The Importance of Trust in a Work Relationship I’ve been married for 47 years. I have run my own business for 33 years, and done business with more than a few of the same clients. I’ve gone to the same doctor for 35 years. What is the secret to all of this longevity? Trust. It’s […]
How to Format a Résumé There are plenty of ways to format a résumé; I’ve seen a million (slight exaggeration). And there are almost as many opinions about how to do it right. But there aren’t many ways to format a résumé that aren’t distracting. And that’s what you want to aim for. You want a […]
Things Headhunters Do Wrong I know what you’re thinking—things headhunters do wrong could fill a book—and you’re probably right. But today I’m only going to tackle a couple of the main issues. In fact, let me clarify that even more—these are only main issues as I see them. And I’m looking at it from the wrong side […]
Clarifying What We Mean—When Is Midnight? During one of my book promotions, the people running the ad sent me this message: Hi Giacomo, I will be posting your book, Murder Has Consequences, as a bargain book on Wednesday, 7/17. Please leave your book on sale until midnight 7/18. Thanks, Administrator I thought to myself, but when […]
What a Headhunter Doesn’t Tell You Working with headhunters can be beneficial, helpful, troublesome, and frustrating. And sometimes all of these can be rolled up into one experience. The best way to deal with headhunters is for both parties to be honest. The problem is that not all job seekers—or headhunters—follow that rule. I’ll cover […]
3 Important Sections of Your Resume I have been reviewing resumes for more than 30 years. During that time, I think I’ve seen it all—from one-page resumes to ones that looked more like small books, weighing in at 30 plus pages. The crazy thing is that the vast majority of people continue to include things […]
Behavioral Interview Questions—Tell Me About Yourself Before we get started with this section, let’s talk a little about how to answer questions. Yes, (said with a sigh) there is a method to everything, especially when dealing with behavioral interviewing questions, and especially when dealing with the seemingly innocent “tell me about yourself” question. Most companies […]
Preparing For the Question—Why Did You Leave Your Last Position One of the most important parts of an interview is the preparation phase. That is where you research the company and the interview team, and practice how you’ll answer the questions the team might ask. And trust me, the outcome of the interview’s success is […]
Working With Headhunters Headhunters are hated by some, revered by others, but mostly viewed with indifference—a ubiquitous necessity. A part of doing business. I’ve been a headhunter for 30 years, and I can tell you the reception I’ve received from candidates has run the gamut—from a warm, pleasant “Let me close the door,” comment, to […]
Interview Myths, Or Facts? Okay, you made it through the phone screen, you did your research and other preparation, and now you’re going for an on-site interview. Before you go, let’s review some of the more common interview myths to see if they’re true or not. The Interviewer Is Always Prepared—Myth Unfortunately, that’s not always […]
The Danger of a Coffee-Shop Interview Don’t Think a Coffee-Shop Interview Is Easy Many candidates think a coffee-shop interview is as easy as it gets, and yet, it might be the toughest—if you don’t keep your guard up. How tough can it be? You are dressed casually. You’re at a public place on neutral ground. […]
Resume Writing Is Not Rocket Science Everyone seems to worry when it comes time to write their resume. Either that, or they rush through the process and end up with a piece of…well, you know. Don’t let it fool you. Resume writing is not rocket science; in fact, it’s not difficult at all. All You […]
Be Perfect On Your Next Interview—Use The Goldilocks Method I realize this sounds ridiculous, but when you give it thought, a large part of the interview process is about avoiding mistakes. Yes, you have to show them you have the experience to do the job. Yes, you have to be able to answer their questions […]
When To Take Resume Advice, and When To Ignore It Most people pretend to listen to advice, but they seldom heed it. And nowhere is this more true than with resume advice. I see a lot of resumes. A few are good. A respectable number are okay. But most are poorly written. I try my […]
3 Rules For Capitalization on Resumes I wrote a post a few months ago about “What To Capitalize on a Resume,” but from the number of emails I receive it’s obvious I didn’t go into enough detail. In this post, I’ll cover a few of the rules for capitalization, and we’ll go into more detail […]
10 Words to Avoid on Resumes Do you struggle deciding which words to use on your resume? Many people do, which prompted me to write this article. I did another post on impact words for resumes, and also one about how powerful words can be in all of your writing. Today, we’ll explore the opposite […]
Great Resumes Must Be Created I learned long ago that writing the perfect resume was not much different than cooking. If you’re making your favorite dish—let’s say lasagna—you don’t just throw any old thing into the pot. If my wife caught me putting carrots in her sauce, she’d cut an appendage off, and she wouldn’t […]
How To Format A Resume We all know that many resumes end up in the trash. But quite a few get tossed not because of content, but because they look so bad. Before you send out your next resume I want you to pretend it’s the one going for an interview. Then dress it up […]
Cover Letter Basics I’ve seen a lot written lately questioning the value of cover letters. Some articles go so far as to say including a cover letter is detrimental. I say bull… nonsense. I’ll address that issue in another post; for today, we’re going to deal with the finer details of writing a cover letter. […]
Body Language, A Candidate’s Perspective If you’re preparing for an interview, you need to give some consideration to what your body language is saying about you. I’m not a fan of body-language interpretation, but I think I’m in the minority because everyone else seems to be on a body-language kick. Do an Internet search for […]
Use or Utilize This post is more for the professional crowd. I may have mentioned that I worked as a headhunter for more than thirty years. During that time, I got a lot of résumés—more than twelve thousand of them. One thing that used to jump out at me was how people tried so hard […]
Make Sure Your Résumé Isn’t Wasting My Time When companies need to hire someone, they resort to what they feel is a process that works, and all too often, it’s a black-and-white decision. It has to be. The person screening résumés has a stack of 200–400 or more applications in front of them, and they […]
Ten Best Words to Put on a Résumé A while ago, I did a post on the ten words to avoid on your résumé. You can see it here. In that article, I mentioned how many of the “go-to” words people typically use are useless. I’m including a table I used in that post to show […]
Rules You Shouldn’t Break When Writing a Résumé The easy answer to that statement is “all of them” but that wouldn’t be correct. As we saw in a previous post, there are a few rules you want to break. The majority of them, however, should be adhered to. So read on for a quick rundown […]
Seven Worst Résumé Mistakes There are a lot of mistakes people make when writing résumés. Some are forgivable and some not. But instead of talking about all the mistakes, let’s just discuss the seven worst résumé mistakes. What Is a Résumé’s Purpose? We’ve talked about this before also. A résumé has only one purpose—to get […]
It Takes a Great Résumé to Get an Interview Before we begin, let’s look at a few things that take a résumé down a peg or two. Spelling mistakes. This may be the number one reason why résumés go into the trash, and yet they’re so easy to fix. A quick run with a spellchecker […]
Connect
Connect with us on the following social media platforms.