Work search tools

Your résumé and other work search tools

Work search tools such as your résumé and cover letter provide a summary of your knowledge, skills, abilities, education, professional (and volunteer) experience, and accomplishments. Because they are used to help you land an interview, particularly in today's highly competitive market, you'll want to take great care in developing your cover letter and résumé. Both should pique a reader's interest and motivate him or her to want to learn more about you as a potential employee.

Often, however, job seekers invite rejection by including information in their cover letter and/or in their résumé that invites a recruiter to screen them out. Remember: because you are trying to land an interview, sell yourself to a recruiter. In other words, you should view your cover letter and résumé as powerful sales tools—view them from the point of view of an employer. Analyze content and layout and use your best judgment in terms of what information you will include, what you'll omit, and how you'll prioritize information and lay it out.

Because today's market is so competitive, with many people vying for the same position, employers are overwhelmed by résumés. Depending on the type of position, vacancies advertised in large newspapers may attract several hundred applications. Imagine the challenge recruiters face when trying to narrow these hundreds of résumés down to a manageable short list. When employers sift through the large number of cover letters and résumés received, their goal is to screen out applicants in order to arrive at a short list.

Your goal, obviously, is to be included in the short list. For that reason, you don't want to make it easy for a recruiter to dismiss or discard your application package.

The reality is that during the initial screening process, recruiters often don't spend more than two or three minutes scanning a cover letter and accompanying résumé. Chances are neither one will be read in its entirety. Hence, the placement of information becomes very important.

Many job seekers fall prey to common mind traps, the most familiar being "no experience = no job." As a result of equating experience with gainful employment, many job seekers may sabotage themselves by presenting their information in a less than effective way. You should list volunteer and unpaid experience on your résumé; do so in a way that doesn't undervalue your skills or this experience.

In order to effectively promote yourself in your cover letter and résumé, you need to know yourself. As mentioned in our section on career planning, there are a number of assessment tools available that can help you determine:

• your likes and dislikes
• your motivations
• the skills (functional, transferable, personal, self-management) you can bring to a job
• your past accomplishments
• concrete examples showing how you handled various past situations—examples that clearly demonstrate to an employer your employability skills (i.e., decision-making, leadership, time management, organization, team-building)

It's also important that you:

• like and value yourself
• firmly believe you have something of value to offer
• maintain and project a positive attitude
• be willing to invest time and energy into looking for work