Cathy Graham authored an informative post entitled “Living Up to Your Resume.” While it offers a number of good insights, here’s the one I want to key in on today … because it is so critically important.
Resume writing services are out there and many are very good. However, you can end up with a product that really bears little relationship to who you are. Experienced recruiters and employers pick up on this quite quickly. Robert Half International conducted a survey of 100 Canadian senior executives, asking them “How common is it for a job applicant who has a promising resume to not live up to your expectations when you interview him or her?” Sixty-five percent said it was very common. One of the biggest causes of this disconnect stems from inflating your achievements. When you get in an interview situation, with its attendant stress, you are unable to relate your experience to match the way it is conveyed on your resume.
One of the things I evangelize to my clients is the importance of consistency between who they look like on paper and who they appear to be in person. It is also why my clients work very hard through the marketing document development process. Until they are crystal clear about their marketable value proposition (MVP), the pain they’ve taken away, challenges overcome, problems solved, and situations improved … and they can articulate those points … they simply canNOT compete as A-players.
How true Cindy. The resume must display who you are and what you can do. Many “resume houses” don’t capture that on a professional’s resume.