Volunteering Abroad

As the U.S. job market worsens, brand new graduates may find themselves without a job and start looking for things to take up their time.  Many will attempt to find a part time position which is a great alternative.  But a new trend for young graduates is to volunteer abroad for programs such as Peace Corps and Teach for America.  There is a high demand in many developing countries for volunteers, providing life long experiences that will benefit you throughout your life.  This is a great opportunity to be productive, help others, and learn more about yourself while the job market is down.  Volunteering abroad also makes you stand out from other job candidates and is a great interview conversation starter.  Additionally, volunteering helps cover any gaps in your resume. 

Following along President Obama's message of service, "I say this to you as someone who couldn't be standing here today if not for the service of others, and who wouldn't be standing here if not for the purpose that service gave my own life."  

www.peacecorps.gov

www.teachforamerica.org

www.unitedplanet.org

The Resume - Format

Understanding the basics of a resume is important, but putting it all together on a piece of paper is a whole other story. Below is a guide towards the formatting basics:

Font Type and Size

If you want a recruiter to take you seriously, use proper font on your resume. Using cute font will make you look immature and not ready to enter the professional world. Stick with Times New Roman, Arial, or Tahoma and you'll be just fine. Font sizes will always be dependent on how much content you have in your resume. The more content you start putting on the smaller the font should be but keep in mind that it still needs to be readable. If you find that your resume is lacking and looking sparse; playing with the font sizes can create some more volume. Stick with a font size between 10 and 14. Anything smaller than 10 can be very hard to read and anything over 14 can create more void than you want.

Using Bolds

Bolding should be used as a way to separate sections in your resume. Every new section such as Objective, Education, Experience, and so forth should be bold as to help organize the flow of information. What you don't want to do is over bold items which will take away from the organization. The section worth bolding sub sections is the Experience section. Bolding each item in your Experience section will draw attention to those items of importance.

Bullets

I recommend starting your first resume by using bullets as a way for organizing information under the Experience section. Each item you list, either an internship or club activity should have at least 3 bullet items underneath. The more information you can list under each section the more information the recruiter will have to make a decision.

Spell Check!

Last by not least, avoid simple mistakes by spell checking and proof reading your resume over and over again.

As your resume changes over time so will your format, so make sure to update your resume and stay flexible with formatting. You can also use a resume template to start out as well and adjust it based on your needs.

The Resume - Basics

Your resume, though just a piece of paper, is a representation of your current life experiences and an advertisement of your skills. Take the time and care to really concentrate on making your resume the best you absolutely can. Below is a guide towards the different areas of a resume.

Objective

This is typically a one sentence statement describing the job position you are seeking. It's role is to help a recruiter remember what you area seeking since they will be receiving hundreds of resumes. Here is an example of an objective statement:

"Seeking an internship position with a top advertisement firm to provide me exposure in printed advertisements"

Education

This is probably the easiest section of the resume. School, Major, and Expected date of graduation is the main information you need in this area. The tricky one is the GPA. If you have a GPA over a 3.0, I would definitely put it on there. For those of you, including myself, who do not have a stellar GPA, I would recommend keeping it off. Some companies require a minimum GPA for their internship positions and some don't. If the GPA is very important to the recruiter they will ask and you must be ready to have an explanation. From my personal experience, I have been able to get many interview spots without having to place my GPA on the resume and it never came up during the interview to be an issue with most companies.

Skills

This area can include just about anything that you feel is pertinent to your field of study. Computer programers should list all coding languages they have experience with while biochemistry majors should list all lab equipment and techniques they have experience with. Being fluent in a second or even third language is a major plus to have and should be listed on the resume as well. Generic skills that should be listed are things like Microsoft Word, Excel, or PowerPoint.

Classes

It may be warranted to list classes you have taken so the recruiter knows your level of knowledge in certain fields. I for one have always thought of this section as a filler to help create more volume in a resume. Most companies will assume your level of knowledge based on your class level and major. If you can avoid putting this section in your resume I would, but if you need a filler section, this is the best one to add.

Experience

This is the major meat of your resume as it contains your previous job positions and a description of your duties for each one. Make sure to list your job title, company, and duration of that job position. At this point of your career, it is ok to add any experiences from High School such as a summer job, club activities, or volunteering you had done. Under each job position, list three bullet points on what your responsibilities were.

Customize

Your resume should be customized for you. If you are in a leadership position through clubs on campus, create a leadership section and list out what you've done. Were you awarded a scholarship or honor? Create a section for that. If you feel that there is information about you that will catch the eye of a recruiter you should definitely include it. Here are some sections worth putting in your resume:

Leadership

Extracurricular Activities

Publications

Presentations

Awards/Honors

A Few More Pointers

Keep your resume to a page. You don't want to list out every detail of your experiences, just the main points. You want the recruiter to interested enough that they want to ask you the details at an interview. Most importantly, do NOT lie on your resume. This is grounds for immediate termination from your position. I have seen new senior hires terminated within days of their hiring because they have a false statement on their resume. There is no reason for you to list skills you do not have and create a level of expectation you can not meet. Remember, your resume is always a work in progress. As you continue to learn new skills, update your resume from time to time so that when a career fair is around the corner you'll be ready.

