How to Write a Cover Letter That Captures Your Future Boss’ Attention!

The key to writing a cover letter that is sure to capture the attention of your future boss or company is to write it yourself. I’m pretty sure that after reading that first line, you’re already debating to yourself that you’re not a writer and you do not have a clue on what to write. Don’t be too hard on yourself, because everything that is needed to create a good cover letter is right there in your head – you just need to know how to tap into that hidden gift.

Know what you want

The first thing that you need to do before writing your cover letter is to know what you want. Here are some good questions you should be asking yourself before you apply for a job:

- What type of job or industry to do I want to work in?

- Why do I like that job or industry?

- Do I have the skills for the job?

Once you know the answers to these questions, writing a cover letter and even answering your interviewer’s questions will be incredibly easy for you, because you aren’t confused and you have given enough thought to what you are doing.

Know what you’re selling

Any good sales person will tell you that you cannot promote a product that you know little about. Now, what exactly is it that you are selling? Yourself, of course! You are trying to convince your prospective employer that you have what they need! Yes, you may know a lot about yourself, but your buyer doesn’t! This is precisely why you should tailor fit the product (you) for the buyers (your future employer). You can do this by reading through the job description intently and ensuring that your resume is updated.

Personalize It!

Once you have figured out what you want and what it is you’re going to pitch to your prospective employer, it is now time for you to write. You can refer to templates and samples so you know what flow or format to use. The important thing is that you are conveying the message that you want to send to your employers.

Get a second opinion

Even if you are a brilliant writer, it’s still important for you to get a second opinion or another’s opinion when it comes to the work you have done. This is why you should have a friend or relative who is good at writing have a look before thinking of mailing it out.

They will not only help you with the spelling and grammar, but they can also provide you with their opinion regarding the mood and tone of the cover letter. By Chris L Maloney – view samples here.

Similar Posts:

• Learn How to Write a Cover Letter – 7 Essential Elements For Success
• Dressing Resume Cover Letters Samples to Kill – Two Great Tricks For Example Resume Cover Letters
• Your Resume Should Look Like a Marketing Brochure – Five Tips to Improve Yours
• Write a Resume For Results – The Cover Letter is Critical!
• Put Some fever in Your Cover Letters
• Cover Letters – The Icing on the Cake
• Brand It, Sell It, Win it – What Makes You Different?
• Cover Letter No-No’s
• Great Cover Letters Are More Effective With Deeper Research
• 7 Cover Letter Mistakes You Make When Applying Via E-Mail

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via employmentdigest.net

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Movin' On Up: What Every Job Seeker Needs for their Next Interview

Recently on “Hired,” a new MTV documentary series that follows college graduates in their pursuit to find their dream jobs in a difficult job market, one prospective candidate designed a shoe for her interview for a design assistant job at Steve Madden. She didn’t get the job, but the shoe design for Steve Madden did get her a second interview.

It seems pretty brilliant when you stop and think about it. Why wouldn’t you bring an example of your work or create something specific to the company that ties in the requirements of the job you’re applying for? In addition to a great résumé highlighting your skills and accomplishments, visually showing the interviewer the value you can bring with a tangible example of the work you could do for the company can put you at the top of the list for the position.

If you’re in the communications field and interviewing for a job that requires public relations work, create a scenario for the company and present a press packet on how you would address the objective. If you’re applying for a journalist position, provide writing samples like news stories, feature stories that publications could feature, in addition to samples from other publications you have written for. For those in graphic design, create a design for a product that the company you’re applying for could sell. You will find that in creative fields like these, you can create something that will show your value and what you can bring to the organization.

For fields like finance and accounting, job seekers will want to bring documentation on how they saved their past employer money. It’s a little more difficult to research a company’s financial status and present a solution for accounting practices than it is to create a design portfolio due to finance confidentiality, but you should still be able to present knowledge about the company’s specific accounting needs. For positions in clerical, administrative, and industrial work, you can highlight your skills by bringing an example of your work. Just think of a project or task you completed at your old job. Apply the concept and relate it to the new position you’re applying for.

