Resume Writing Stinks (Part 1 In A Most Likely On-Going Series)
Written by Russ on January 10, 2008 – 12:34 amWithout really trying all that hard, I’ve managed to put together a really sound plan for myself for 2008. Barring a lot of the details, it involves getting a BS in Business Administration (online), going for the CUA (Certified Usability Analyst from Human Factors), attending IDEA in Chicago and possibly another conference or two. Oh, and having a second child.
Through all of this planning and reflection, one thing that bubbled up to the top was that, well, my resume kind of looks like crap. Not just the run of the mill sort of crap, but the type of crap that, when I look at it–and even worse, when I’ve seen it on someone else’s desk with a staple trying to hold the many pages of it together–I can only cringe. While I am not actively pursuing new career opportunities, it does not mean that I should rest on my laurels. In fact, this is probably the best time that I can imagine putting a new resume together–when I don’t feel the pressure of being in the hot seat to find different employment for one reason or another.
I thought it would be a good idea to hire an outside consultant to work with me toward achieving this goal, but had some trepidation. Thanks to a previous and somewhat costly experience in the past. I wanted to get other opinions on the subject, because that experience led me to the crap resume that I have today. That resume does a fantastic job of showing up in nearly everyone’s keyword searches across the board–”pipe designer” being the most recent oddity, so I decided to ask a different group of people for referrals this time around.
As a member of the IA Institute, I have access to the IAI Members Mailing List and I sent out a note explaining my situation and my goals. I was hoping that some of my peers in the field might have some insight as to identifying a professional Resume Magic Maker.
I was wrong.
About identifying a professional resume writer, at least.
And the end result of being wrong is not something that I am all displeased about.
The overall theme of the responses was that relying on someone else to author your resume seems to be a bad idea. I couldn’t disagree with that less given my previous experience with a recommended professional. I was only provided with a resume that I eventually had to rewrite (and maybe it was just the timing of it all, but the difference in the “paid for” versus “authored-by-Russ” versions was substantial enough just from the contacts made to me via the job boards alone).
Olga Howard was one of the first to respond, and apparently I had missed out on a UXnet panel and workshop in DC about the issue. (The Boxes and Arrows article “Getting Hired – What Employers Really Want” is here, also by Olga)
The problem with resumes was identified pretty clearly, and it rings true to part of the problem I see–and what I was lazily hoping someone else could help me with:
There are two main reasons why Information Architects and their potential employers may not find the right match: 1) the terms used by the IA and the employer sometimes mean different things 2) the IAs’ resumes and portfolios may not sufficiently explain what the IA was doing, or there are not enough samples of work—wireframes, taxonomies etc. So employers cannot easily determine whether the IA is a good fit for the team.
This clearly describes part of the hell that comes with authoring a resume. So many terms with so many different meanings to so many people–and how can I overlook any of them if I want my resume to look good and get noticed?
Oy.
Dilemma-ville… Population: Russ.
It was also pointed out that people apparently share another problem with me: They’ve also got too much crap in their resume. I look at my resume from time to time and notice small disconnects with consistency in message, style and presentation. The part that gets to me the most are the areas of content where I really, truly feel like I have not articulated what my role and accomplishments were within the organization. Not everyone understands that Personas, Content Maps, Site Maps, Wireframes, etc. aren’t simply documents thrown together, but instead they are the work product that comes from vast amounts of researching, reviewing, revising and that other stuff that really makes the difference: critical thinking.
The next paragraph really put things into perspective for me:
After the panel discussion, while we were reviewing each other’s resumes, several people suggested that we ruthlessly pare the content in our resumes. Start with everything we think needs to be in the resume, and then remove what is not imperative. Then, what does remain will be rewritten to stand on its own. Like magic you’ll end up with the perfect resume. This will most definitely help you keep the resume weight down to 3 megs.
I claim to my friends and family that I desire less clutter in my life. I strive to throw out 1 more shirt in my closet because I really won’t wear it–even if it is in great shape and has a slimming effect on me. Less is more, by gosh, and we all strive to figure out how to place 10 lbs. of “stuff” into a 5 lb. bag on a daily basis in our projects.
The resume project is no different, and though I fought diligently against taking the time to manage this project myself, it has become very clear to me that this is exactly how I have to adjust my thinking if I want to work to be done correctly.
Jonathan Lane chimed in with some outstanding advice that he has picked-up from a recent layoff experience. In summary, the advice is simple, sound and it’s going to be pure hell to try and fit my career–several contract gigs included–into the set of “rules” that Jonathan picked up from Lee Hecht Harrison.
- No more than two pages. Period.
- List your education last.
- Don’t spend too long describing your job role in each position.
- List your accomplishments.
These instruction are simple enough. Simple enough to read, that is.
When you’ve worked half a dozen contracts that all have had varying shades of IA/UXD this task starts to feel daunting. I know I’m not the only person in the world who has a resume with full time and contract experience on it, and I’m pretty sure that a 6pt font won’t be too acceptable, either. Meeting this challenge is going to require a little flexibility on the rules and a lot of effort on my part to pare things down and still keep it all meaningful to an audience that will take meaning from different keywords.
