps up bogie's life lessons story for today.

February 4 at 4:36pm

btw, would you mind if i repost this on my blog, anonymously?

February 4 at 7:58pm

Sure. I'd like to see if you get any response.

Thanks for the thoughtful answer. I guess I shouldn't be too worried, especially if a company like yours isn't digging that deep into their applicants' history.

_________________________

 I'm interested in your experiences, hunches, fears and nightmares regarding black marks.