As a recruiter I was always amazed when job seekers could not readily provide me with their references when I was preparing to send them out to a client of mine for an interview.

There is more to providing references than just writing a few names on a piece of paper.

Preparing references involves two main areas:

1. the information and how you present it;
    
2. the references themselves.

Have your references available

Always have your references available to be given to a job interviewer or hiring manager when they are requested. A reference request is a good indication that the job interviewer wants to find out more about you. They are interested in you.

How many references and who should they be?

The number and type of references requested will vary from organization to organization. So be prepared with a range of references including:

1. supervisors
2. peers
3. personal references

Be organized

Your references should be organized in detail on a standard sheet of paper.

Your name and telephone number should be at the top of the page just as it appears on your resume. i.e.:

References for Joe/Jane Jobseeker
Home telephone: nnn-xxx-xxxx.

Always have at least 5 printed copies of your references on hand when you go to an job interview.

Required reference information

Each reference should include the following information:

• Their full name.
• Their relationship to you … supervisor, peer or personal.

Supervisor References

All prospective employers and recruiters will want work references from current and former employers.

It is not uncommon to be asked for Supervisors going back two, three or four jobs.

Some employers want a list of employers and your immediate supervisor going back ten years.

If a security clearance is required then you may be asked for the names of every supervisor you have evert had.

• Their full name
• Their title
• The name of the organization where you reported to them
• The time period that you reported to them, including months and years
• The name of their current employer
• Their current direct telephone number at work

Peer References

• Their full name
• The name of the organization where you worked with them
• Their title at that organization
• Your relationship to them at work
• The time period that you worked with them
• The name of their current employer
• Their current direct telephone number at work

Personal References

• Their full name;
• For a personal reference, provide a brief sentence about how you know the person and for how long;
• Their current place of employment;
• Their current title or position;
• Their current office telephone number.

Take Action

Job References can make the difference between you receiving a job offer or not receiving a job offer.

Great references can also determine the salary and compensation that you are offered.

Take action today and get your job references organized. Be prepared.

Richard Ward
Personal Coaching | Cultural Consulting | Sounding Board

Career Reading

• Resumes
• Resume Cover Letters
• Job Interviewing
• Job Search

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days

Let’s rate it and see in the quiz that follows. Is your it resume 100% ready?

Rate your resume

Be brutally honest with yourself. Tell it like it is and rate yourself as you would a friend that you are trying to help.

The answers to these questions can help you to zero in on what, if any, weaknesses your resume may have.

The questions cover these areas:

1. contact information
    
2. languages spoken
    
3. degrees & certifications
    
4. employer details
    
5. employment dates
    
6. supervisors reported to
    
7. responsibilities
    
8. achievements
    
9. schools, colleges & universities
    
10. ongoing training
     

Answer yes or no to each question.

1.) Does your contact information at the top of your resume conform to the addressing rules of Canada, the United States of America and other members of the Universal Postal Union to ensure correct electronic scanning and indexing of your resume?

Yes__ No__

2.) Have you listed all of the languages that you speak, including English, on your resume immediately after your Contact Information? And rated your proficiency?

Yes__ No__

3.) Have you listed under their own heading, just after your contact information, the degrees and certifications that you have successfully achieved?

Yes__ No__

4.) Does each of your job listings include the correct name of your employer, the city that you worked in and quantified description of what the organization did and how many employees worked in how many locations?

Yes__ No__

5.) Does each of your job listings include the dates that you worked for each employer including the months?

Yes__ No__

6.) Does each of your job listings include the title of the supervisor to whom you reported?

Yes__ No__

7.) Does each of your job listings have a quantified list of your responsibilities?

Yes__ No__

8.) Have you included a list of achievements for each and every job showing how you have helped to improve productivity, streamline operations, improve morale, cut costs, maximize sales or profits?

Yes__ No__

9.)  Have you listed all of the schools, colleges and universities that you have attended including dates and locations complete with the diploma or degree achieved?

Yes__ No__

10.)  Have you listed all of the training organizations or in-organization training that you have received including dates and locations complete with the designation, certification or course name?

Yes__ No__

My score: Yes _________ No __________

9 – 10 Yes: Your a Winner!   If your resume really is in the Top 5% you should be receiving a high number of first, second and third interviews and negotiating for the salary that you want.

7 – 8 Yes: Above Average but remember that employers only select from the candidates that they perceive are in the top 5%. So that means you will still lose interviews and job offers to applicants who score 9 – 10!

5 – 6: Average If your resume scored 6 points or less you are in trouble! And your resume may have been consigned to File 13 – the waste basket.

0 – 4: Poor If your resume scored 4 points or less you are probably receiving few interviews and the job offers that you have been receiving, if any, are at minimum wage. Far below what your experience and skills should be getting.

No matter what your score, the question is “Are you receiving interviews and getting jobs offers?”

