Avoiding Resume Mistakes While Trying To Get Noticed
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 "Every hiring manager has seen a resume that was a bit ‘out there,’" says Rosemary Haefner, Vice President of Human Resources at the jobs website CareerBuilder.com. "These job seekers are probably trying to be clever and stand out, but it often backfires and that resume usually goes straight to the ‘no’ pile."
Harris Interactive conducted a survey on behalf of CareerBuilder among 2,298 hiring managers to unearth twelve of the most eccentric things employers have ever seen on resumes this year. For instance, one applicant wrote about her family being in the mob, while another candidate applying for an accounting job said he was "deetail-oriented" and spelled the company’s name incorrectly.
The study also reveals one-in-five HR managers reported that they spend less than thirty seconds reviewing applications and around forty percent spend less than one minute–so it’s possible that some applicants include outlandish or inappropriate content to stand out from the crowd of candidates. But there are more professional ways to get noticed.
- If you get professional help, use a coach who has experience in your field - Every profession has its own customs. For instance, Wall Street resumes should be tailored to readers with short attention spans.
- Do not let a coach write the resume for you - Take a coach's advice, but write it yourself. "An HR person or a recruiter will immediately pick it up if a resume has been written for a person," says Borland. "They can tell the words on the page are not words the candidate would use."
- Treat your resume as a marketing document - This is the toughest challenge of resume-writing: figuring out what's special about yourself. What's your personal brand?
- Write a 40- to 50-word summary that includes three reasons someone should hire you - The summary should vividly describe your personal brand, including three compelling reasons an employer would want you.
- Break up text with bullet points detailing your accomplishments - If you've worked for the same company for a long time, it's best to describe your work as a list of four to six achievements.
- Include all awards and accolades - Even if you won that citation 10 years ago and you worry the employer may never have heard of the award, everyone understands what a prize means. Do list any awards you've won.
- Tailor your resume for the position you're targeting - You should have an all-purpose resume for yourself, but do rework that 40- to 50-word summary to address each particular job you're after.
Haefner suggests modifying your resume for each position to showcase your achievements and professionalism, and to demonstrate why you are the best candidate for the job. But be sure to do so with clean, clear content and easy-to-read formatting. "You want to go easy on the eye," she says. "And you should only include relevant and appropriate information." Including a silly detail or decorating your resume may be eye-catching, but it will bring only a gasp or a chuckle–not a job offer.
"It’s not always bad to be creative," she adds. Since creativity isn’t completely out of the question, CareerBuilder asked hiring managers for real examples of creative approaches that made positive impressions. Here’s what they reported:
- One candidate sent his resume in the form of an oversized Rubik’s Cube, where you had to push the tiles around to align the resume. He was hired.
- Another 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.
- An applicant created a marketing brochure promoting herself as the best candidate and was hired.
- A candidate listed accomplishments and lessons learned from each position. He gave examples of good customer service he provided as well as situations he wished he would have handled differently. He was hired.
- A job seeker applying for a food and beverage management position sent a resume in the form of a fine-dining menu and was hired.
- Another job applicant crafted his resume to look like Google search results for the "perfect candidate." This candidate ultimately wasn’t hired, but was considered.
Whether you decide to be creative with your job application or take a more traditional route, your resume must be flawless. Haefner recommends asking three or four people to edit it, as sometimes you need an objective eye to notice that some content may be sloppy, inappropriate, or irrelevant.
When asked what would make them automatically dismiss a candidate from consideration, employers pointed to resumes with typos; that copied large amounts of wording from the job posting; with an inappropriate email address; that don’t include a list of skills; that are more than two pages long; and resumes that are printed on decorative paper, among other things.
   
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