The ever-generous Peter Boersma shared his online resume with us–an act that scares the bejezus out of me. (Peter was also kind enough to sign-off on his email letting us all know that he’d *never* use a resume-writing service–another point that, while I believe it was good natured, I took to heart) Mark Schraad pointed out that part of my hesitation around publicly posted resumes comes from wanting a degree of control over the interviewing situations that I may get into:
Just like marketing a product (which is exactly what you are doing with job interviews and resumes) YOU want to control the flow of information – and if possible the conversation. You want to develop a relationship and have the opportunity to add dialog as needed to make ‘the sale’. You also want to have the opportunity to say, ‘this is not the right fit’.
Bingo! That was a big part of what I was feeling (all of the “someone’s going to steal my identity…again” stuff aside, of course), and he did a much better job of articulating many of my internal emotions about it all.
Mark also brought up a point that totally makes this resume writing experience head down a completely new path–and a greater level of “stink” for me:
…there is a solid strategy for three different resumes. The first you might hand to someone on the occasion of meeting them (outside of the interview), the second you would send them upon application (this is the 2-3 pager) and possibly the longer, more indepth version that you take with you on the interview.
I only wanted to write 1 resume, dammit. Right after I formally (finally?) launched UserGlue, the website, my friend and recruiter Anotei Baatz mentioned to me that I would get more interest if I had an online version of my resume and portfolio (and Olga supported this, but my feelings are more in tune with Mark Schraad’s on the topic). I’m not exactly trying to land new business at this point in time, but I saw the validity in the requests. I started to find the best way to describe some of the work and some of the companies that I’ve worked for without exactly creating a brand new stinking resume. I took the easy way out and just sort of fluffed enough bulleted items on a couple of pages in order to get content live. I’m not saying this is correct, but it is what it is, and will need to be re-addressed when I get through this resume re-writing exercise that I’m getting mixed-up in.
Now, however, I see the value in this line of thinking, but I am not certain that 3 is the magic number. This will be determined eventually, and I believe that the best approach on this is to look at it from your own perspective of how many ways you need to present yourself in a resume-like format.
Theresa Putkey brought up that it’s the personality more often than the resume that gets you the job–and she is absolutely correct. However, it’s that resume–or at least one of the 3 or so that you decide to create–that opens the door. Right now, my resume could most likely open a door, and if you set the stack of papers down next to the corner, it could probably hold the door open during a good sized wind storm.
Michael Micheletti made the point that the excessive statistics may cause more harm than good if you aren’t taking care in how you present them. It’s one thing to mention that your efforts ultimately effected the end result, but quite another if you’re making claims of “Improved usability by XX%”. I’ve been on enough interviews and conducted enough to know that these types of claims are the ones that can get you into hot water with the wrong type of personality on the other end of the desk–and one untimely misstep and you can be instantly dead in the water. As Michael says:
Because we all know that 43.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
Except for mine, which happen to be 100% factual and accurate, most of the time. Right. Stick to the day job. I know, I know.
Through a bit more online digging–particularly through Olga Howard’s already existing efforts, I found a few more resources that I think are good starting points. Livia Labate has a great article, “What I Want To See In A Resume” that provides a lot of insight and additional considerations. Her online sample resume provides a really great kick-off for what that I would consider to be the resume that you would most want to put up on a job board (and now that I’m categorizing resumes, will 3 be enough? Insert Tootsie Roll Lollipop “Licks to the center” joke here):
First Last
123 Name St City, ST (000) 000-0000
first.last@firstlast.com | http://firstlast.com/portfolioMonth YY to Month YY: My Title, Company Name, Location – Two or three sentences describing responsibilities go here.
Your favorite, proudest accomplishment goes here
Your second greatest accomplishment goes here
Your third relevant accomplishment goes hereRepeat for as many relevant jobs as you want to show.
Degree Title, YYY, Institution
Degree Title, YYY, Institution
I’m not going to get all worked-up over the presentation layer just yet–start with a simple, basic font. I really just want to be able to easily cut and paste this one into the various job boards that I use, and I will most likely want to have this one saved as a text resume as well, so I can easily cut and paste it into some other company’s far-too-involved application site.
This will be the first resume that I need to create. This is the resume that it should all evolve from. This is the resume that I will want to test with my peer group, revise and then spend a little bit of time cleaning it up, making it pretty and formatted and PDF-able. I’ll want to add a little personality, perhaps just in the layout so that it is memorable enough to be easy to find in a stack of resumes on a desk–even if it has a 3rd party’s logo and contact information stamped on the top of it.
And that is the place that I plan on starting for the next Resume of Russ. I owe a debt of gratitude to the IAI members that participated in the discussion and to those who contacted me off-list offering their support in one fashion or another. Active participation has some pretty nice benefits, and if you are at all interested in learning more about the IA/UXD space, you really cannot go wrong with the IA Institute as a great starting place–even if you just sit back and lurk on the email list for awhile. The experience and resources are vast, and the willingness to assist another member is invaluable.
My next step is to tear down my current resume and get it right down to the barebones version that I need to start with in order to make my next resume(s) the right kind of resume(s).
More on that later, I suspect.
Posted in Resumes | 1 Comment »
I would say that personality gets you the job, that a resume might get you in the door, but networking and using that personality can get you a lot of opportunities too.
Granted, I work on word-of-mouth referrals and people don’t usually ask to see my resume these days, but it’s knowing people that is the BEST move in job searching. No matter what, always network. You never know when you might need help or when someone else might need your help.
Resumes suck. I hate them. They say so little about a person, v. superficial, but I guess that’s typical of our culture.