Ultimate Career
Career Worth Living For!
Trying your luck?
Mar 24th
Over the past week, I have placed 3 job advertisements out on Hong
Kong’s jobsdb.com seeking suitable candidates to join the Career
Architects team. Amongst the applicants, I see some names that
appeared in all three jobs (and some several times). Mind you, the
jobs are quite different in nature – trainer, program manager, and
marketing associate – and demands rather distinct skills and
experiences.
If these people applied for all three jobs, it will appear to me
that they think that they fulfill the requirements of all 3 jobs
and that they have experience working in all of these 3 jobs.
The fact is that none of these applicants can do all 3 jobs well
simultaneously. And if they really can do so, they certainly would
not be available in the open market (they would have been too
valuable to not be employed!)
And the fact that they applied for all 3 indicates to me that they
were simply trying their luck. They simply do not know that they
want.
If they applied for all 3 jobs in Career Architects, I can safely
guess that they applied for many other jobs in many other companies
as well.
Would I shortlist such applicants for an interview? No.
As an employer, the key criteria when shortlisting potential
employees is that the one selected should be one who has exhibited
the capability to help me solve my problems. This person should
have a good understanding of what my business is about, what the
job requires, what problems he/she needs to handle or solve, and
knows, to a large extent, how he/she will fit in.
You should realize by now that researching the company that you are
applying to, along with the job and people in it, is a vital step
towards a successful job-hunt. And a successful job-hunt is one
that helps solve a problem within an organization. No company or
organization will hire if they do not have a problem or issue to
resolve.
I am certainly not interested to work with people who are simply
trying their luck in their job application. With their action, they
are saying that they do not have any interest nor passion in the
work. How, then, can they contribute to the company mission and
vision?
I know that all employers will make this assumption: “The way you
look for a job will be the way you do the job.” And so, if you do
not put in effort to understand the company and job and see how you
can contribute to the company, you will likewise not put in much
effort in the job should you be hired.
With this, you’ll realise that it is actually very very easy to stand out from job-hunting crowd.
Résumé Attack!
Sep 4th
Over the past few weeks, we have been gearing up to hire new staff members to join our team. Just last Friday, we put out 2 job advertisements out on JobsDB in Hong Kong and before the week is over, we last counted about 88 applications. I suspect that by this weekend, we’ll have well over 100 applications to look at.Â
Top 10 problems most (99%) of the applications have:
1. Â Â Did not follow instructions given in the job advertisement.
2.   Did not send cover-letter.
3.   For those who sent a cover-letter together with their resume, the cover-letter and resume are one-size-fits-all. Some even contain another company name which they previously applied to. Much to my amusement, there was even one applicant who simply forwarded the email, along with his resume, he sent to another company to us!
4.   Did not bother to research the company.
5.   No effort was spent understanding the company needs.
6.   No effort to demonstrate that they possess the job requirements.
7.   Resume poorly formatted (i.e. does not provide easy reading).
8.   Achievements from previous experiences not evident in the resume.
9.   Self-focused instead of job and company-focused.
10. Poor use of English. Very poor for some. And yet, they say in their resume – Fluent in written and spoken English.
Looking from the employer’s perspective, recruitment is a highly time-consuming business activity. Executives are already hard-pressed for time to handle their own daily work. Going through 100 resumes (or more) to shortlist candidates and then sparing time to interview the shortlist is certainly not something that is high on the priority list.
Hence, it is absolutely vital that, if you want the job, you do yourself a big favour by making reading your cover-letter and resume an easy task!
With this in mind, job (internship and permanent jobs alike) applicants must remember these points when crafting your application:
1.    Hiring managers are extremely busy. They are highly unlikely to give much time to YOUR resume. Expect between 5 to 15 seconds maximum. So, how do you stand out??
2.    Your resume is your personal brochure – make sure that it sells and promotes you as the best candidate for the job!! If you are going to send out a boring, general resume, you are better off not sending it at all. It wastes your time as well as the employer’s.
3.    Ensure that your resume is only 2 pages long MAXIMUM. Nothing more! Nobody likes to read long, boring documents.
4.   MAKE SURE you send a cover-letter other than your resume. As a professional, a cover-letter is a MUST! It allows you to sell your services specifically and demonstrates your writing style.
5.   Whatever you put on the resume and cover-letter, make sure they are highly relevant to that company and that job.
6.    Do all you can to help the hiring manager understand why and how you fit the job and the company.
7.    Your resume must show your previous job experiences and achievements. Experience alone says nothing!
8.   Always send PDF versions instead of WORD versions.
9.     If you are emailing your application, make sure your cover-letter is in the email content itself with your resume attached.
10.  There are tonnes of resume and cover-letter writing books and materials out there in the bookshops and the Internet. However, not all advice are good. Be very selective of the advice you follow. Just think of this: If everyone follows what those books teaches, will their application still stand out?
Remember that your cover-letter and resume can’t get you the job. They are tools to get you an interview. Make sure you use them prudently.