Welcome back to the work week y'all! It's Berkeley County Youth Fair week. I'll be there on Wednesday night from 5pm-7pm.
Outrageous Résumé Mistakes...oops!
With millions of people looking for jobs today, how do you make sure your résumé successfully captures the attention of employers and doesn’t end up in the Deleted Items folder? CareerBuilder’s study of 2,298 hiring managers nationwide provided real-life examples of resumes that stood out for the right – and wrong – reasons, and explores common pitfalls to avoid. When asked to share the most memorable and unusual applications that came across their desk, hiring managers gave these examples:
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Candidate called himself a genius and invited the hiring manager to interview him at his apartment.
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Candidate’s cover letter talked about her family being in the mob.
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Candidate specified that her résumé was set up to be sung to the tune of “The Brady Bunch.”
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Candidate’s résumé was decorated with pink rabbits.
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Candidate applying for an accounting job said he was “deetail-oriented” and spelled the company’s name incorrectly.
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Candidate’s cover letter contained “LOL.”
Examples of What Worked
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Candidate sent his résumé in the form of an oversized Rubik’s Cube, where you had to push the tiles around to align the résumé. He was hired.
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Candidate who had been a stay-at-home mom listed her skills as nursing, housekeeping, chef, teacher, bio-hazard cleanup, fight referee, taxi driver, secretary, tailor, personal shopping assistant and therapist. She was hired.
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Candidate applying for a food and beverage management position sent a résumé in the form of a fine-dining menu and was hired.
Common Pitfalls to Avoid
When asked what would make them automatically dismiss a candidate from consideration, employers said:
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Résumés with typos – 61%
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Résumés with an inappropriate email address – 35%
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Résumés that are more than two pages long – 22%
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Résumés printed on decorative paper – 20%
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Résumés that detail more tasks than results for previous positions – 16%
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Résumés that include a photo – 13%
Want to learn something new?
So I'm snooping on my friend's Facebook page and I find this interesting site. It's called Skillshare. The front page says, "Learn anything from anyone, anywhere." Sounds interesting right? So I go to the page and it offers classes for anything from knitting, to setting up a business budget, to editing photos in photoshop. Interesting. Unfortunately, it's set up by cities and there aren't any in the Eastern Panhandle but there are some in DC and Baltimore if you truly want to go them. Click here to read about Skillshare.
Thanks for tuning in!