Redsprouts will continue working on more resume articles that deal with the best way to format and how to add some punch to any resume. Stay Tuned.

Career Builder Survey

Career builder recently published survey results of 31,000 hiring managers. Of interesting note,

49% of hiring managers reported applicants lying on their resume with 57% of hiring managers pulling the application from the candidate pool. Never lie on your resume, if you are not a right match for the job based on what you put on your resume, your company will eventually find out.

43% of hiring managers spend less than one minute on resumes. This is not a big surprise of course. Hiring managers will receive hundreds of resumes for one position and do not have the time to thoroughly look over your resume. The important message here is make your resume stand out.

What the Career Builder survey did have was a list of key words hiring managers use when looking through resumes:

• problem-solving and decision-making skills (50 percent)
• oral and written communications (44 percent)
• customer service or retention (34 percent)
• performance and productivity improvement (32 percent)
• leadership (30 percent)
• technology (27 percent)
• team-building (26 percent)
• project management (20 percent)
• bilingual (14 percent)

Of course this does not mean you should blanket your resume with these key words unless you truly have the experience to do so.

Career Builder Survey [CareerBuilder]

Resume Building Internship Experience

One of the great things that a summer internship can do is beef up your resume in many different areas. My first internship was a position in the environmental department of an oil refinery. I was involved in projects that allowed me to learn new skills and understand how my degree would help me in the real world. When I sat down to fill out my resume, I realized how much more I could include other than adding a new section under job descriptions. In addition to improving my skills with Microsoft Excel, I also learned how to use specific environmental and plant operation software which I added to the list of the computer software I was familiar with. One of my projects required me to use a sampling analyzer which I became proficient in using and could now add to my resume under laboratory equipment device I was capable in using.

Your internship can not only benefit you with great job experience but it can also help you build familiarity with specific software and equipment that other companies are looking to hire people with skills for. Many companies that offer internships are very proactive about training their interns with every aspect of their job. I always made it a point at my other internships to try to get training on relevant tools and skills to add to my resume as I knew that other companies would be looking for these skill sets. The more software and equipment skills you can learn at your internship the more appealing you will be to the next company looking to hire you.

Career - Avoid Simple Mistakes

I have had the opportunity of helping my company recruit for entry level and internship positions at different colleges. Several months ago, I was invited to attend a career fair and talked to many interested undergraduates. Upon returning to the office and looking through my emails, I came upon one that made me understand why recruiters don’t always respond back. This prospective student had emailed me about his interest in getting an internship with my company, but had gotten the company totally wrong. Even more frustrating was that I had remembered giving my business card to this student and it is quite obvious from my email address that I did not work for the company that was mistaken for. Additionally, the student had made the worst mistake by misspelling the word "resume" on their file attachment.

Now I may seem harsh to this particular student, but in an ever increasingly competitive world, simple mistakes like that can end your dreams short. Always spell check your resume, cover letter, and email message before sending it out to a recruiter. It only takes a couple of minutes to do and can save you from ending up in the "do not hire" list.

The source of this student’s mistake was using a template email. Template emails are by far, the worse way to contact a recruiter about your interest and can easily be identified. Instead, write separate emails designed around the needs of the positions you are interested- it'll add a personal touch.

By avoiding simple mistakes, this prospective student would have had their resume forwarded to human resources and most likely would have gotten an interview slot. Let this be a lesson towards taking a small amount of time to avoid a long term problem.

Career - Getting Experience at School

Regardless of where everyone wants to end up after college, whether it is an advanced degree from graduate school or joining the rank and file of the working world, you’ll need to get some relevant experience. What comes to mind when people hear, “Go get some job experience first”, are the prized summer internships. Those are great for someone who already have some prior experience, but what about for someone just starting out? You need no t look further than your own college campus.

To the untrained eye, colleges are just a place for students to attend lectures and professors to harass them with midterms and finals. In reality, colleges are bustling places of activity where teaching classes is just a small part of what they do. Most professors are also there to advance themselves through research and publishing papers. Granted that most of the help comes from their graduate students, but even they don’t like doing the small time grunt work required in research. This is where you come in.

Undergraduate research positions provide great opportunities to not only work one on one with graduate students and professors but to get some great job experience as well during the school year. Research positions can encompass anything from working at the lab bench making solutions to rolling out a survey to collect statistical information. Either way it will look good on your resume and will provide that difference that can set you apart.

So how can you get these great experience building positions? It can be as easy as asking your professor and showing interest in their research. Additionally most schools have a career center that helps fill research positions where needed throughout the campus. These however can be on a first come first serve basis and require a basic or advanced understanding of the research topic, so sign up early and study up before meeting the professor.