Even with the job market showing signs of improvement, there are still many people competing for every open job. So, before your next interview, take the initiative to create something that will impress a potential employer. Learn more about their needs and be ready to sell how you can help them. This will not only showcase your talent but will also show that you researched the company, demonstrating your initiative, your work ethic, and desire to work for them.

via blog.expresspersonnel.com

Posted via web from AndyWergedal

Entrepreneurs and Personal Branding | Personal Branding Blog - Dan Schawbel

On my personal blog I wrote an article about how my entrepreneur friend has struggled in the job search. She wore a lot of hats at her old company and her resume demonstrated that. Unfortunately, companies aren’t looking to hire an “entrepreneur.” They are looking to hire a “sales manager,” “business development manager,” “marketing manager,” and so forth.

I feel a lot of entrepreneurs, myself included, struggle to develop their personal brand when applying for a job. While entrepreneurs feel they need to list every accomplishment and everything thing they do – it’s just quite simply not relevant when applying for a specific job. Therefore, I’ve created a list of items any entrepreneur must do to help develop their personal brand.

Developing your personal brand

1. Pick a desired skillset and stick with it.

You’re an entrepreneur. You’ve been involved with 15 to 20 different projects at your company. Now, it’s time to pick the task you enjoyed the most and begin making a career out of it.

Think about what you excelled in at your company. Think back to your success at the organization – where did you have the biggest impact? And most importantly – what did you enjoy doing? You’re an entrepreneur – you have fun in business. If you’re going to be switching away from being your own boss to having your own boss – make sure you choose a job function you enjoy.

2. Have your resume focus on the specific skillset you chose.

After reflecting on your life as an entrepreneur, you decided that you are a sales professional. You enjoyed all the other disciplines, but realized that your best contributions to your business was in sales. Great! Now your resume should focus on all your sales accomplishments.

You can have one bullet point containing all of your other entrepreneurial activities at your company. After that, the rest of your bullet points should be related to your sales work. Talk about creating a sales plan. Talk about how you managed the sales process. Talk about what you looked for when you hired other sales team members.

This is the part of the process where the prospective employers see that a large part of your entrepreneurial success was due to your sales skills. They begin to see how your sales skills can explicitly benefit their organization.

3. Begin a blog.

You’re an entrepreneur! You enjoy building things. Here’s another project to start: a blog on the certain skillset you choose. For this example, if you are going down the route as a “sales professional,” it’s time to start writing a blog about running sales in a startup. Talk about the different challenges you faced. Talk about the experiences of running a startup’s sale organization.

Your blog will serve as the first way you rebrand yourself from “entrepreneurial superstar” to “entrepreneurial sales superstar”. By writing blog articles that demonstrate your sales acumen, you will begin to shed the image that you are an “entrepreneur who wears many hats” and begin to develop the image that you are “an entrepreneur, who is used to wearing many hats, who succeeds at sales.”

4. Update your social media profiles.

You should update the descriptions on all your social media profiles to reflect your new sales professional personal brand. Your Linkedin headline should reflect your new brand, saying something along the lines of “Experienced and entrepreneurial sales professional.” Your Twitter handle should make mention to your previous life as an entrepreneur and your new life as a sales professional.

On Linkedin, you should request recommendations that mention your specific skillset. If a prospective employer is on the fence about you, they will go to your Linkedin profile for more “clues” about you. If they go on to your Linkedin profile and see a couple of recommendations that explicitly mention your skills in sales – that could be the factor that tips the scales in your favor.

On the other side, if they go on to your profile and see people recommending you for everything BUT your sales skills, that could cause some doubt.

5. Write a case study or guest blog article.

As a final way to establish credibility on your chosen niche and to further establish your personal brand, you should write a case study detailing a specific sales story/example at your startup and how you overcame any obstacles. If you are guest published on a well known sales blog, it’ll help establish your credibility. On your resume, you can include a section on your published work. This would count as third party validation of your abilities.

