Caution: Reading this
may cause you to experience an epiphany!
Recently, I came
across an article on how rapidly corporate recruiters scan résumés. (I’d cite the specific article, however I’ve
lost track of it.) What caught my attention was the article’s degree of accuracy.
There was a trivial point with which I
took exception: That was the amount of time initially spent reading a résumé.
The article cited six seconds, while I maintain it is closer to 7 and 11
seconds.
I pulled my résumé critiquing sheet to compare
notes. Sure enough, the top issues mentioned in the article tracked my in-house
checklist. I was shocked! (No I wasn’t. I
just said that to inject a measure of levity.)
Normally, clients
retain my résumé services for the sole purpose of having me outfox crafty
recruiters at their own game. For serious résumé writing projects, I don’t use a
critiquing checklist, simply because I don’t need one.
The referenced checklist
is solely for those on tight budgets and do-it-yourselfers. For a flat-rate fee,
and 25 minutes of my time, I will compare known issues against what the
individual created. If later they decide they want me to fix it, I subtract the
critiquing fee.
But I digress. Recently,
a job candidate found me. Since graduating from college six years ago, she has
been floundering in the job market. Her résumé had failed to generate a single
job interview. She had done everything her college placement office instructed her
to do, and it hadn’t worked. Those dismal results motivated her to use my professional
writing services.
She had used the
college’s suggested format. Everything in the résumé appeared to be technically
accurate. In terms of her education, she was qualified for the type of career
she was pursuing. So the question remains--why wasn’t her résumé working?
The individual
in question had committed a series of red-flag errors, the major one being
vagueness as to what she is pursuing. Corporate recruiters would have to study
the résumé carefully to ferret it out. Fat chance of that happening!
Like it or not,
corporate recruiters operate on subliminal autopilot. They may tell you
otherwise, but in reality, no one—absolutely no one—can glance at a résumé for
six or seven seconds and consistently spot the best candidates.
As a skilled
résumé writer, I know this. I know that clients retain my services for the purpose
of outfoxing the corporate fox. To do
that, however, you have to think like the fox, or in this case—a corporate
recruiter.
Performing that
task, requires one to perform mental gymnastics. Over the years, I’ve developed
the ability to do that. Imagine that you are a corporate recruiter. You have
been assigned the task of finding a highly qualified candidate who can
manufacture, market or analyze widgets. If you are experienced in doing this,
you have enough sense to set up a pseudonym email to isolate incoming
responses.
Next, you
develop an ad to discourage marginal candidates. For example, you may indicate
that the company requires an individual with a master’s degree, when in
reality, you may only need someone with a bachelor’s. Or, you may state you
require someone who has experience working with left-handed widgets.
Now for the
dreaded part. If the ad failed to be sufficiently detailed, you will be
inundated with responses. If 50 hit the email in-box, that is bad enough, but
what if 500 arrive? Ninety-five percent will include a cover email—some
longwinded and others will cut to the chase.
The first thing
you do is skip all the longwinded emails. There is a 50:50 chance you will
glance over the short ones. (Short is
defined as any message that entirely fits on the screen your iPhone or Droid.)
Next, you open
each attachment, which in most cases will be the résumé. In one-two-three
fashion, you eliminate all the ones longer that two pages. (If you don’t, you
will limit yourself to glancing over the first
page only before making the decision
to toss it.)
So what are you looking for? Surprisingly, it
amounts to a host of simple, if not nonsensical things like the individual’s
name, where the individual resides, contact info, what the individual is applying
for, who the person worked for, positions held and education. At the subliminal
level, you decide whether the content will be easy to digest. Blam—that’s it! Done. Next.
In 11 seconds or
less, the job seeker’s fate was determined. Your backlog of emails dwindled to five,
perhaps eight. Now you have to decide which individuals you want to invest the
balance of your invaluable time.
Instead of
plowing through a ton of attachments, you have prudently culled the stack of résumés
down to something manageable. Only those get a second glance. The final step
involves a quick read of each. This requires no more than a minute or two
apiece. Should you spot something that triggers a red flag, one
or more of the remaining candidates can be eliminated—thus increasing your invaluable
time.
If any of this
comes as a surprise, then you’ve undoubtedly had an epiphany.