For all of us unemployed out there, this piece of paper, the resume, is the difference between getting a call for an interview and Not.According to the Union of Unemployed there are more than 31 million of us unemployed. If everyone is searching as hard as Adam and I, how come it is so difficult to actually get picked up.
One of the major frustrations with applying for jobs is every company sends you online to apply. So, no one sees your ambition, your personality, your attitudes, they only see your information on paper (which most of the sites don’t even import your information correctly, so after uploading your resume you then have to retype everything 5 times to submit one application)…and you are added to a pile of about a gagillion that recruiters and HR people receive in hopes that you will stick out and you will get a call.
Daily, we wait for phone calls.
We have tried applying for jobs where we have connections or know someone who knows someone…but in the end, we have found that this doesn’t particularly work either…obviously…we are still unemployed.
Being 28 weeks pregnant I am finding it harder and harder to interview (I have had 7, and not been offered a single position…even though they are all in the county I used to teach in and technically I have had connections with administration in more than half of the schools I interviewed at).
I feel like at my last interview when the AP asked why she should hire me, instead of telling her all about the benefits the kids and I would receive as their world culture teacher, I should have been bluntly honest and said, well….my husband and I have been out of work for 5 months, living off our depleted savings, about to have our first child and I need this job. (Ill keep that in mind for next time.)
Adam has applied to an average of 5 jobs a day, 4 days a week for 5 months…with a few days missing due to the holidays….that’s about 400 jobs give or take. Not all of the jobs are salaried jobs or “big time” jobs either…he has even applied to clean out the bird cages at a local park…and still nothing.
We both are awesome people with full resume’s and an array of talents. We can do anything, have proven it in the past and are open to being trained for anything…but I guess with so many people on the job hunt why on earth would they train us when some piece of paper in their stack already knows how.
So, back to the piece of paper. Last night I was perusing Pinterest and came across a pretty awesome looking resume. It was easy to read and looked like fun. It stood out and I immediately liked the person who it represented. When I showed it to Adam, he too said, “oh, we should remodel.” When I went to the message board where it was originally posted, the HR people and recruiters tore it apart and said how they would immediately put it aside as a no. They said depending on the job and your audience this could work, but more often than not, you would end up just being passed up.
I was shocked! (read the comments here).
I started looking and found so many more cool resume’s that I feel as if, what do I have to lose. Check out some of theses.
I love each one of them for different reasons. The first reminds me of a linkedin profice. The second, I love the pieces and how it is easier to read then paragraphs, like a fun magazine article. The third, includes a TON of numbers, which I have heard is extremely important in making your results and experience stand out and the last is just clear cut and to the point.
What do you think? Do you agree that these type of resume’s are distracting or do you think it’s time to revamp yours?
Related articles
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- Inside Job: 5 Reasons You Should Tap Your Friends and Contacts to Get a Job (money.usnews.com)
- 5 Surprising Mistakes Job Seekers Make (thedailymuse.com)
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Keep exploring
Intentionally and incrementally. Most families who live this way did not leap from conventional to adventurous overnight. They built remote work capacity, paid down debt, tested longer trips, and had increasingly honest conversations about what they actually want from their lives. The leap feels bigger from outside than from inside.
Different for every family. For some it is long-term travel. For others it is weekend adventures close to home. What connects them is intentionality about how time is spent and a preference for experiences over accumulation. The version that fits your family is the right one.
By finding stability within the adventure rather than treating them as opposites. Routines, rituals, and family rhythms travel with you. Familiar foods, bedtime routines, and predictable family dynamics provide stability even when the location changes. Kids need consistency in relationships more than consistency in geography.
That people are fundamentally similar across cultures in what they want for their families. That comfort zone is a smaller circle than it feels from inside. That the things worth having in life require effort and discomfort to get. And that time together doing hard interesting things is the most reliable source of family closeness.
By getting clear on why you made the choices you made and returning to that clarity when the outside noise gets loud. Most families living unconventionally describe an initial period of explaining themselves that gradually gives way to just living the life. The explaining becomes less necessary as the results become visible.
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Great article! I can understand your frustration. I have been out of Grad school and unemployed for the past 5 months. It is so frustrating.I have pretty much exhausted all the contacts I have. I keep trying on LinkedIn and interviewing on the phone, but being an international student doesn’t help much 🙂 The moment they hear I’m an international student, they say they’ll get back to me 🙂
I did like John Red’s resume the best. But I have no idea how a recruiter would view that. I guess it depends on the recruiter’s mood that day- if he feels like thinking out of box or sticking to the rules.
I really do hope both of you find jobs soon, because I can see how your situation must worry you. Don’t worry, I promise to send up an extra prayer for both of you. The best, is always, yet to come 🙂
That was a really really nice comment. Thank you so much. We will keep our fingers crossed for you too.
These resume samples are wonderful. It seems to me that it is much easier to attract the attention of the employer than with the help of online resume, But, I wouldn’t revamp mine, as I think not every company will understand my intention.