• How to Explain Job Hopping

    COVID-19 has changed the career landscape in countless ways. Many people lost their jobs, left the workforce to take care of their children, or resigned because of issues with vaccine mandates. As a result, the pandemic has made job-hopping more normalized and more acceptable. More than ever, people are changing jobs when they need to, regardless of their length of employment. However, those who move from job to job after short stints (less than a year) may still be viewed as job hoppers.

    While there’s no official definition of job hopping, I describe it as a repeated pattern of leaving a position after less than a year. I’m currently working with a client who took a job that turned out to be quite different than expected, and now, less than eight months later, she's changing again. Sometimes a brief work ...
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  • When To Change Your Job Title On Your Resume

    I've been asked this question by clients so many times: Can I adjust my job title?  

    The answer is....sometimes.

    I do advocate changing your job title, just slightly, in two situations:

    1. To Accurately Describe What You Do

    First, you change it when it actually makes your title more accurate to you do. Many job titles out there are very ambiguous and don't give an accurate picture of what the job entails. Plus, we've all taken jobs that sounded like one thing, and then turned out to be SO much more when we actually took the job.

    Let's say your job title is Program Coordinator. This job title may seem harmless but it's very general and could be misleading. The word "coordinator" typically implies something low ...
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  • Never Be Overqualified Again

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    Have you ever been told you’re "overqualified" for a job? Of course, you have. Anyone over the age of 40 will tell you that’s a code word for old.

    So, what does conventional advice say to do? Remove the older jobs on your resume. Remove the years from your education. Slap a younger photo on your LinkedIn profile. You’re supposed to play all sorts of games to hide the fact that you are 50 something with 30+ years of experience.

    All of this sounds great…until they interview you. You can hide your age all you want on a piece of paper or online, but you’re forgetting one little thing: they’ll figure it ...
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  • New Year, New Career: What You Need To Know For The 2019 Job Search

    It's a new year and for many...that means a new career or job search. If that's you, you're in good company. This is one of the most popular times to job search. As I coach whose worked with 200+ clients, I see job seekers with various levels of knowledge and comfort when it comes to how to navigate the modern job search. I see the differences between those are successful and those who just complain and bad mouth recruiters all day and wonder why they aren't employed.

    If you are planning to change jobs this year, consider what's changed in the last few years.

    The 2019 job search is...

    Digital. We all know how much online job boards have the changed the search process. But the onset of this technology doesn't give you carte blanche ...
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  • Social Media Recruiting At An All-Time High

    If you've looked for a job at all in the last few years, you know that the recruiting landscape has changed dramatically. Many people still underestimate the role of social media in their job search though. If you don't have a clean, professional and value-based presence online, it will affect your job search results.

    According to research done by JobVite in 2016, over 90% of employers now use social media in some way to screen job candidates before hiring them. This number has increased dramatically in the last ten years. In addition to viewing your profiles, they are also doing basic online searches to see what kind of results your name produces.

    Let's take a look at some recent research and see exactly how deeply social media ...

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  • Keywords On Your Resume: Context Matters

    Having the right keywords on your resume and in your LinkedIn profile is the hottest trend right now for job hunters. There are a plethora of free articles online telling you that your resume will be tossed in the trash if you don't have the right industry-specific buzzwords. The same advice goes for your LinkedIn profile and having enough skills listed to boost its SEO performance.

    Yes, it's true that many applicant tracking systems are scanning and parsing your resume for essential keywords that are found in the job description. "Keyword stuffing," as it’s called, is the practice of having a long list of keywords at the top of your resume. This will help you get past the applicant tracking system and get your resume ...

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  • The Triple Threat: Resume, Cover Letter and LinkedIn

     

    When I redesigned my program options recently, I wanted to increase the effectiveness of the program for YOU as the job seeker. That means going beyond the resume. By far, my most popular program is the Career Jumpstart. Why? Because it covers every first impression that the employer typically has of you: the resume, the cover letter, and the LinkedIn profile. This is especially true in the modern age of online applications.

    You will need all three of these documents at some point in your search. There a few industries where I'd say you don't need a LinkedIn profile, but not most. And yes, I still want you to have a cover letter on hand in case the application asks for it.

    So here's something else to consider. Having the same person write all three ...
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  • The Single Biggest Mistake That Job Seekers Make (And How To Fix It)

     

    If I had to take all of the mistakes that I see job seekers make and boil it down to one critical item, it would be this: Relying 100% on the resume. The resume alone is not enough to get you a job in most cases, and this is THE SINGLE BIGGEST MISTAKE THAT JOB SEEKERS MAKE. Yes, you need to have a great resume and the hiring manager will eventually read it, or at least most of it. However, doing nothing but firing off resumes online rarely gets anyone a job.

    The path of least effort= the path of least results.

    This also is where a resume writer or career coach can add tremendous value and save you a significant amount of time. My staff knows how to write a quality resume quickly. This saves ...
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  • Three Reasons Working With A Career Coach Will Help Your Job Search

    Let’s face it—much of the job search is set up in the employer’s favor. Employers have access to reliable salary data through compensation surveys, and they often have hundreds of applicants to choose from for just one posting. Unless you possess some very rare and specialized skills, it’s typically up to the job seeker to get the employer’s attention, and not the other way around. Improving your resume and your strategy with a coach is an excellent way to expedite your results.

    Some people claim that it's cheating to have someone else write your resume. The notion that hiring a resume writer or career coach is cheating is completely absurd. Is it cheating for an athlete to use an athletic coach? Or for a vocalist to use a vocal coach? Job searching and resume writing are skills ...
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  • 3 Reasons Why Your LinkedIn Profile Is Not An Online Resume

    Most job seekers treat their LinkedIn profile (if they have one) as simply an online version of their resume. They copy and paste everything from their resume and transfer it right to their profile. Or, they simply list their positions with no information to describe them. Neither of those is the best approach.

    It’s important to understand the ways that a LinkedIn profile is different than your resume. Unlike your resume, social media profiles are visible 24/7. Anyone can view it at any time. This makes it more difficult to target specific positions with a LinkedIn profile. Your resume is kept private until the moment you choose to send it and therefore can be customized prior to someone reading it. The implications of this are significant. This means that your LinkedIn profile must be well-aligned with the positions that you are applying ...
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