Update your Resume and LI profile - Do It!
In a job I was in approximately twelve/thirteen years ago, certain structural changes were made and as a result reporting lines to management also changed.
This new management had undertones of bullying and ultimately started to choke team culture.
Where once we had flowers, the place was growing toxic mushrooms.
This post is not about the specific bad management style (I'll make a post about it in the future someday) but rather I want to again place emphasis on the importance of keeping your Resume and LinkedIn profile up to date.
When those changes were made we soon began to realise that work was no longer enjoyable.
With opportunities for internal movement at almost zero, the only option left was to start looking outside.
And oh boy did I get slapped in the face.. Over and over and over.
The bitter truth - My resume was terrible. My LinkedIn profile was even worse.
It sounds easy to say, "go and update your (neglected) Resume over a weekend",
but the reality I found, was that it took many, many iterations of tweaking, formatting and re-formatting to get it right.
Every time I revisited and re-read my Resume, I found errors, silly mistakes, things that could be worded better.
We are lucky in today's era to have AI automated tools to help us with this,
but some fundamentals rules have not changed in Resume writing and should be followed.
My key points:
- Formatting and layout is super important
- >> It needs to be easy to read, easy to skim and easy to find key information.
- Summary of your experience in industry.
- >> The longer your experience, the longer the summary.
- List out key strengths - keep in simple and short.
- >> These could be systems knowledge, technical and/or soft-skills
- Contact information needs to contain
- >> Mobile
- >> LinkedIn profile. Top tip: You can customise your LinkedIn URL so it looks more professional - See here
- Reverse chronological list of experience - Role title, Company Name, Start/End date, role type - eg: contract
- >>This needs to include a short summary on what you were involved in and role,
- >> and then your personal achievements in the role,
- >> any key highlights you want to mention related to a certain experience.
- Education - Summary list of higher education and/or courses/certifications
- References - Have a heading, but leave a comment something similar to "Available on request" - My referees change constantly, and I don't want to share their personal contact details on every job post I apply. If you succeed past the interview stage, they will ask you to provide referees as needed.
Lastly, once your Resume is good enough for the role you are applying, you will automatically see an improvement in agencies and recruiters coming back to you and with indications of whether you are OK to be short listed.