So stop wasting your time in a prolonged job search by using a weak resume. It is time to take action and create a great resume that will get you interviews!

Richard Ward
Personal Coaching | Cultural Consulting | Sounding Board

Career Reading

• Resumes
• Resume Cover Letters
• Job Interviewing
• Job Search

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days

Before we go into detail about writing an effective resume, let’s look at some of the issues that your resume can help to address. By addressing these issues your resume can help to improve your chances of getting an interview.

Employers may have concerns in the 3 main areas of:

1. Skills,
2. Personal Characteristics and
3. Money

The above 3 main areas of skills, personal characteristics and money including the following 5 areas:

1. Can you do the job?
    
2. Will you do the job?
    
3. Will you get along well with others?
    
4. Are you manageable?
    
5. Can the company afford you?
    

Skill Concerns

1. Can you do the job?

• Do you possess the skills needed to be productive and make a contribution to organizational objectives within a reasonable time frame?
   
• Have you proven you have done this job elsewhere? If so, how successful were you at this job, and what problems did you encounter? (And did those problems help you develop new skills and insight, or will they likely be stumbling blocks in this position?)
   
• If you have not already done this job elsewhere, is there enough evidence to suggest you have the necessary skills, and thus are very likely to succeed in this job?
   

Personal Characteristics Concerns

2. Will you do the job?

• Even if you possess the skills, are you sufficiently motivated and do you have the energy level and self-confidence to do the job? What evidence is there to support this?
   
• Will you be dedicated, conscientious, fair, hard working, determined, and give 100% – or will you be distracted, drop the ball, be absent or late frequently, or otherwise not measure up to company standards?
   
• Are you sufficiently interested in this type of job to be motivated to do a good job and make a contribution?
   
• Will you stay long enough to make a contribution after the expense and time that is invested in recruiting and training?
   

3. Will you get along well with others?

• Will you fit in and be a team player? Is there evidence to support this?
   
• Will you be a positive influence on your coworkers – or will you cause friction or breed dissension, hurt morale, or talk down about the company?
   
• Will you fit in with the corporate culture – attitudes, values, personality, and personal style?
   

4. Are you manageable ?

• Will you be easy or difficult to manage – by the person who will be your manager or supervisor? Is there evidence to support this?
   
• Will you follow and/or support organizational policies and procedures?
   
• How will you take direction?
   
• Will you support organizational changes?
   
• Will you fit in with the existing style of management?
   

Money Concerns

5. Can the company afford you ?

• Is the salary range of this job compatible with your salary history?
   
• Is what you want to earn, reasonably expect to earn, and/or need to earn compatible with what this job pays?
   
• Is the benefit package consistent with your needs and expectations?

Not every job is right for you

Not every job is the right job for you, but you can address many of these concerns by being prepared. And having a great resume goes a long way to helping you be prepared for an interview.

Be prepared

The above concerns are front and center when a recruiter or employer is reviewing your resume, during interviews and when your references are consulted.

Resumes That Get You Interviews Coaching will help you to create a resume that will effectively address employer concerns and get you interviews.

Richard Ward
Personal Coaching | Cultural Consulting | Sounding Board

Career Reading

• Resumes
• Resume Cover Letters
• Job Interviewing
• Job Search

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days

Do you know the dollar value of your resume to you? Have you have never sat down to think about what your resume is worth to you in dollars & cents?

More than likely, if you are like the rest of us, you have never sat down to think about what your resume is worth to you in dollars $$$ and cents ¢¢¢.

There is an old saying that "first impressions count" and your resume is usually how people first see you when you are hunting for a job; and decide whether or not to invite you to a job interview.

Your resume, therefore, really sets the pace, to a large degree, for the number of quality interviews you are invited to, the quality of job offers that are made to you and the level of salary and other compensation that they contain.

A weak resume will see you receiving fewer interviews and lower salary offers. While, on the other hand, a strong resume will help you to receive more interviews, more great job offers and higher salary offers.

Strong, effective resumes shorten the length of your job hunt.

Let’s look at some numbers.

Just how much money are you losing weekly or monthly when you are out of work? And how will you ever make up the amount that you lose?

Someone earning $36,000 will lose $9,000 in a 3 month job hunt; and someone earning $60,000 will lose $15,000 if unemployed during a 3-month job search.

• How long will it take to make this up financially?
• In turn, what is a resume worth to you if it cuts your job search time?
• Helps you to get a higher salary?

An investment in your resume will help you to:

• get more interviews,
• get more job offers and
• decrease the number of weeks that you are look for work … saving you thousands and thousands of dollars, and
• possibly earning you thousands of dollars a year in more income.

There is more!

Take a look at what a great resume can also mean to you in dollars and cents if it can help you to increase your salary by $100 per week; or by 10%; or double it or add $5,000, $10,000 or $20,000 to your yearly income.

