WANT TO MAKE SURE YOUR RESUME OR CV GET READ

Ditch the clichés “shop worn terms just makes hiring managers eye glaze over, here’s what to say instead”

In this dismissal job market, a resume that stands out from the crowd can make the difference between getting hired or atleast making it to the interview stage- and getting nowhere. The secret to a CV that will give you a fighting chance. Learn to replace tired old words and phrases with what I call accomplishment-speak. The most common mistake job hunters make is defining themselves by a role or title, instead of telling what they actually did. You may ask what is the difference? It’s  one thing to identify as a software programmer, period and quite another  to say, Developed a program with 60% fewer bugs that was adopted three times faster by customers than the previous version. The latter language gives prospective employers a clear picture of what you can do for them.

Sales executive seems to have a particular seems to have a particular aversion to accomplishment-speak. They’ll write “managed the ABC company in Accra “. Well that doesn’t tell me anything , instead I think you say something like this led a team of four sales people who increased revenues by amount of (Ghc 100,000) in 2010, now you’ve got my attention. Or take the word “entrepreneurial” which gets often splashed onto peoples resume without any supporting evidence.  What entrepreneurial actually means is that you can take the initiative to start new things, so give an example of a time when you did that, for instance you can I created  a new business process that increased customer satisfaction by X%, or whatever it was that you achieved.  With companies seeing more resumes per job opening that at anytime in recent memory, a current trend is to a career summary at the top, to give a concise overview of your whole career so far. Clichés like proven, dedicated and detailed–oriented often get strung together in those paragraphs. A much better approach use that one or two of your accomplishment to describe your achievements in concrete terms. A resume should be a history of your specific accomplishments and tell what problems you have solved for previous employers. Most resumes do not do that and that’s why they don’t get read. I believe deleting clichés and using accomplishment-speak instead can give your job hunt a significant boost. Learn to use accomplishment-speak instead of clichés it gives an edge. Contact me on onyekachistanley30@yahoo.com  for a professional Resume writing.