Horizon Point Consulting

Category: Beyond Ready

Beyond Ready is Horizon Point’s line of resources for students preparing for college and/or career.

  • 4 easy steps to know which keywords to include in your resume

    With all kinds of tools out there these days for a computer instead of a person to initially screen a resume, we get lots of questions about keywords.  What keywords am I supposed to include seems to be the critical question.

    What keywords should I include?

    You will know what keywords to include because they are in the job posting.  Tagcrowd.com  is the quickest and coolest way we’ve found to identify keywords by the frequency they appear in the posting.

    What you do:

    1. Find a posting
    2. Copy and paste the posting into Tagcrowd.com
    3. View the word graphic it displays
    4. Make sure the biggest words are incorporated into your resume

    Here’s an example:  On Indeed.com we did a simple search for “IT” positions.

    Picking this one:

    ITJobPosting

    We pasted it into tagcrowd, and this is the result:

    tagcrowd copy

    If you were applying for this position, the key is to make sure you emphasize the marketing experience you have in social and content marketing.  Development software, writing, research, and Mircosoft product experience are going to be needed.  You’ll also need to emphasize ways you’ve collaborated and engaged others.   And see “bachelor” up there in the top right corner? You’re going to need a bachelors degree.

    If you are wanting to develop a resume for a variety of openings, then search for openings in the area in which you are pursuing, copy and paste several of them into tagcrowd and look for consistencies.  The words that come up the biggest and most frequently need to be included in your resume.

  • You Get 6 Seconds: Think Like a Recruiter when drafting your resume.

    You Get 6 Seconds: Think Like a Recruiter when drafting your resume.

    Count to six. What do you think you could get accomplished in this amount of time? Not much, but a recruiter has already reviewed your resume and moved on to the next one by the time you can get to seven.

    The Honest Truth.

    Hiring managers and recruiters, at least when it comes to making decisions based on a resume, don’t care about anything but your experience and your education if it’s required for the job.

    Someone may tell you having phrases like “highly motivated”,   “self-starter”, “strong interpersonal skills”, etc. need to be on your resume, but you can’t prove that you are these things simply by putting them down on paper.

    The cold hard facts that can be put on paper, and therefore, as the video shows, where recruiters focus their time:

    1. Where you’ve worked and for how long
    2. What education you’ve obtained

    And that is what the powers that be look at. You may be able to prove to them in an interview that you are, in fact, a “self-starter”, but stick to the concrete stuff on a resume. Where you’ve worked and for how long matters- whether we like it or not.

  • An Ode to Mollie and All High School Graduates: Seek Joy

    An Ode to Mollie and All High School Graduates: Seek Joy

    It’s that time of year. The cusp of summer means high school and college graduations. The end of something and the start of another. A time of transition.

    Mollie, a high school Co-Op student who has worked with us, graduates today.  She’s been a sheer joy to work with because of her sweet spirit and willingness to do anything and everything without a question or complaint even when I’ve dumped mind-numbing spreadsheet work on her.   She has done an outstanding job writing most of our Thursday blogs this spring, giving great advice to students and parents about career and college preparation.  And most importantly, she is great with my kids. Her curly hair, our son has found, is the best race track for toy cars.  Mollie, thanks for letting him turn your head into a race track!

    As I think about what advice to give to Mollie or any graduating senior, I can’t say it any better than country music (and definitely not better than Sandra Bullock). In the words of Darius Rucker, realize “It won’t be like this for long.”   So ENJOY it.

    Enjoy it by finding the root of the word- joy.  In the words of Sandra (Bullock that is) at her surprise graduation speech this week, “It’s the joy that stays with you.”

    Find joy in:

    1. The work you end up pursuing
    2. In people

    Mollie wrote about wanting to be a Child Life Specialist.  After a particularly trying set of medical tests this past week with our son, we realized the value of a Child Life Specialist during one procedure with him.  Mollie, you’d be great at this.  But don’t give up on the dream job of antique hunting.  You can do both, and being a child life specialist is kind of like babysitting.

