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MYSTIC RESUME WRITING Is Your Resume Killing Your Chance Of Getting A Job?

By Leonard Burg, Soul Therapist

It probably is if you have been sending it out and getting little or no response. It probably means your resume emits little passion or energy that would pique an employer’s interest. Remember, the average recruiter reads hundreds of resumes. They may take from one to three minutes to scan a resume. If that scan does not move them, then your resume probably goes into file 13 – the garbage. The chances of someone reading your resume are slim, unless you are submitting it to someone who has asked to see it, or you make your resume more dynamic. Since usually the recruiter does not know you and is culling from hundreds of resumes, it is vital that your resume is as close to a masterpiece as possible. It should radiantly project a vivid picture of who you are, what you can do and, most important, what you can contribute to their organization to make it better.

Hello! --- It’s the Networking NOTE: The real way people get jobs is by networking. Experts estimate that 75% of the people who find jobs find it through networking. People who find not just jobs, but ‘careers’ treat the ‘job search’ as ‘career development’. For instance, Career Service professionals tell students that they should devote as much time to ‘growing their career’ as they do to one of their difficult courses. If you are unemployed or underemployed, then your current ‘job’ is to find a job. You have to put the same energy into your job search that you would put into a day job! While it’s true that ideally the most qualified get jobs, the reality is that being ‘qualified’ is a given, nor is it enough. The people who most often get the jobs do so through networking. Networking means job fairs; professional organizations, journals and periodicals; seminars and events; and circulating your resume everywhere you network. But if you bring a jalopy-type resume to a Rolls Royce network, it will be an exercise in futility. More about networking is beyond the scope of this article, but there is much you can do to create a job-winning resume.

Routinely tweak your resume. It is a growing, not static, document.

Make sure each job that you mention highlights what you actually accomplished – the results you achieved, what you produced, what was noteworthy, what was praiseworthy or meritorious, what left the place better off when you left than when you got there, or what you did that added value. An easy way to ferret this out is to analyze each job or major task using a Job Results Resume Analysis Grid.

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Job Results Resume Analysis Grid One way to add substance to and enrich your resume is to do an analytical exercise in reviewing the jobs and tasks you have experienced. For each job isolate each major task and ask the following questions for each task:

1. What was a major challenge/obstacle that I faced in carrying out the task?

2. What actions did I take to tackle meet the challenge?

3. What skills, talents and knowledge did I cultivate or enhance in the process?

4. What were the concrete, visible results of my work that contributed noteworthy value and achievement to the organization, that left it better off when I left than when I arrived?

5. How much did I do? To the extent possible quantify what you did---i.e., translate everything into numbers:

a. How many people did it affect?

b. How many hours did it take?

c. How much money did you handle?

d. How many did you people supervise?

e. How much volume of goods or services did you process?

f. How many times (frequency) did you do xxxx, for how long (duration), and with

what intensity?

6. How well did I do it? Cite the qualitative aspects of results---i.e., what was good, better, best, timely, etc. Compare what you did to known high standards.

After you have thoroughly analyzed the jobs and tasks you have performed, and translated it into results achieved, now it is time to re-structure your resume. You now should have more substantive content with which to populate your resume. In crafting your resume, there are many different resume styles and formats from which to choose, but the content of which is beyond the scope of this essay. However, whatever style you choose, there are certain principles to keep in mind to help make your resume stand out in the crowd.

Make Your Resume Dynamic

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Employers may have only a minute or two to scan your resume, so it better stand out and compel them to read it. You can help in this by doing the following:

1. Use bullet-items,

2. Avoid using the pronoun ‘I’ ,

3. Be terse, and steer clear of prosaic, long-winded wordiness,

4. Use ACTION verbs to describe what you did or achieved,

5. Qualify the verbs with vibrant adverbs, to the extent possible,

6. Qualify the nouns with colorful adjectives, to the extent possible, and

7. **VERY IMPORTANT:

Routinely submit each and every verb, adverb, and adjective to the acid test of the

Thesaurus; find a more dynamic, or contextually appropriate word to paint a more vivid,

real picture of what you are saying or describing.

All of the above should make your resume emanate more energy and passion, and inspire recruiters to actually read it! What can further make your resume readable is how you coherently format it.

Making Your Resume Consistent and More Readable A few more tips to guarantee a dynamic, easy to read resume:

Make it one page; unless you have been invited to submit a resume or you are going for a very specialized job requiring a “curriculum vitae”, they probably will not read it if it is more than one page.

Omit leading in with a career objective; your cover letter, if needed, should relate your resume and career goals to the job you are interested in.

Use margins no smaller than .5 inch all around.

Use an easily readable font---i.e., Times Roman, Calibri, etc.; (don’t change fonts in the resume)

Size the font no smaller than 10 pt.

