Living Life Abundantly

Making Sure You’re Ready

You are trying to get a job and you are all ready with your resume, reference sheet, and cover letter. Before you get all excited and put your info in the mail, you will want to go through a few check points.

First and foremost, run a spell check on your computer. But don’t stop there. Read your documents over and over to make sure there are no typographical or grammatical errors. It might also help to have someone else read over them as well to be sure that it looks the way it should.

The more people who see your resume, the more likely that misspelled words and awkward phrases will be seen (and corrected).

Here is a checklist to keep in mind for your cover letter:

• The contact name and company name are correct
• The letter is addressed to an individual, if possible
• The cover letter mentions the position you are applying for and where it was listed
• Your personal information is all included and correct
• If you have a contact at the company, mention him or her in the first paragraph of your cover letter
• The cover letter is targeted to the position you are applying for
• The letter is focused, concise, clear, and well organized
• If you have a gap in your employment history, explain it in your cover letter
• The font is easy to read
• No spelling or grammatical errors
• Read the cover letter out loud to make sure there are no missing words
• The cover letter is printed on good quality bond paper matching your resume
• You have kept a copy for yourself
• Your letter is signed

When it comes to your resume, there are also a few things to keep in mind. Much is the same as for the cover letter, but you want your resume to be tip top as well. Here’s a check list:

• There are no typographical or spelling errors
• The format is consistent throughout the entire document
• Use a good quality, heavier paper – heavier than regular copy paper
• You may want to use a colored paper, but make sure it is not garish like hot pink or neon green. Cream, gray, and off white are always good choices
• Use 8 _” x 11” paper
• Print on only one side
• Use a font between 10 and 14 – you want it to be easy to read and look pleasant to the eye
• Use non-decorative fonts, but don’t be afraid to experiment and use something a little interesting – just not TOO interesting!
• Stick to one font
• Avoid italics, scripts, and underlined words except for when underlining your headings
• Do not use horizontal or vertical lines, graphics, or shading.
• Do not fold or staple your resume.
• If you must mail your resume, put it in a large envelope and mail flat
• Be sure there is enough postage on the envelope to make it to the company
• When at all possible, deliver your resume in person and ask to speak with the personnel director when you do so.
• Follow up after a reasonable period of time if you have not heard anything. This shows initiative on your behalf and makes you memorable in the mind of the person doing the hiring.

There are literally hundreds of different ways you can write a resume and so many formats you can use, it can be mind boggling.

If you are applying for a creative job, it is alright to be creative with your resume, but not too creative. A professional position, however, necessitates a professional resume.

Whichever way you decide to go, be sure to have your resume be eye catching and intriguing. As we have said, the resume is your first introduction to your potential employer, so you will want to make the best first impression that you can right out of the gate.

Do some research and look for various formats that you can try with your own resume. There are many, many places on the Internet that offer up free templates where you can just fill in your own information and you are on your way.

The purpose of a cover letter is to introduce you and your resume as well as give some additional information about yourself to potential employers. You may also want to point out some parts of your resume you want the employer to pay special attention to.

An individually typed cover letter typically accompanies each resume you send out. Your cover letter may make the difference between obtaining a job interview and having your resume ignored. It makes sense to devote the necessary time and effort to write effective cover letters.

A cover letter should complement, not duplicate your resume. Its purpose is to interpret the data-oriented, factual resume and add a personal touch. A cover letter is often your earliest written contact with a potential employer, creating a critical first impression.

There are three different kinds of cover letters:

• The application letter responds to a specific job opening you have seen advertised
• The prospecting letter inquires about any job openings
• The networking letter which requests information and assistance in your job search

If you are sending out a resume, your application cover letter should always include a line in your cover letter that says where you found the advertisement for the job you are applying for. If you saw it in a newspaper, be sure to underline the name of the newspaper (grammar rules count!)

You should always tailor your cover letter to the specific job you are applying for. It’s certainly easier to write generic or blanket cover letters than it is to write a cover letter specifically targeted to each position you apply for. However, if you don’t invest the time in writing cover letters you’re probably not going to get the interview, regardless of your qualifications.

Our first tip in writing a cover letter that works is to make a match between your qualifications and education with the job. This takes some time and effort and it’s not always easy, but, it’s important. Take the job posting and list the criteria the employer is looking for.

Then list the skills and experience you have. Either address to how your skills match the job in paragraph form or list the criteria and your qualifications.

Do not design a form letter and send it to every potential employer.

