A Surefire Way Not to Get Hired
By Suzanne Richardson
Jobs are hard to come by these days. So when my friend “Carly” was offered an interview a few weeks ago, I was really pulling for her. She’s smart and seemed perfect for the position – but ended up not getting the job. I believe it was mainly due to a common interviewing mistake she made. But you can boost your chances of getting any position just by learning from Carly’s failure.
When Carly called me after the interview, she sounded bummed. “I didn’t get it,” she told me.
When I asked what went wrong, she said, “When the hiring manager asked me to go into details about what I liked about the company, I couldn’t answer him. I hadn’t really looked into it that much.”
The fact is, the more you know about the job you’re applying for, the better. A Robert Half International poll of executives, reported in MSN Careers, found that most job applicants “display at least some knowledge of the company or industry.”
Doing background research before your interview will not only show the folks who are doing the hiring that you’re interested in the job… it will also help you determine, specifically, how you can contribute to the company’s success. (And, trust me, knowing that will come in very handy during the interview.)
If you can’t find any info about the business online, do what Carly should have done: Call up the company and set up an “informational interview” with the head of the department you want to join. You can ask questions – and show interest – without the pressure of a traditional job interview. And then, when you’re ready to apply, you’ll be a much stronger candidate.
This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.
How to make sure an IT recruiter spots your IT resume?
When an IT recruiter does a search for a resume using an online job site like Dice, Monster, CareerBuilder, etc or their companies resume database; they search for qualified IT professionals using keywords.
Generally, the IT recruiter will first do a search based on a specific skill set that their client is looking for, such as ASP.net, CCNA, etc. Let me example:
A client needs 3 software developers who know ASP.net, VB.net, SQL Server, IIS, C#. My client really needs someone who knows ASP.net and SQL Server.
Using this example, I;m going to show you how to guarantee an IT recruiter will I’m going put in the keywords of ASP.net and SQL Server. Now, why is this bloody important? This is important because if you resume was written highlighting your skills using ASP.net and SQL Server, your resume will appear at the top of my search list
Key Point: If your IT resume is keyword rich for a specific skill set, 9 times out of 10, it will land at the top of an IT recruiters search results when they are looking to fill that open position.
Whatever you do, DON’T WRITE KEYWORD THROUGHOUT YOUR RESUME JUST TO MAKE IT KEYWORD RICH.
The easiest way to make your IT resume keyword rich is to use specific IT skill sets throughout your resume. For instance, I would put SQL Server and ASP.net in my summary and throughout my experience sections of my resume to make it keyword rich.
I will let you in on another little secret, generally IT recruiters pay attention to when the last time your IT resume was updated. So, it is best to go online and change something on your IT resume every couple of days. This way the IT recruiter will think that is was recently updated.
Key Point: If you change the word “the” to “a” just once a week on your online resume, an IT recruiter will think that it was updated recently because you made a change. It doesn’t have to be a big change to your online resume, any change will make your online IT resume look like it was updated recently.
Make any change to your online IT resume to make it appear as if it was recently updated to stay at the top of IT recruiter’s search results.
Follow these tips and you will be on your way to attracting IT recruiters to your IT resume like bees to honey.
To your IT career success,
Ivan Hurt
Certified Professional Resume Writer (CPRW) and Ex-IT Hiring Manager