Use bold, Italic, underlining, CAPS and indentions for contrast --- But make sure to do it consistently, using the same motif for each section and subsection.

Read your final draft out loud after the final spell check; you will catch words that may be spelled correctly but don’t fit; and it will serve as a mirror to help you more

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objectively determine whether it moves you the way you want it to move an employer.

Ask a friend or associate to read your final draft out loud; again, it will help you to assess how dynamic it really is.

Back to Networking

Now that you have a dynamic resume, Network, Network, Network. Carry it everywhere you go. Here is one way to build your network:

Make a list of everyone you know, from friends and family to the neighborhood cleaners; then make sure that each and every one of them at least knows what you are trying to do career wise. And by all means, give them a copy of your dynamic, tweaked resume.

Find out what seminars and events are taking place in your area that are related to your career goals; attend as many as possible and schmooze as much as possible; have your resume and/or business card on hand, just in case.

Subscribe to journals, magazines and newsletters in your field, to stay up to snuff on the state-of-the-art of your field, and to help discover networking events (many periodicals are available on line or at the library for free).

Find out what professional organizations exist in your field; join one, if possible. Or, at least regularly peruse their website.

Sowing the seed: the Mystical Dimension of Career Building and job Search

Routinely act as if you are already a seasoned professional in the job/career of your choice. This goes beyond ‘visualization’.

o Act and feel as if that which you desire is already achieved;

o always be in the mood of the wish fulfilled;

o Imagine how it would feel should your desired goal already be achieved, and then hold onto that feeling!

Be in the mode of a ‘sabbatical’ in regards to your ‘dream’ job; what does this mean”? The root of the word comes from ‘Sabbath’, which means to rest. The esoteric meaning of the day of rest – the Sabbath – is to STOP BEGGING. How?

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o Once you sow a seed, stop planting it;

o Act (believe) as if it is going to sprout, even though you can’t see the roots forming underneath; instead

o Do the following when the idea of your dream job comes into your sphere of awareness. Give it:

Sunshine (pay attention to it - acknowledge it as you would the time of day),

Air (affirm the goal in the present tense as if it already is,

Water (Assume the emotion/feeling of the wish fulfilled),

Earth (do something – anything- that you would do if you already had the job)—i.e. Keep your clothes pressed and ready, Desk organized, Day/time organized, and/or

o Create A physical gesture (neuro-linguistic programming) that symbolizes the wish fulfilled (***you get this by making a physical gesture every time the idea, feeling, joy, vision, etc. of the wish fulfilled comes into your sphere of awareness. Some common gestures are):

Both hands come up to the heart or solar plexus (I have witnessed this in clients who spontaneously make such gestures when a ‘taste of honey’ of bliss comes into their awareness re a wish fulfilled)

Make the sign that some spiritual teachers make when greeting people --- bring two hands together at the eye center and bow (this is especially powerful as it connects the idea of the divine as being the source of your prosperity and for whom you actually work). Or,

Depending on your spiritual/religious beliefs, make the sign of the cross, genuflect, raise your hands to the sky, bow, curtsy, etc. **DOING THE ABOVE GESTURE EVERY TIME THE ISSUE OF YOUR DREAM JOB COMES INTO

YOUR SPHERE OF AWARENESS DOES TWO MAIN THINGS:

It prevents negative thoughts from sabotaging your effort to achieve your goal; and

It sustains the materializing of your goal within the time frame necessary for your continued growth and development.

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In Summary:

Though the suggestions in this article may seem like a lot, the likelihood is that you are already doing much of it naturally. Like all super successful people, you can focus and systematize what you already do to get better results. Again, remember, if you are unemployed or underemployed, then your JOB now is to find not just a new job, but to grow and develop your career. Do all your ‘work’, on or off the job, no matter how ‘menial’, as if it is your dream job. For example:

If you are a low paid interviewer in a marketing company, act like you are Barbara Walters or one of the top interviewers in the world;

If you are a sales clerk act like you are the top selling sales clerk in the world;

If you are a temp worker, act like you are the best envelop licker, photocopier, telephone answerer, filer, etc. in the world.

What the foregoing does not only makes your work more appreciated, and adds to your skills toolbox, but also it puts you in the mood of the dream job wish fulfilled. Using the foregoing tools you will be surprised how your dream job or opportunities fall into your lap, sometimes completely unexpected! What may have seemed like fruitless effort suddenly materializes like a flower sprouting in the springtime. But you will know what you did to help reap the harvest. I hope all this helps or contributes to your quest. Good luck! Len Burg Soul Therapist Available for lectures and individual consultations Lburg.soultherapist@gmail.com (212) 283-7569