Effective cover letters explain the reasons for your interest in the specific organization and identify your most relevant skills or experiences (remember, relevance is determined by the employer’s self-interest). They should express a high level of interest and knowledge about the position.

To be effective, your cover letter should follow the basic format of a typical business letter and should address three general issues:

1. First Paragraph – Why you are writing
2. Middle Paragraphs – What you have to offer
3. Concluding Paragraph – How you will follow-up

In some cases, you may have been referred to a potential employer by a friend or acquaintance. Be sure to mention this mutual contact, by name, up front since it is likely to encourage your reader to keep reading!

If you are writing in response to a job posting, indicate where you learned of the position and the title of the position. More importantly, express your enthusiasm and the likely match between your credentials and the position’s qualifications.

If you are writing a prospecting letter a letter in which you inquire about possible job openings – state your specific job objective. Since this type of letter is unsolicited, it is even more important to capture the reader’s attention.

If you are writing a networking letter to approach an individual for information, make your request clear. The advantage to writing a letter like this and including your resume is that you will be making contacts in the business world and when a job opening comes up, they may still have your resume on file. It never hurts to be pro-active when looking for a job!

In responding to an advertisement, refer specifically to the qualifications listed and illustrate how your particular abilities and experiences relate to the position for which you are applying. In a prospecting letter express your potential to fulfill the employer’s needs rather than focus on what the employer can offer you.

You can do this by giving evidence that you have researched the organization thoroughly and that you possess skills used within that organization.

Emphasize your achievements and problem-solving skills. Show how your education and work skills are transferable, and thus relevant, to the position for which you are applying.

Close by reiterating your interest in the job and letting the employer know how they can reach you and include your phone number and/or email address. If you want, you can make a bid directly for the job interview or informational interview and indicate that you will follow-up with a telephone call to set up an appointment at a mutually convenient time. Be sure to make the call within the time frame indicated.

In some instances, an employer may explicitly prohibit phone calls or you may be responding to a “blind want-ad” which precludes you from this follow-up. Unless this is the case, make your best effort to reach the organization. At the very least, you should confirm that your materials were received and that your application is complete.

If you are applying from outside the employer’s geographic area you may want to indicate if you’ll be in town during a certain time frame (this makes it easier for the employer to agree to meet with you).

In conclusion, you may indicate that your references are available on request. Also, if you have a portfolio or writing samples to support your qualifications, state their availability.

So, we’ve covered the three most important documents you need in a job search: the resume, the cover letter, and the reference sheet. Before you get excited and start mailing out your creations, there are some things that you need to do prior to that.

Skills and Qualifications

While not all resumes contain a skills section, this may be helpful when you want to emphasize the skills you have acquired from your various jobs or activities, rather than the duties, or the job title.

If you do not have enough previous experience for a specific job you are seeking for, it is important to emphasize your skills pertaining to that job.

Skills can be just as important as work experience to employers. To prepare this section you should:

• List jobs, activities, projects and special offices.
• Think of skills you have gained through those experiences.
• Group these skills into 3 – 5 job related skills categories and use these as headings.
• List your skills with significant details under the headings.
• Arrange headings in order of importance as they relate to your career objective.
• Arrange skills under headings in order of importance according to your goal.

In this section, you will also want to include any office machines you have experience operating, software programs you have become proficient in, and anything else that you feel might put you over the top with the job.

Example:
Leadership

• Conducted monthly club and board meetings for Lafayette Junior Woman’s Club.
• Headed club’s $8,000 philanthropic project sponsored by Tippecanoe County Historical Association.
• Coordinated responsibilities of committees to sell and serve food to 1500 people at fund raiser.

Business Communication

• Completed a formal report for Business Writing course.
• Wrote annual state and district reports of all club’s community service projects, volunteered hours and monetary donations.
• Compiled, type, mimeographed and distributed club books to each member.

Financial Management

• Supervised the collection and dispersion of $4,000 in funds to various agencies and projects.
• Wrote and analyzed periodic business statements regarding funds to specific projects/agencies.

The next section can be worded in a couple of different ways. Here is where you want to let the potential employer know you have participated in activities and events as well as that you are a member of professional organizations along with any special awards that you have received.

A lot of this depends on whether or not you are fresh out of school looking for your first job or if you have been in the business world and are applying for another job.

Awards and Achievements

You can choose a few different ways to word this section. If you like, it can be titled “Activities and Honors” or “Awards and Organizations”. It really is up to you. You have to tailor your resume to your specific needs as well as towards what type of job you are applying for.

