Senin, 09 Agustus 2010

Ditch the Resume Objective

By : Nels Wroe

Your résumé is spit-shined, polished, lightly buffed and glistening in all its glory. You've run it through keyword tests, tailored it to specific employers, focused on results you've achieved, and even printed it on coffee-scented paper stock (one can never be too prepared, right?).

But when it comes to that darn objective, you're never sure what to write. Will you sound too generic? If you get too creative, will it turn the employer off? Yet the truth is that the objective -- at least in the traditional sense -- is dead.

Ready to take its well-worn place is something far more important: a stark assessment of who you are through the eyes of your potential employer. Maybe your experience is solid, and the results speak for themselves -- but can employers truly relate to your experience in their world? Are you helping them see your potential through a lens they understand?

Potential is in the eyes of the beholder

Many job seekers get so focused on presenting themselves to a potential employer using the traditional "here's what I want to accomplish" objective that they overlook another, more critical component -- the valuable skills they already possess.

But why are those so important? Heck, it's results that count, right? Sure -- but only to a point. When faced with the choice between someone who blew past his sales targets but left a trail of upset co-workers and frustrated clients in his wake, and someone who can show equivalent results using a forward-thinking and team-oriented approach -- you can likely guess which one a hiring manager will go for.

Yes, employers want to see results. But they also want to see how you achieved those results. An objective will give them an idea of how you'd go about it for their company – so show them. Why waste your time, and theirs, with an objective that speaks nothing to this?

Understand your potential

Before you can hope to sell a future employer on your potential, you need to understand it yourself. Anyone can say she has "tons of potential" or use phrases such as "out of the box" or "dedicated," but how can you quantify and describe this to employers in a way they can relate to? It's simple. You need to understand yourself.

Not in the vaguely New Age kind of way, but in the brass tacks, nuts and bolts of knowing your own work styles and competencies kind of way.

And there's the problem. Most of the objective methods used in the past to help us understand ourselves and our potential are not ideal for illustrating this to an employer.

Instead, assess yourself using one of the many tools that employers use to identify potential. These assessments provide accurate, objective and useful measures of your natural styles and competencies in the workplace. They can help you put your accomplishments into context -- and better yet, will help you explain how you achieved your results in language that employers can relate to.

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