In the end, you’ll always be branded as an entrepreneur. But, if you are serious about working for someone, you need to be able to prove you can focus on one or two specific job functions and you’ll need to be able to demonstrate how your history as an entrepreneur puts you above others who have may have more experience performing their one or two specific job functions. Working on your personal brand will get you to that level.

Guest Author:

Ben Cathers is a young entrepreneur and author who successfully built three different internet startups before he was 19.  Ben is the author of Conversations with Teen Entrepreneurs and was named in 2005 by CNN as a member of “America’s Bright Future.”  Ben has been mentioned in the Wall Street Journal, FOX News, ABC News, CBS News, Yahoo! Internet Life, The London Sunday Times and in over 40 different publications.  Ben maintains a blog on social media and entrepreneurship at BenCathers.com and is on the advisory board of BranchR.com, ZepFrog Corp and iGot2Know LLC.

via personalbrandingblog.com

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6 Ways to Turn a Job Fair into a Job - Excelle

Steve Berman | Excelle

When you’re young and the world is seemingly your oyster, going to a job fair sounds like a no-brainer. A bunch of companies looking to hire? and All in the same place? As long as you bring enough copies of your resume and pass them out to everyone, you’re certain to get a callback. Right?

Not necessarily. Without the right approach, job fairs can be less than fruitful for those looking to hook up with their dream company, or any organization for that matter. Spending the time to travel to a job fair and putting in tons of legwork — only to receive no feedback at all — has frustrated many a job seeker. But don’t swear them off all together

via excelle.monster.com

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HR Secrets You Don’t Know About - Excelle

Human Resources. A real department of mysteries. Are they your advocate? How do they really decide if you’re right for the job? And why can’t you ever get a straight answer out of them?

A lot goes on behind the closed cubicles of HR. Curious? Take a peek at a few insider secrets about how HR really functions to better understand what you’re dealing with.

Why You Aren’t Getting the Job

What do you do with too many job seekers and too few jobs? Hiring managers have a wide variety of applicants to choose from, but more often than not, they find themselves reading resumes from candidates who don’t even meet the job requirements. Read the job description! If you aren’t hitting everything, you’re wasting your time and the interviewer’s. With a wealth of applicants to choose from, hiring managers are only going to select the best of the best. Meeting the requirements is just the bare minimum. Trust us.

I Spy…

Forget your Facebook profile, that’s so 2009. These days, identity theft is so common that heightened security measures and meticulous processes are a basic standard. There’s a reason why HR runs a background check, asks (and follows up on) multiple references, does drug tests, credit reports, and (of course) Googles you. They really do want to know as much about you as they can. It’s their job!

Watch Your Back

Because HR won’t, even if they want to. HR has the company’s back first, yours second. They’ll be your advocate as far as they can be, but at the end of the day, you’ve got to tough it out on your own. Thinking about reporting your boss or complaining to HR? Make sure it’s worth it. Despite policies and company jargon, tattle tales always look weak and the employer will probably get the benefit from the doubt. Plus, you’re inevitably burning a bridge as far as corporate culture goes. (Sexual harassment is a different story.)

HR Doesn’t Know it All…

They used to. Human Resource departments used to be the backbone of the company, handling everything from firing, hiring, training, and everything in between. And then came the Great Recession. Company downsizing equals outsourcing HR. That means all those HR functions are now the responsibility of third parties, reducing many HR departments to a handful of staff pushing papers and other administrative duties. You think HR has all the power? Think again.

…Because We’re Human After All

Not aliens from Mars, or creatures from another universe. The HR department is made up of plain ol’ humans just like you. Prick them, and they bleed; abuse us, and they’ll go cry in the corporate bathroom – or make your life miserable because they can. Contrary to popular belief, HR isn’t made up of evil masterminds plotting your demise. Like any other department, they’re just doing what they’re being paid to do, and sometimes that might mean making your job harder. Respect the limits of HR and acknowledge that they do what they can. Honey trumps vinegar at the workplace, every time.

via excelle.monster.com

Posted via web from AndyWergedal

Striking the Perfect Balance On Your Resume » Blog | Great Resumes Fast

Have you ever heard someone suggest that the only way to get a job today is to lie on your resume?  I’ve heard several people say this over the last few years.  That said, consider this: I’ve also heard just about every recruiter and hiring manager I know complain that they are tired of reading resumes that dramatically overstate a candidate’s qualifications for a job.

