A Recruiter's Pet Peeves About Resumes

By Suzy Kridner
Career Specialist
What happens when you send out hundreds of resumes and hear nothing back.
No telephone call asking for an interview or acknowledgement that your resume even reached the right person.
It's one of the most frustrating aspects of job searching. Is anyone out there even reading your resume that you labored to hard to make perfect?
What to do? You can keep plugging away, making sure your resume is the best it can be and is tailored for the job you are seeking.

Read some pet peeves from one recruiter who is tasked with reading resumes.

Be the first to know a job is available!

Tell me if this scenario sounds familiar:

You just found the perfect job opportunity online! You read the requirements and get excited, because you have all the skills they are looking for. But then your heart sinks - the position has been available for a LOOOOONG time. By now many people have applied for it and your chances of getting noticed - even with all the skills - is low. (Sigh.)

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Temporary versus Permanent

Posted by: Darlene Duncan. CWDP. JSS, CCC, JCTC, JCDC
Training Coordinator

Believe it or not, the holiday shopping season is just around the corner. This means that retailers will soon be hiring seasonal help. They probably won’t run a help wanted ad in the paper. They’ll most likely put a sign in the window or post a job order in Employ Florida.

Those of you reading this are probably thinking, “I don’t care about seasonal jobs. I want a permanent full time position with benefits.”

That’s understandable. Let’s go over the pros and cons of temporary or seasonal work.

PROS
Getting a paycheck
Something to add to your résumé
Being out in the world where you can meet people
Valuable work experience
Keeping your skills sharp or learning new skills
Chance to gain a good reference

CONS
Minimum wage (still beats the daylights out of $0)
No benefits
It’s not a permanent position (ah yes, but it could turn into one)

From my perspective temporary or seasonal work has a great many benefits. One, it shows potential employers that you’re not just sitting at home waiting on something to fall into your lap. You’re out there doing what you can to make positive things happen in your job search.

Two, you have an opportunity to meet people and I don’t mean just the customers that come into the store at which you work. I also mean the people for whom you’re working. Although you never know who the customer is or what they do for a living. They may own a company and be looking for someone just like you.

Three, you’re keeping your skills sharp and probably acquiring some new skills at the temporary jobs you pick up.

The list could go on for more than three, but I think you get the idea.
I know from personal experience that a temporary job can become a regular position. More than once a temporary job I’ve had has become a permanent position, including the job I have now.

How to ask for what you want

By: Lori McMullin, APR, Director of Business Operations & Communications

Center for Business Excellence

It’s been a few weeks since my last blog post. My husband and I recently took our delayed honeymoon and my great blogging teammates pitched in to cover my spot. Thanks, guys!

Typically, my blog material comes from some type or real-life inspiration I’ve encountered during the previous week or so. Today’s post is no exception. See the accompanying photo? That’s me atop Upper Yosemite Falls about ready to keel.

My very active and fit husband had his heart set on hiking this particular trail and I thought I could handle it pretty well based on the fact I spin three to four times a week. Wrong!

After hours of slipping, sliding and falling (and encountering a rattlesnake), I really couldn’t wait to get back on the ground, hopefully, in one piece. By the way, you apparently really do need to invest in hiking shoes! Oh, well!

Although I’m glad I persevered for nearly seven hours to the top and down, it wasn’t until we got back I realized I should have spoken my mind about what I’d like to do on our trip as well.

A romantic dinner by candlelight or nature stroll hand-in-hand would have pleased me to no end. Even sitting for a bit in the night air and enjoying the silence and tranquility would have been more my speed to help unwind and relax.

We expect our fellow human beings to be intuitive, but that’s not always going to happen. Sometimes, we must ask for what we want or say what we think.

This is especially true in the workplace. I found a link about how to ask for what you want at work I thought I’d share:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christine-hassler/how-to-ask-for-what-you-w_b_261653.html

The case for and against retraining

The following is the case for and against retraining our workforce. Which side of the aisle do you choose?
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/can-retraining-give-the-unemployed-a-second-chance-09142011.html

Facing the Real World of Work

By Suzy Kridner
Career Specialist
Trying to find a job in this economy is scary for people of all ages.
Older workers think the jobs are going to young people. And those right out of college think jobs are going to the more experienced.
It's true that job hunting is difficult for everyone.
Older workers need to focus on their skills, not their age or how long they've been in the workplace.
Those who have graduated this year, or in the last few years, need to focus on their skills too.
According to a blog from the U.S. Department of Labor, two important qualities for recent graduates are structure and discipline.
While these two items might seem fairly trivial at first glance, they are two of the more significant changes many will face when transitioning from college to a career. The blog goes on to say that the amount of change and adjustment required for these two areas will vary greatly depending on one’s previous full-time employment history.
For blogger Kevin Sheil, a Wage Hour Investigator for the Wage and Hour Division of the DOL, "the most important piece of advice I can give is to figure out a schedule that works best for you, allowing for both maximum productivity and the necessary free time to pursue your interests."

Read more about transitioning from college to work in Kevin Sheil's blog.

