Online Profiling to make the most of your Resume

For decades, people have been searching for jobs through a tried and tested method recommended by various well-wishers, consultants and head hunters of ‘Resume with a Cover Letter’. The cover letter then became a cover email, the Resume an email attachment. Now the Resume is often an attachment to the online application form on the company website.

While this has probably been helpful to the company HR team in sorting resumes, it has made it difficult for you as a job seeker to stand out or differentiate yourself.

Most Resumes are dreary recitals of dates and facts that leave the HR officer only moderately informed and the potential employer himself or herself totally bored. They don’t want to know what you have been but what you have achieved. Applying for a job is an implicit undertaking to improve the success and profitability of the employer you are applying to. Even with a professionally polished resume, based on our experience in mentoring over the last 25 years, applications will fail in many cases because of a lack of – or a negative – online presence.

Today an essential tool to be at the front of prospective employers’ minds is through your online presence. They usually search through the social media – so making sure your LinkedIn, Facebook and other profiles are up-to-date and consistent with your Resume is an obvious first step.

A recent article in the Wharton e-magazine explains how important this is. It points out that “the extent to which individuals have established a strong and compelling online presence is having an impact on who gets the interview and job. Actively building a digital footprint that proves presence in a professional community and expertise in the field is increasingly important.”

Knowing what kind of a digital footprint to create, and knowing which sites to leave your footprint on is as critical in many job functions and most industries as is physical networking within those circles. Employers in these sectors often think that not having an online presence somehow automatically disqualifies you from the job. It is fast becoming a “must have”.

An obvious result is that your on-paper, in-person, and online presence need to be coherent and consistent. That’s easy if you are being authentic in all of these. But in wanting to build a suitably impressive presence for your quest for fabulous job offers, beware how much of what you say is just packaging – important as that is?

Terrific Mentors International has a specialist Associate who collaborates with us to make online profiles work better. Working together we can transform your public persona, not by publishing unbelievable hyperbole but by presenting the facts in a way potential employers want. ‘Cutting to the chase’ in job getting is increasingly important. A clear, crisp description of what you have done and what you have yet to do turns employers’ heads to have a second look.

It’s that second glance that gets you the job.

If you’d like to know more about TMI’s ‘Your Visibility Service’ please email deepa.shahi@terrificmentors.com.