Career Cube Blog

Lately my friends have been paying off favors in the form of illustrative examples of what’s really going on in the world of a hiring manager. His company was looking for a technical writer. Seems like a pretty straightforward search doesn’t it? He showed me a resume where the candidate was a self-proclaimed writer, but the resume included such typos as defining his objective to “be able to sale[sic] one of my scripts,” that his work will “always look at it’s best”, and..the real capper…”I am a very good proofread.[sic]”

Holy SMOKES!! Are ya SURE????? ‘Cause I’m kinda not feelin’ that you are such a good proofread(er).

Man, you’ve gotta hope that this person posted their resume on the job board when they were drunk or stayed up for 24 hours straight. Regardless, I’d feel confident in betting that he won’t be getting any phone calls soon. Which is too bad because I’m sure that he’s a perfectly nice, well-intentioned guy, but when you post your resume as a writer, and that’s the only skillset you address on the resume, you’ve got to deliver.

Another issue I see with resumes is people who define themselves as an outstanding (or worse yet, amazing) anything. That’s putting a lot of pressure on yourself. The only thing that makes this infraction even worse is when people are using outstanding to talk about intangible skills such as communication or leadership. Those things are more a matter of personal opinion. Can you tell me that your communication skills are so outstanding that you’ve NEVER had a misunderstanding with a friend or co-worker? I’m thinking your friend may have a different opinion of what it’s like to communicate with you consistently. Are you such a successful leader that you’re chosen as a leader for every project, and that no one has ever had an issue with your style or effectiveness? Wow-your resume doesn’t need to be on Monster.com, you should get your own TV show to teach others your amazing ways.

OK, I’m kidding, but I think you can get the point.

It’s WAY more effective to say that you are a demonstrated leader, or proven effective communicator. This shows that you’ve got some evidence, or history, or examples to support your description of yourself; that you’re not just pumping up your resume to force the hiring manager to be excited about you. I can wholeheartedly assure you, they’ll be excited when they see that you’ve got experience for the position they’re looking to hire. Promise.

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