    Most of all, Mollie, and all graduating seniors out there, share in joy with others. You’d be great as a Child Life Specialist because you would bring joy to children and parents through who you are.

    Mollie, we sure have enjoyed you- thank you.  Keep being you and the world will continue to be more joy-filled because you are here.

  • 6 Steps and Tools for Better Networking

    6 Steps and Tools for Better Networking

    Last week, we discussed the importance of networking because Computers Don’t Give People Jobs- People Do. If you still aren’t convinced of this based on the data presented last week, then here is another tid-bit of data for you:

    5D79972C-1628-4D1D-BA78-AE0DF976C1F6

    According to this chart, networking encompasses almost half of the way that companies fill job openings.

    So the proof is there. If you want to get a job, the best way to do it is to network. But how do you do it?

    Here are some steps along with a Networking Log to help you track this process:

    1. Set a networking goal. Our Networking Log has a baseline goal for you.
    2. Identify your network. Who are you already connected to and who are those people connected to?
    3. Develop a plan to reach out to your network. Target who you will reach out to, by when, and how (in-person meeting, email, phone, social media).
    4. Request that the network contacts you reach out to send your information to anyone else in their network that might be in need of your skills and expertise. Many of them won’t do this, but for the few that do, this method may lead to promising job leads. I know one job opportunity I’ve had and accepted was a result of this type of networking.
    5. Follow-Up. You have to stay in front of people who you are networking with and continue to reach out to them. Create a schedule to follow-up with those network connections that are most promising.
    6. Track the leads and results achieved from each contact. This can help you identify the best methods and networks to tap into for further results.

    But I’m not looking for a job you say? Whether you’re an active job seeker, passive job seeker, or not a seeker at all, networking is critical to seen and unseen opportunities. This same method can also help sales or business development professionals as well as recruiters (there are two sides to the job networking equation after all!). Taking the time to have a networking game plan and follow through on that plan, no matter where you are in your career, can help you take advantage of relationships. And relationships are what lead to the best possibilities in work and life.

    Image source: Lou Adler (@LouA) is the Amazon best-selling author of Hire With Your Head (Wiley, 2007) and the award-winning Nightingale-Conant audio program, Talent Rules! His latest book, The Essential Guide for Hiring and Getting Hired, is now available on Amazon.

    Beyond_Ready_Cover-smaller

  • Computers Don’t Give People Jobs- People Do.

    Computers Don’t Give People Jobs- People Do.

    A recent LinkedIn group posting by a job seeker asked the question, “Tons of  applications vs. networking (in a new place) – Which might work best?”


    While applying online for openings is a necessary component to job search, I think this chart and table answers the job seeker’s question clearly:

    wherejobopportunitiescomefrom

    Mark S. Granovetter, a sociologist at Harvard, investigated how people get jobs. His study included professional, technical, and managerial workers who recently found jobs, and the chart shows the methods by which jobs were obtained.

    Granovetter’s data also indicated that of the people who found jobs through personal contacts, 43.8% had new positions created for them.

    Granovetter concludes: “Personal contacts are of paramount importance in connecting people with jobs. Better jobs are found through contacts, and the best jobs, the ones with the highest pay and prestige and affording the greatest satisfaction to those in them, are most apt to be filled in this way.”

    Recommended Job Search Effort Allocation

     

    Priority

    Method

    Recommended Effort Allocation

    1

    		 Unpublished Sources

    70%

    2

    		 Advertisements

    10%

    3

    		 Executive Search Agencies, Job Fairs

    5%

    4

    		 Present or Former Employer

    5%

    5

    		 Targeted Mailings

    5%

    6

    		 Other

    5%

    So if you are searching for a job, spend the majority of your time focusing on networking to find out about most of the jobs- the unpublished ones.

    Next week, we’ll give some recommendations on how to network and provide you with a tool for planning and tracking your networking efforts.