Little white lies: Who’s going to know?

Some job seekers think that the goal of a resume is to get them a job.  In reality, a resume is a tool designed to get you an interview.  It is then up to you to actually “close the deal” and get the job during the interview.  By listing experience on your resume you’re inviting an interviewer to ask you more about it.  When you fabricate experiences you don’t really have, it becomes readily apparent when an interviewer presses you for more details.

Overstating your case

Sometimes job seekers don’t intend to be misleading on their resumes, but they don’t know how to describe their previous experience both truthfully and impressively.  This is where hiring a professional resume writer can be especially helpful.  It’s important to hire a writer who will take the time to conduct a personal interview with you; professional resume writers are trained to make your experiences sound as impressive as possible.  You don’t want the person who must evaluate you based only upon what he has to read to inadvertently overestimate your abilities or qualifications.

Underselling your product

In contrast, job seekers who do a personal consultation with a professional resume writer often find that they have unintentionally been underselling their professional qualifications.  Having someone else on the outside looking in will create a whole new vantage point and can frame your experience in a way you never previously considered. We often hear clients say “I’ve done all of that, I can’t believe I never thought of that before.”

No matter how much experience you have, there’s a way to successfully—and truthfully—market your accomplishments on your resume. It’s just being able to find the balance between impressive, uniquely qualified and not overstating accomplishments you can’t back up in an interview later.

via greatresumesfast.com

Posted via web from AndyWergedal

Job Search Networking Opportunities All Around – How to Find Them! | EmploymentDigest.net

You will find opportunities all the time, every day and everywhere, to use the power of networking to build key connections and accelerate your job search. Of course, there are the typical networking events such as job fairs, business functions, on the golf course or tennis court, in association meetings, and even organized networking meetings.

But there are strategic partnering/networking opportunities in other meetings as well. Perhaps you’re worried that people will think it’s inappropriate for you to be job search networking everywhere.

Are they right? Yes, if you network the way most job seekers do!

The first rule of networking: Relationship first Often job seekers are only focused on their agenda to get something. They don’t take time to create a connection with other people.

If you are truly interested in other people, and ask them about their business and themselves, two things will happen. They will enjoy talking to you because you are one of those rare creatures who “listens”. And they will give you information that can lead to opportunities for you. Just let them talk, and listen for the information that will be helpful to you. Perhaps you’ll also hear how you can be of assistance to them as well. Always be on the lookout for opportunities to achieve mutual goals with your networking partners.

Every contact in any setting can turn into a tremendous opportunity to gather and share valuable information. When you are talking to people, if the conversation has gone well, regardless of the topic, you can always say something like: “I’m thinking of moving on to a marketing director position at a company that makes or distributes consumer electronics. What advice would you have for me?”

If this part of the conversation yields results, you might also ask “Who do you know who works in a consumer electronics firm such as (company A and company B)?”

How to know when to ask You will know if the time is right to ask these questions. You may not have built enough rapport in every conversation to ask, so do what feels right in the moment. Don’t let your fear of rejection stop you here. It’s to your advantage to ask these questions as often as possible. You never know!

Admitting to being the original reluctant networker,  Katherine Moody would do almost anything, including hiding out in the ladies room, to avoid a networking event. So she interviewed some networking masters to learn their simple and rarely discussed secrets. Then she went on to get her last 4 jobs by networking her way into the hidden job market with those simple secrets. Katherine shares those insider techniques on her job secrets blog. http://hrjobsearchsecrets.com. While there, get her free report: How to create a memorable brand for your networking. You’ll love what it does for your networking!

via employmentdigest.net

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