posted by Sara Moore on Career and Business Development

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Need some help finding employment?  How about for landing your dream job?  If you answered yes to either of these questions, maybe I can help!

To start things off, I decided to just do a short and simple blog post on some quick tips for resumes and cover letters.  In the future I plan to go into more depth and explain approaches, styles and strategies, including action words, impact statements, outlines etc. So keep watching and reading and implementing!

Resume Quick Tips!

1. A resume is to be no more then two pages!  You don’t want to overwhelm a person with too much information.  Remember, the people hiring are reading a lot of resumes.  You can further elaborate in your cover letter and in an interview.

2. You shouldn’t put references on your resume.  Use the old standby “available upon request”.  When you stick your references on your resume you are giving a hiring agent permission to call them, before even getting a interview.  Wait until you get an interview.

3. Use an appropriate e-mail address!  You want to be professional, and “partyhard@hotmail.com” or “sexy_girl84@hotmail.com” don’t exactly give that impression.  So use the most professional one you have.  Consider making a new one if you don’t.

4. Use impact statements (more to come on making these!) all throughout your resume.  These statements are taking the normal “good communication skills” you may stick under the skills category and turning it into something like “gained good communication skills through 2 years of customer service”.  Basically, you are giving proof that you do have the skill you just named.

5. Give proof of everything. If you say you have computer skills, tell them why. If you tell them you are a good team-worker, tell them how.

6. Be consistent in format. Stay away from overusing fonts and bullets. Try to pick one and stick with it. Use Ittalics or bolds to emphasis titles, but be consistent in their use and don’t go crazy.

7. Spell check, and then spell check again and then give your resume to someone else and have them spell check it!

Cover Letter Quick Tips!

1. A cover letter should at best only be one page!

2. Address it to someone. Try to find out who will be getting your resume.  If a name is not given, use “hiring manager” or “human resources”.

3. Do not start your first paragraph with “my name is” or “I would like to apply for”.  They know who you are and obviously you are applying.  Instead, do a catchy opening, tell them something nice about themselves; why you want to work for them.  And then tell them something about yourself, mainly why they will benefit in hiring you!

4. Do an outline first.  It makes it easier to keep the cover letter clear and your points organized.

3. Pick threeish skills you want to highlight and then in a paragraph tell them that you have it, tell them where you got it and tell them why this skill of yours will benefit them.

4. The three skills you pick should be pulled not from your own personal list but from the job posting itself. Look for the main things they want and match them to your skills. You want to show them you have the skills they are looking for.

5. Don’t lie. It is easy to make the skills and experience you do have sound really good. Don’t lie about what you have as you likely will get caught.

6. In the last concluding paragraph, always thank them for their time and tell them in some way that you are looking forward to the opportunity of hearing from them. Give your contact information again. Studies show that statistically when contact info is included again at the bottom, people are more likely to get a call back.

Those are my quick tips. Hope you found them helpful. If you have questions, feel free to comment on this post with them. If you think I missed something out, let me know.

Happy hunting!

Sara