Perfecting Your Resume
Podcast Transcription
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Maddy: Hi everyone, thanks for joining me for another episode of PFCU’s Money Talk, I’m your host Maddy. For this episode we get into resumes and cover letters. Everything you could ever want to know and all from two of PFCU’s very knowledgeable HR ladies, Brenda and Heather. They share valuable insight from an HR perspective on how to put your best foot forward when it comes to waiting your resume and cove letter. This is their second time on the podcast, so you can check out their last episode, Find a Career You Love, and just in case you need a reminder, here are Heather and Brenda with a quick intro and then we dive right into the episode.
Brenda: My name’s Brenda Paulson, I’m the HR Manager here at PFCU. I’ve been in the industry for 25 years with 8 years in HR.
Heather: My name is Heather Spitzley, I’m the SVP of HR and Training here at PFCU. I have been with PFCU for six and a half years, in the credit union industry for 20 years and have served some type of role in the HR/Training function for the last 15 years.
Maddy: Okay, so I’ll just jump right in. We’ll start very basic, I’m sure most people know what a resume is but if you guys could share what the purpose is of a resume.
Heather: Yeah, absolutely, I’d love to tackle that question. It’s a great one cause I think a lot of times individuals get caught up in the application and really, it’s the resume that sells yourselves. So, a resume is part of an application process and it allows you to highlight your strengths, your experience, your education and any extracurriculars that you participate in to really share with your employer or perspective employer.
Maddy: So, let’s just start with what information should be included and I know you hear different opinions on what you should leave off, what you should include so if you could just give an overview on what you guys think are your must-haves, maybe things that you should definitely not include, things like that.
Brenda: The, I think, even before we get to what you should include or not include, it’s very important for individuals to understand truly what the job is seeking or the employer is seeking. So, when you’re writing your resume, you can really tailor your resume to what position you are applying for. Cause I will tell you, we see many different resumes come through and we know that we are a financial institution, well we may receive an application or a resume that says, I’m interested in a position in the medical field. So, immediately that resume is kicked out. And so, just making sure that your resume is tailored to the position in which you’re applying for and another thing that I always strongly encourage people to do is look at the actual job. The experience of the job, the responsibilities of the job and tailor your resume to that as well. So, if somebody is looking for an individual that has financial institution experience, really highlight any sort of financial experience that you may have, even if you haven’t worked in a specific credit union or bank before. So, as an example, any sort of cash handling or customer service experience if you’re applying with a position as a teller. So, just really highlighting the different skills that are applicable to this position where you may have had experience in the past.
Maddy: Okay, so customize your resume for the job you’re applying.
Heather: Yes, absolutely. Absolutely.
Brenda: Yes.
Maddy: Let’s see, and are there things that you should keep off of your resume? I was, I read an article somewhere that you used to have to put, like, your objective was a big thing at the top. Is that a thing anymore?
Brenda: It’s funny, we talked about this last week when we were discussing this podcast. And the objective is a little bit, for lack of a better word, old school, right? So, really it should be a career summary kind of highlighting what industry you want to work in or have been working in and what your skills are from that career you’ve had so far.
Maddy; Okay, that’s good to know. I didn’t know that. And how about formatting? I know there’s so many different ways you can format a resume. My biggest question is, is it acceptable to have a resume that’s more than one page?
Heather: I would say yes, absolutely. I would say yes, depending on the level of position that you’re applying for.
Maddy: Okay.
Heather: So, if all of your experience in the last 15 years has all been customer service related and maybe you took a different lateral move or you moved to a different company for a better opportunity but you stayed in a position that was similar. You don’t need to list the, you know, maybe 20 employers that you have worked with over the last 15 years or whatever that may be. But really highlighting that level of growth so if you went to an employer and you received a promotion or you had added duties or responsibilities, include those especially if it really speaks to the position in which you’re applying for. That will allow that interviewer or the company that you’re applying with, see your advancement and your capabilities in those different areas.
Maddy: If someone does not have job experience, like they just graduated college or high school and they don’t have a lot of experience to put on their resume, what else could they put on there to kind of make their resume a little more built out for their first job?
Brenda: I would definitely include anything that they’ve done throughout their schooling- babysitting, lawnmowing, extracurricular activities, sports, what teams have they been on that shows teamwork, volunteer work that they’ve done, national honor societies that they’re a part of. Any extracurricular items that would show having responsibility, being a part of a team, being a part of something to show on top of going to school, this is also what I’ve been doing. A lot of people don’t consider those things to be important on a resume but if you have no actual work experience, they do give an employer a feel for your work ethic and your responsibility level.
Maddy: Okay, good. And how do you feel about, let’s say you’re applying for like a creative job or a design type job, kind of making your resume look a little bit different or doing some different design things. Is that frowned upon? Is that kind of, I don’t know, how do you feel about that?
Heather: I would honestly say going back to the position you’re applying for so asking your question of somebody that’s more creative. You want to show your creative side so really speaking to having your resume speak to the industry in which you’re applying for, I would strongly encourage anyone to do. So, if it’s a position that is more creative, you really want, your goal with a resume is to sell yourself and make yourself stand out. And so, if you can do that by using more of a customized template or just putting your own spin on the template in general that you’re using but still look professional. I strongly encourage that, cause it really makes you stand out. An employer may be receiving 100 resumes so if they come across yours and they’re like, oh wow, they took the time to really customize this resume, that for me as hiring manager would really stand out.
