You got that end of year bonus … or not. You are wondering if you should stay or go … or not. You would like to climb the ladder where you are at or perhaps somewhere else.
Nonetheless, you have heard how important it is to engage in your own career management and keep your career documents up to date. With the start of a new year as well as a new decade, it’s time to add this task to your New Year’s Resolution so you are prepared for any downsizings, reorgs, mergers and acquisitions, changes, etc. These things happen and many times with no notice!
Remember hearing those Girl and Boy Scout mottos to BE PREPARED?
Are you?
Aside from LinkedIn, you need to have a resume. So if you ask 10 resume writers how to write a resume, it’s probable that you will get 15 or more different answers.
As I am one of those resume writers, I have only one style I use – a researched based style, which I then convert to a resume with no formatting that will make it through the online application process, otherwise called the Applicant Tracking System or ATS. I write resumes with technology and bots in mind and not for making a visual statement of creativity.
However, today, I’d rather talk about those creative visual resumes. Although I do not offer this style, they might be the right thing for people in the creative space, as long as they are handing it to a human being or emailing it or perhaps adding it to their LinkedIn profile as a media attachment. Yes you can add your resume to your LinkedIn profile and here is how.
Although I do not know for sure, I can only surmise these types of resumes would have a heck of a time making it through any ATS and they could potentially lack the keywords necessary to match job descriptions, In addition, they might be extremely difficult to customize for each job application without constantly re-hiring the creator, unless you controlled the software.
Nonetheless, here is a list of some resources.
Hopefully this list is helpful should you choose to go down this path for whatever reason you want to justify. For me … I’ll stick with the research-based one that I can also tweak so it’s bot-friendly!
Bottom line … do not neglect managing your career and your career documents. A simple start would be with a Bronze membership.
AUTHOR BIO
Lynne Williams is the Executive Director of the Philadelphia Area Great Careers Group, a 501(c)3 nonprofit with over 6300 members and alumni providing career education and networking. Lynne also writes for vista.today, montco.today, and delco.today.
