How tough is today’s job market? Well, think about the complaints you hear from job seekers. A few years ago, it was that they didn’t get the job. Now, the chief gripe is likely to be that they didn’t even get the interview.
Dave Fecak, of JobTipsforGeeks, offers some tough love over at Lifehacker for folks whose resumes have disappeared into a black hole:
“To anyone who has sent out large quantities of resumes without any response or interviews, I offer this advice: The complete lack of response is not due to the economy. It’s based on your resume, your experience, or your resume submission itself.”
Fecak examines a few common resume problems, and possible solutions to each. These are a few of the mistakes we’ve seen in our time on both sides of the interview process:
1. You sent your resume to HR@ignorethisCV.com. If at all possible, send your resume to a real person at the company, instead of one of those jobs@ addresses that are manned by robotic dust bunnies.
2. Your resume is full of spelling mistakes. Spelling and grammar count. Anyone can make a typo, and once you do, it’s hard to see your mistake. Have a friend proof your resume before you send it.
3. You’re cutting and pasting your cover letter. People can tell when you’re using a form letter. Also, it’s easy to leave in information that’s geared toward other jobs, leaving recruiters at that accounting firm to wonder why you highlighted your experience cleaning and training macaque monkeys.
4. Even your resume doesn’t think you want this job. From Fecak’s list: “If your objective states ‘Seeking a position as a Python developer in a stable corporate environment,’ don’t expect a callback from the start-up company looking for a Ruby developer. This applies even if you are qualified for the job! Why doesn’t the company want to talk to you if you are qualified? Because you clearly stated that you wanted to do something else.”
5. You seem like a stalker. Resist the urge to call, text, and send passenger pigeons to see if your resume went through. While it’s fine to follow up — eventually, and once — you don’t want to seem desperate or needy.
6. Your resume is a novel. You don’t necessarily need to keep your CV down to one page, like they told us way back in college, but it shouldn’t look like “War and Peace” when it’s sitting on someone’s desk.
7. You look like you can’t commit. If you have lots of jobs on your resume over a short period of time, Fecak advises making it clear why some of them were of short duration. This means specifying which were contract positions, which were eliminated due to mergers, and so on.
More From PayScale:
8 Reasons You Didn’t Get the Job
Millennials’ Job Prospects Aren’t So Bad After All [infographic]
5 Career Training Tips Inspired by Olympic Athletes
(Photo Credit: tedmurphy/Flickr)
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