Keep your Head up

It is now Monday September 19, 2011 and our data here at the One Stop shows us that a proportion of our local unemployed population has been looking for work longer than 52 weeks. Unless you are in those shoes you could only imagine the difficulties that these jobseekers are experiencing financial and otherwise. I myself at the height of our recession was unemployed for a number of months and I must say that they were some of the most stressful uncertain months of my life. I want to say to all individuals out there looking for work that there may not be a lot that you can control about the economy, the job market and employers hiring at this time, but the one thing you can control is your attitude about your situation. I was once told that most dilemmas in life will be overcome by perseverance, hard work, and keeping a positive attitude/outlook. This is easier said than done when you have been trying to persevere for 52 weeks. In the vein of this thought, the following is just a little entertainment and inspiration to help you get up and continue to persevere.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmrOB_q3tjo&feature=player_detailpage (Click on the link and listen to the lyrics)

Create Your Own Job?

Posted by:
Darlene Duncan, CWDP, JSS, CCC, JCTC, JCDC
Training Coordinator

Do you have a great idea for a service or a product? Have you always wanted to have your own business with unlimited income potential?

Then maybe, just maybe, it’s time for you to pursue that goal. Some of you may be thinking, “Yeah, I’d love to pursue a business of my own. However, I don’t have any money and don’t know where to find financial backers. On top of that my business skills…well, let’s not even go there. Why bother?”

Wait! There’s help. If you have a great idea and the drive to follow through with a lot of work, then University of Central Florida’s (UCF) Business Incubator at the Daytona Beach Airport may be just what you’re looking for.

Owning your own business may be the Great American Dream, but remember when you’re the boss you’ll work harder than you ever did for anyone else. Why? Because everything is your responsibility. That means you don’t get to call in sick and go fishing with your friends, not if you want your business to succeed. You have to be at work before your employees and in many cases after everyone else has gone home you’re still at work.

A great idea, the willingness to put in the necessary hours and a willingness to learn the business skills you need to make it all come together could be your ticket to a wonderful future. If you never try, you’ll never know. This is another one of those situations where I ask you, “What have you got to lose by investigating the incubator?”

If you go to Google and search the words, UCF Business Incubator at the Daytona Beach Airport, you’ll find several articles written about the incubator. Read the articles and if this looks like something you could do, give them a call and set up a meeting.

The phone number for the Business Incubator is 386-872-3101.

Save $1,000 A Year

Posted by: Darlene Duncan, CSDP, JSS, CCC
Training Coordinator

Like it or not you need to have money to get by in today’s world. I’m going to share a few of the methods I use for saving money.

The first one, I’m sure you’ve heard of before. Whenever I’m given change in the form of coins as soon as I reach home all the coins go into a bucket. Once the bucket is full I go through it, one coin at a time. It doesn’t take that much time and can be done while watching television. Some of you may ask why not use one of those machines that count and wrap it for you? Because those machines will not pick out the wheat pennies and the mercury dimes, both of which can be worth much more than their face value. In addition to that, some of those sorting machines take a percentage.

The second idea adds up a lot faster than the coins. When you get home from running errands take all your one dollar bills and put them away. Never leave the house with one dollar bills in your pocket, instead save them. Once you have enough saved to make a trip to the bank worth the gas, take your savings and deposit them.

My third method is something that most of you are really going to balk at. Stop paying to watch television. That’s right. Lose the cable, the satellite or whatever service you’re paying to watch television. Instead put up an antenna. I haven’t paid for television in over 25 years. My antenna pulls in 24 channels. Granted, some of you don’t have the option of an antenna. You either live in a community with covenants and deed restrictions or you live in an apartment, which means you don’t have the option of an antenna. However, you can begin to explore less expensive services for your television watching.

Save and roll your coins. Never leave home with one dollar bills on you, save them. Stop paying exorbitant amounts of money to watch television.

Make saving money fun. Turn it into a game the whole family can play.

Click here for an article about how to save $1,000 a year.

An Assignment for Labor Day

By Suzy Kridner
Career Specialist
Kelly Dingee has some great ideas to help in your job search.
The Strategic Recruiting Manager with Staffing Advisors says if you are asking people to help you with your resume, ask them to be direct and skip the whole "I don't want to hurt your feelings" talk. This is how you present yourself to the rest of the world, you need to know what works and what doesn't.
And keep in mind resumes are subjective, Dingee says. It's okay to have more than one version and certainly okay to run it by more than one "expert." Save every version and figure out what you like and what works best.
If you have not built a LinkedIn profile, do it. If you just finished your resume, upload it. That quickly populates your profile and even better, contains a lot of the keywords recruiters will use to find you, Dingee says. If you built a profile and haven't updated it in ages, update it.
Update your Facebook profile, she recommends. Include your work information on your info page. Add your resume to your notes section. Let your friends know you're looking. Friends with your boss? Better visit your privacy settings first or be selective in what you share, i.e. don't post "I need a new job" if you're friends with your boss.
Build a Twitter account? That's your call, Dingee says. She likes Twitter. You can definitely search it for job posts and follow companies you're interested in working for. Will it have the highest return on your time investment? Dingee's not so sure. But it's a good place to engage and get referrals.

Some more ideas for updating your resume and where to post it.