This optional section points out your leadership, sociability and energy level as shown by your involvement in different activities. This should be your shortest section and should support your career objective. Additional information about activities can be included in your application letter or discussed at your interview.

You should:

• Select only activities and honors that support your career objective.
• List your college or professional organizations and arrange them in order of importance as they relate to your career objective.
• Include any office or official position you held.
• Spell out any acronyms your employer may not recognize.
• Include dates.

Example:
Accounting Club, President
Alpha Zeta Professional Fraternity
Purdue Grand Prix Foundation, President
Purdue Association for the Education of Young Children (PAEYC)

For any awards, you should include the year you received the award. You also may want to include a brief explanation of the criteria that you had to meet in order to get that honor.

Finally, you will wrap up your resume with a references section.

References

This is the shortest section of your resume because it should only consist of one sentence – “References are available upon request.” You should generally not include references on your resume. You will put your references on a separate reference sheet which we will address in the next section.

If the job you are applying for asks in the advertisement to include references when you send in your resume, you should change the “References” section to read “References are attached.”

Which will makes a good transition into the next part of this series – your reference sheet.

References

You will want to have several different people on hand who will vouch for you as far as your character, your work habits, your work ethics, and your general value and worth as an employee and person.

You will want to have a minimum of three references and no more than five. At least one of these references should be a personal reference who is not a relative. It can be a friend, a co-worker, or an acquaintance. The others should be work or school references.

The first rule of thumb for references is to ask the person first if you can use them as a reference when applying for jobs. As long as you have a good relationship with them, most people are happy to oblige for you and give you a glowing recommendation.

The purpose of a reference sheet is to have a list of people who can verify and elaborate on your professional experience for a potential employer. Past employers, professors, and advisors are the best professional references to have.

It is important to have a reference sheet because potential employers will often ask for a list of references they can contact. If you included a statement such as “References Available upon Request” on your resume, you should be able to produce a reference sheet as soon as one is requested. In any case, having a reference sheet will save you time later on during the interview process.

Make sure to include people who know what type of person you are and who are familiar with your work. It is important to select individuals who know your distinctiveness so that they can provide a positive and accurate description of you to the employer or company in which you are seeking employment.

You should ALWAYS contact your references before including them on a reference sheet. It is also a good idea to give them a copy of your resume and talk to them about the job you are seeking so they will know how to best represent you.

When you are listing your references, you should include the following information:

• Your name
• Your present and permanent address(es)
• Your reference person or persons’ information, which includes that person’s:

o Name
o Department/Company
o Title/Position
o Address
o Telephone number
o Brief statement as to how you know this person.

It is not required to include the last part – the statement as to how you know this person, but it can help. That way if a potential employer does check your references, they know why you wanted to list them on your reference sheet.

Another very important part of the job application process is the cover letter that you will include with your resume.

This is the most complex section of your resume, and it is required, although you have a great deal of freedom in the way your present your experiences. To get started on this section, make a list of your job titles and the names, dates and locations of places where you worked.

Break each job (paid or unpaid) into short, descriptive phrases or sentences that begin with action verbs. These phrases will highlight the skills you used on the job, and help the employer envision you as an active person in the workplace. Use action words to describe the work you did.

You may choose special fontss, bolding, underlining, or placement to draw your reader’s attention to the information you want to emphasize. When the company you worked for is more impressive than your job title, you may want to highlight that information.

Briefly give the employer an overview of work that has taught you skills. Include your work experience in reverse chronological order—that is, put your last job first and work backward to your first, relevant job. Include:

• Title of position,
• Name of organization
• Location of work (town, state)
• Dates of employment
• Describe your work responsibilities with emphasis on specific skills and achievements.

You should probably not go back more than your three previous jobs so that your resume doesn’t get too long. However, you will want to include any job experience that is relevant to the job you are applying for to show you have experience in that field.

Depending on how you are formatting your resume, there are a couple of ways that you can put this section together. Here are a couple of ways you can try this:

April, 1998 – XYZ Corporation; Anywhere, IL
Present Position: Sales Analyst
Duties: To monitor sales activities for 20
sales people, calculate profit/loss margins,
make suggestions for improvement, hold
educational seminars to insures sales are
progressing as they should, prepare annual
statements, formulate and implement new
procedures to improve efficiency
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

XYZ Corporation; Anywhere, IL
April, 1998 – Present
Position: Sales Analyst
Duties: To monitor sales activities for 20 sales people, calculate, profit/loss margins, make suggestions for improvement, hold educational seminars to insure sales is progressing as it should, prepare annual statements, formulate and implement new procedures to improve efficiency
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

XYZ Corporation; Anywhere, IL
April, 1998 – Present
Sales Analyst

• To monitor sales activities for 20 sales people
• calculate, profit/loss margins
• make suggestions for improvement
• hold educational seminars to insure sales is progressing as it should
• prepare annual statements
• formulate and implement new procedures to improve efficiency

There are many, many more ways that you can layout this section and it all depends on how your whole resume is laid out. As long as you have the basic information about what company you worked for, when you worked for them, your position at the company, and your job duties, then you should be covered.

