Monday, February 2, 2009

Going Professional

I'm trying to revamp my resume. Boost my job image. Get myself hired. Not be homeless and jobless effective May 1st.

Like every Northeastern student ever, I have a resume that sums up my basic experiences at jobs and internships and touts my decent GPA. There's an application deadline at the end of the week for a non-profit consultancy job (one-year duration, some business classes provided, menial (but at least existent) salary, and health insurance provided). A connection at the company warned me that HR is potentially looking for people with work experience, even though the program is geared towards new young professionals.

My goal is to highlight the work experience I have managed to obtain during 5 years at Northeastern. Even though I'll be a new grad, my resume doesn't resemble it. However, my current resume doesn't pop. I've looked at it so many times that it's more likely grey words than anything engaging or active. There are a few tactics I'm trying though:
  • Stronger, more active verbs at the beginning of all my bullets. I want words more representative of the activity they are referencing: create = not specific. Participate = lame. Good verbs are hard to come by, however.
  • More quantifiable terms. Created something? What number of something? For how many people? In what span of time? Did I come in way under the deadline?
  • Specific skills I want to highlight: supervising interns, copyediting and proofreading a publication, managing several projects at once reliably,
  • Social Media: my knowledge of and interest in blogs, Twitter, and other forms of marketing and communication
  • My range of experience: while it may seem slightly less focused than the resume of a business major or engineer, I think my strength at any job will lie in my familiarity with multiple fields and skills.
Suggestions? Willing to read and comment on my resume? Any skills I might not be thinking of that you would either want to see as an employer or know I have as an acquaintance?

2 comments:

  1. I'm having a really tough time figuring out how to comment on your blog. Not for lack of comments, but finding the button to click on the screen! WAHH!

    I obviously figured it out.

    I want to read your resume. I love reading resumes. I should go into HR. Or be a recruiter. They make money.

    Good active verbs found here:
    http://www.quintcareers.com/action_skills.html

    ReplyDelete
  2. I wanna see your resume, just cuz... Maybe it will encorage me to get my ass in gear and starting doing more stuff (but then again if I do that I might collapse)

    ReplyDelete