English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

From the article “Resume and Cover Letter Guide: Drafting Descriptions”, I learned a number of very important things about creating a resume. Creating a resume is extremely important for college students because the ultimate goal for the majority of college students is to graduate college and get a desired job, and a well drafted resume is key in landing the perfect job.

After reading the articles on forming a resume, I have realized that I might as well just write my name on an envelope, spit in it, then mail it to my future employer. It is probably better than me sending an actual resume about myself. All these articles mention separating yourself from the crowd. When I read this I can't help but think, "I am the crowd." There is nothing really special about me, I get average grades, I am in a few professional practice clubs, and I have webbed feet. I feel like every other resume boasts something better than my freakish feet.

Douglas Richardson's Skeptical Resume Reader Tells How He Really Thinks was an eye-opener.

The article's message (think about your resume's reader) was not unexpected; if the concept was new to any student in this course then the ship has set sail without that person. Still, the pointed delivery was not just comical; it really made me think - not the message but some of the specific material the article presented.

For this week’s reading response I personally enjoyed the article by an HR coordinator titled “Skeptical Resume Reader Tells How He Really Thinks.” I found it interesting to hear from an HR coordinator what they do actually think about resumes that they receive. I like how the author was very up front with their opinions about how they view resumes. He admits that he only spends around 30 seconds looking at a resume. He stated that he may make a second pass of about another 15 to 30 seconds. That means that in total you probably only get about 1 minute of the readers time.

While reading the articles on Resumes there seemed to be a lot of overlapping information and sometimes a lot of disagreements. My favorite article was "A Glimpse and a Hook". The section on the First Pass seemed to sum up the reality of how someone looks at resumes. My favorite part of the article was when the writer said, "Do I know you? Whether I do or not, I’m going to immediately Google you to see if I should. Oh, you have a web blog. Excellent.".

The importance of my resume in gaining the attention of the interviewer cannot be overstated. Richardson states “…I read-I mean really read-less than half”. Richardson again states in his article “…they spark my interest in a particular product-you”. Our instructor writes in Blog #2, “ 10-30 seconds: That’s all the time you have to survive the first cut…”. As stressful as this is, the best thing to do is to do your best and establish some sort of “edge”. The “edge” I speak of revolves around differentiating myself from all others applying for the job.

After reading the “resume draft readings” I feel somewhat discouraged and intimidated about creating the “perfect” resume, however subjective that is. It is hard to tell exactly how each person should construct their resume because there is no standard for writing them and no standard for the person(s) reading them. However, these articles gave some good insight on how to make your resume better and present your personal information/experience in way that people will notice.

The biggest thing that I got from these readings is that resumes are a huge waste of everyone's time. A person can spend an outrageous amount of time constructing the 'perfect' resume and simply have it discarded by potential readers because those readers happen to not like the bullet style you have chosen to outline your skills. This likely has something to do with society's general theme that, in the business world, no one wants to really get to know anyone else before they do business with them-decisions are made hastily, often irrationally, and based too much on aesthetics.

“Skeptical Resume Reader Tells How He Really Thinks”, by Douglas Richardson reinforces what I have been told since I started writing resumes. With a lot of resumes to read, recruiters do not have the time to carefully read and look over each individual resume. Therefore not only do you need to made sure that everything has, as Richardson states, “a clear-cut sense of direction” but that you do simple things like spell everything correctly.

     The set of suggested readings for this week presented, nay, exposed some truths that many individuals don’t often anticipate in drafting resumes. I, for one, was rather surprised by some of the frank statements I came across. Consider the following by Douglas Richardson of CareerJournal.com: “My job description doesn’t include extending charity to job seekers and resume writers. On the contrary, I find I approach every resume with a certain impatient cynicism.” I almost took offense to this.