Next is the education section.

Education

This section can be set up much like the job experience section – it all really depends on what format you are choosing for your resume. This section is an important one for most students, and it is a required element of the resume. In this section, you should include:

• The name and location of your college or university
• Your degree and graduation date
• Your major(s) and minor(s)
• Grade point average (your cumulative GPA and your major GPA are optional)

Use placement of information, bold type or underlining to highlight the features you want to emphasize. It is sometimes necessary to pinpoint a feature or features that make you standout among other students.

For example, students bold their university or college if they feel like that is a distinctive feature. Others may decide to bold their type of degree.

New graduates without a lot of work experience should list their educational information first. Alumni can list it after the work experience section.

Be sure the following is included in the education section of your resume:

• Your most recent educational information is listed first.
• Include your degree (A.S., B.S., B.A., etc.)
• Your major, institution attended, and your minor/concentration.
• Add your grade point average (GPA) if it is higher than 3.0.
• Mention academic honors.

Here are two examples of education sections, with different information emphasized.

Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana
Bachelor of Science, May 1999
Major: Supervision; GPA 5.5/6.0

Bachelor of Science in Accounting, May 1999
Minor in Finance, GPA: 5.5/6.0 Major, 5.2/6.0 Overall
Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana

In your education section, you may want to include a couple of sub-groups – especially if you are a recent graduate looking for your first position. The first sub-group is “Related Course Work”.

This is an optional part of your Education section, which can be quite impressive and informative for potential employers. Students seeking internships may want to list all completed major-related courses.

Graduates might list job-related courses different than those required to receive the degree (employers will already be aware of those). Include high-level courses in optional concentrations, foreign languages, computer applications or communications classes. You may choose more meaningful headings such as “Computer Applications” if you wish to emphasize particular areas.

Remember – employers and recruiters are familiar with the basic courses required in your major. Limit these sections to special courses or skills you have to offer.

Another optional sub-group in the education section is “Special Projects”. This optional section may be added to point out special features of your education that are particularly interesting to employers or that may make you more qualified than others for the job you are seeking.

Students often include research, writing, or computer projects. Limit your description to the most important facts. You may expand your discussion in your application letter.

If you like, you can include any awards you received or special achievements in this section, but most resumes will have a separate section for this to cover not only academic awards but also business awards.

Our next section has to do with your special abilities as they apply to the position you are trying to land.

Everyone in the business world knows that having a good, strong resume can mean the difference between getting a job and not getting a job. You will need to have a resume that is crafted professionally and that will reflect you, your job abilities, and your experience.

Having a good resume is so important when you are searching for a job that it should be your number one priority. There are all sorts of ways you can go about crafting a resume that works, but there is no magic formula for a resume that will work all the time.

The choice really is up to you how you put together a resume, but there are certain nuances that you will need to be included in your resume that every employer looks for.

It is not difficult to put together a resume that works, but it is important that you not overlook what makes your resume most effective. This one or two page document speaks about you, your abilities, your experience, your education, and your accomplishments.

It is the first thing that a potential employer will see before he or she meets you, so you want it to really be compelling and make them want to pick up the phone and call you for an interview!

There are all sorts of schools of thought regarding how a resume should look, what information it should contain, and how to put it together. However, most business people agree that when they look at a resume of a potential employee, they want to the resume to be concise, to the point, and easy to read.

Whichever school of thought you, as a job seeker, subscribe to, you will still want your resume to be what a potential employer wants to see. That is why you will want as much information about resumes as possible so you can have something that you can be proud to send out as an introduction to you and what you can do for a company.

What we will do with this Resume Writing Secrets series, is show you a few different ways to craft a resume. This series will cover the important parts of a resume and show you ways to make your resume a work of art! This series will also give you some tips and tricks to get your resume noticed over other applicants.

Moreover, this series will also give you some advice about the job interview and what you can do to land that job. Finding the job of your dreams isn’t always as simple as just filling out a job application and then waiting for a call. It takes some aggression on your part and the right tools.