Happy Beginning of the Year! Time to jump-start, resuscitate, or just carry on with the changes you’ve decided to make. If one of those changes involves your job, today’s post can help you. Our new year starts with the basics of writing a solid resume. Whether you’re a first-time job seeker, returning to the workforce, or just thinking about making a change, consider these tips as you write or polish up your resume.
1-Consider the job you want. What types of skills and experience does it take to be successful in the job you’re after? If the job description is available, read it carefully to understand what a potential employer is looking for in a candidate. If you’re unsure about the type of job you want, update your resume for the job you’re in. It never hurts to polish up your resume with recent accomplishments or updated job duties, just in case that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity arises.
2-Review your own skills and experience. What are your strongest skills? What skills do you most enjoy using? Relate these skills to the job requirements; recruiters look for transferable skills. Try to quantify, where it makes sense. How many years of customer service experience do you have? How many people attended the events you organized? Think of examples of how you’ve used your skills. Saying you have “excellent customer service skills” is fine but saying you used your “excellent customer service skills to increase repeat business” is better. You can say you “restocked shelves” or that you “restocked shelves and familiarized yourself with product location to help customers find products quickly and easily”. A recruiter can see exactly how you used your skills to meet your employer’s goals. If you can relate your experience to goals your target employer wants to achieve, all the better.
3- Another way to think about your strongest skills is to remember what you’ve been complimented for. Have you been recognized on the job or when volunteering? Received compliments from employers, customers, co-workers? These are skills and behaviors that could relate to your prospective position. Think of examples. Were you awarded “Employee of the Month/Quarter/Year”? Perhaps customers ask for you by name because of your excellent customer service?
4-Think about your accomplishments. Your resume tells a better story if you can include the results you’ve achieved rather than just a list of tasks you performed. Accomplishments tell not only what you did but how you did it. Have you had an opportunity to make changes or improvements? Did you suggest a new way of doing something that saved your employer time or money, or improved customer satisfaction? Maybe you created and implemented a new job procedure that helped you and your co-workers? Did you ever have a chance to step up and assume some job duties that were above and beyond your own responsibilities? Find examples and relate them to the job you want.
Get started now and we’ll have more tips for you next week. If the idea of writing or updating your resume seems daunting, just work on one of these tips today. Pick one that interests you and start taking a few notes. Then, do another one tomorrow. You’ll be surprised how much you accomplish.
