When it comes to digesting all kinds of advice — there are some who like to read and those who prefer to listen. For that reason, I’m offering both!
Here are 5 tips I share with clients who hire me as an executive resume writer to help accelerate your job search.
1. Attach a Cover Letter as a Part of your Resume
Do you have a cover letter that you need to send with your resume but are not sure how to attach it? You have a couple of choices:
- If you’re submitting it online, add it as page one of your resume, place your resume below it, save the entire thing as a pdf and send it along.
- Another option is to send it as an email, putting the cover letter in the body of your email and attaching the resume.
2. Don’t Upload Your Resume Details to Chat GPT
I’m a fan of Chat GPT, Bing Chat, and all of the AI’s for starting points for a lot of cover letters, thank you letters, and interview prompts. But my PSA is that people shouldn’t upload their resume details into OpenAI tools.
Doing so means you’re sharing all of your unique career history (your blood, sweat, and tears) to to enter the public space for public consumption. Theoretically, this could mean someone copying details from your resume into theirs.
3. Use a Cover Letter to Address Difficult Topics Upfront
Cover letters can be a great tool for addressing what I call “elephants in the rooms,” or things you worry someone might perceive as a red flag.
Examples of “elephants” include job gaps, job hopping, or making a leap into a new industry or role.
A cover letter is a great place to be transparent, head the elephant off at the pass — so to speak — and control the narrative.
4. Keywords Keywords Keywords
Between job titles, job postings and AI, it’s easier than ever to identify keywords, or, in the case of LinkedIn, skills aligned with a target role.
In addition to helping you understand what your industry is looking for and how your skills align with the right role, embedding them into your career documents can boost searchability.
I advise job seekers to search for 5 or 6 job postings and prompt AI to 1) identify the skills required for each one 2) eliminate any duplicates and 3) rank them in order of importance.
This exercise will provide you with a great set of the Top 10 keywords to include in your resume, and to weave into your LinkedIn headline, summary and experience sections.
3 Pro Tips for LinkedIn
1) Make sure you back up each Top 10 with the story you craft for each job included in your Experience section.
2) When completing the Skills section in LinkedIn, select those that most closely match what appeared in your search.
3) LinkedIn provides room for 100 skills. For optimal searchability, try to include as close to 100 as possible.
5. Stand Out to Companies on LinkedIn
Want to know 2 ways you can make yourself more attractive — or stand out — on LinkedIn to companies of interest?
- Follow them. Sounds silly, but when people are searching for you using LinkedIn Recruiter (one of the tools sold to recruiters to search for talent) that company can see if you’re following them. It’s a great way to show interest!
- Connect with a handful of people at that company. Company connections also shows up in LinkedIn Recruiter searches and may help you rank higher on search compared to others without any common connections to those in the company you’re targeting.
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