Maddy: Okay, that was one of my next questions was how do you stand out because you know, HR and recruiters, they get tons of resumes every day so, is there any other way to stand out or is it just, you know.
Heather: Cover letter.
Brenda: That’s what I was going to say!
Maddy: Okay, okay!
Brenda: If y Somebody who takes the time to write a cover letter.
Heather: Yes, absolutely. Because that’s going to draw me in to wanting to read your resume. So, if there’s a very well written cover letter where you’re really highlighting your skills, maybe you put some personality into the cover letter, that makes me want to go ahead and move forward and read the resume. So really, getting that attention from the cover letter, I would strongly encourage you to take some time and really focus on how you want to present yourself and you can do that in your cover letter.
Maddy: I didn’t even think about cover letters. A lot of jobs do ask for a cover letter just right off the bat. Do you have any, I didn’t prepare for this, but do you have any suggestions or tips or anything about cover letters that you’d want to share?
Brenda: One thing I would say is make sure that you change your cover letter per position. We’ve seen cover letters that are written to another company that obviously this person has probably applied to as well, which is, you know, what you should do. But when you don’t take the time to customize even the cover letter for the employer you’re applying for, it can look like a lack of attention to detail and obviously most positions you want to, you need attention to detail and so you want to make sure you’re showing that you have that right in your cover letter. Also, your contact information needs to make sure it’s correct. We’ve stumbled upon a few people, you know, their phone number has changed and they didn’t update their cover letter or their resume. That’s important.
Maddy: Yeah, very basic.
Brenda: Yeah, that’s important. Or we’ve stumbled upon too where we’ve called people and their mailboxes are full, well then, we can’t leave them a message to ask them to call us back. So, that’s important as well but yeah, that cover letter needs to be customized to make sure it’s for each employer, to make sure that it shows A. attention to detail and that you took the time to really apply for that position.
Heather: And I think it’s important too to include in that cover letter any information that the employer is asking for. So, if they say during the application process, you’re reading the summary of what they’re looking for for the position and they say please include salary information, make sure you do that. Or please make the resume is going to this particular person. Follow those directives because it’s really important because your resume may get lost in the shuffle, especially if you’re not, like Brenda said, using the information that you have that’s most current and that’s most current for that employer.
Maddy: Do you just have any tips or advice for someone that may need help writing their resume or just starting editing. Like, is there resources for that or just have someone look it over?
Brenda: Absolutely, yes. Templates are your best friend. Use your resources, right? So, Word and most Microsoft programs and I apologize, there are probably other programs out there that I am unaware of but they have templates for resumes and cover letters. Use them! They’re a great resource and a great tool. Google how to write a resume, it will step-by-step are available. It’s really important that you look like you took the time to format your resume, make it look professional and put together in a nice format and way for the employer to review.
Heather: I always encourage too individuals, or I really like individuals and they really stand out to me if they take the time to get to know us as employer before they even apply. So that their cover letter says something about PFCU and they relate their experience to PFCU as a future employer so just, like Brenda said, really taking that time to research who we are, research the process and then creating, really, that whole package as a potential applicant.
Maddy: Was there anything else that you wanted to add that maybe I did not cover by a question?
Brenda: Proofread, proofread, proofread.
Heather: Yes, yes.
Maddy: So, if you see a mistake on a resume, is it immediately to the side?
Brenda: It is not.
Maddy: Not necessarily.
Brenda: Not necessarily but it’s noticed. But it’s noticed and it’s hard not to. It only takes a second to read that cover letter and resume over to make sure you’re using the correct grammar, you’re using the correct punctuation and as we know, most programs also help us with that as far as telling us if we have something spelled wrong. Another, again it goes back to attention to detail, it shows attention to detail for that so always, always proofread.
Heather: And I would say too, have somebody else proofread it for you as well. Whether that be a trusted coworker or a friend, a mentor or whoever that may be because sometimes they’ll pick up things that you as the writer, don’t see.
Maddy: Yeah. I’ll never forget when I graduated college, I applied to a job and I got the job but I’ll never forget in the interview, he had my resume and he circled a mistake that I had and he’s like, just so you know like, I caught this. It was awful.
Brenda: See? It’s noticed. It’s noticed. And it’s funny how when you look at enough resumes, you do, you can’t help but notice those things, you know. They just kind of stick out.
Maddy: Was there anything else? Well, let me just ask about references.
Brenda: Yeah.
Maddy: So, do you put them on your resume or do you only provide those when the employer asks, is it a separate document? What does that kind of look like or what could it look like?
Brenda: I think that can be your preference, most people do put reference available upon request. Some people do include reference letters that they received in their application, depending on the level of position that they are applying for but I will say that if you do include references, that you make that those individuals that you’re using for a reference, know that you’re using them as a reference and have given you permission to do that. It cannot look so wonderful when we call references and they’re caught off guard and don’t know to expect a call like that so that’s really important too.
Maddy: Okay, good.
Brenda: Good luck to everybody, you know.
Heather: Yes, absolutely.
Brenda: Right now, like I said in the last podcast, I feel like people can reinvent themselves right now and why wouldn’t you if, you know, if you have a dream or a goal, throw your hat in the ring. Have a great resume, have a great cover letter, apply for a position. You never know what’s going to happen.
Maddy: Alight, well thank you.
Heather: You’re welcome.
Brenda: Thank you, Maddy.
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