Can you imagine the difference this would make to you?

Think about it.

It may only cost you a few hours of time and a few dollars to improve your resume — while it can take years to achieve promotions that increase your salary.

We spend over one-half of our adult lives working but the process of writing a resume or looking for a job is given little importance.

Most of us do not realize that our resumes have such a dramatic impact upon salary offers or long term career growth and our quality of life.

Because most of us don’t realize the financial value of our resumes we don’t treat them seriously.

We spend years developing our careers, fighting for promotions, and/or investing thousands of dollars in completing college degrees and advanced certifications AND then typically spend only 1-2 hours creating a resume to market skills that we have spent countless hours and many years nurturing and developing. It just does not make any sense – at all!

Most of us have been taught that a resume should list the type of job we want, the jobs we’ve held and our education — so it seems a simple process. Yet, in today’s job market employers receive 100 to 1,00 or more resumes, or more, for each position they advertise.

You need to stand out from the crowd and your resume can help you to control your professional image and align your skills with the job that you want.

Richard Ward
The Job Search Coach

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days

When you are looking for work you are selling … you.

Every sales person has a business card and so should you.

Your Job Search Business Card should have the following information:

• Your name
• Your degrees and any certifications
• Keywords about your IT experience
• Your email address
• Your telephone number – it needs to have voice mail
• A link to your web based resume and profile

This is an especially useful tool to hand-out to all of your family and friends. After all you cannot really expect them to remember what your information technology skillset is. And give 5 or 10 copies. Ask them to hand them out to their friends. Build your network of people who know about you.

Free Job Search Business Cards

You order free Job Search Business Cards online and have them delivered to practically anywhere in the world.

I started using these cards myself and I now recommend them to everyone. It is a no cost means of getting a well printed business card.

Richard Ward
The Job Search Coach

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days

Here is an example of a web based resume.

Publishing a resume on the Web is advantageous in a number of ways:

• Employers can access your resume 24 hours a day – 7 days a week.
• You can quickly refer a recruiter or potential employer to your web resume during an impromptu phone conversation.
• You can provide a link to your online resume on your Job Search Business Card.
• Web published resumes are readily found by employers using resume spider technology to find passive resumes
• A web based resume enables you to include links to work samples (written work, graphic design, other Web pages you’ve designed, photographs, reports, etc.) that can demonstrate your skills to employers.

Here is a sample of a web based resume and personal portfolio available to you at the JobsWorkCareers.com Job Board. Create your own web-based resume and personal portfolio at no cost.

Richard Ward
The Job Search Coach

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days

There are many opinions passed around about how long a resume should be, the information that shouldn’t be put in the resume, how many years back you should go when including jobs and so on.

All of these opinions are usually prefaced by “They say…”.

I haven’t yet discovered who they are.

The basic components of a resume are:

1. Contact Information
2. Degrees, Diplomas & Certifications
3. Languages Spoken
4. Work Experience
5. Education
6. Professional/Technical Training
7. Awards & Prizes
8. Community & Volunteer Experience
9. Travel
10. Sports
11. Hobbies

In closing

Your resume is your story and should present your career experience, education, training and most importantly your achievements in an easy to read format. The length of your resume will be determined by your years of experience, not by an arbitrary one or two page limit.

Richard Ward
Your Personal Career Coach

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days

Your Resume Cover Letter must stimulate the recipient of your resume to open your resume and give you consideration. You are introducing yourself and saying that you have what it takes to do the job that they are trying to fill.

Cover Letter goes in the e-mail Message

In the age of e-mail your Cover Letter should go in the message of the e-mail and not as an attachment because it probably will not be opened and read as an attachment.

Keep your cover letter brief.

Assume that the person receiving your resume is busy – very busy. Be thoughtful and put yourself in their shoes. Keep your cover letter brief and to the point. You are not writing an essay or a novel. You are trying to communicate with someone who is probably very busy and you are competing for their attention.

There are 9 basic parts to a great Resume Cover Letter:

1. Your name, telephone number and e-mail address at the top of the Cover Letter.
2. Address the letter to someone in particular, if you can, or use To Whom It May Concern.
3. Name the position that you are applying for unless a file reference number is requested, then use the file reference number.
4. Briefly give an overview of your experience as it relates to the position being applied for.
5. In point form list the 3 or 4 most career highlights that relate directly to the job according to the ad that you are responding to.
6. Tell them that you have attached your resume that provides a detailed overview of your skills, experience, education, training and achievements.
7. Thank the person reading your resume.
8. Sign the e-mail with your name, home telephone number and personal e-mail address.
9. Add a PS to the note telling the recipient that you check your voice mail and email on regular daily basis.

Remember – your Resume Cover Letter has only one purpose – to get your resume opened & read.

Richard Ward
Your Personal Career Coach

Post a Job! $87 for 90 days