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Resume Q&A: Job Titles on Your Resume

Q. I work in one of those companies where job titles are pretty creative. The marketing department is headed by a “Chief Amazement Officer” rather than a Chief Marketing Officer; and as the second in command, I am the “Idea Builder Extraordinary” instead of the Vice President of Marketing. The Chief Amazement Officer recently went on to another job, and I’ve been temporarily fulfilling that role, too. So how do I translate those titles and indicate what I’m really doing these days?

A. Your first problem, translating your title into something more standard, is actually the simplest. You can write Idea Builder Extraordinary and then put the equivalent standard job title after that in parenthesis like this: Idea Builder Extraordinary (Vice President of Marketing). If your field is notable for creative job titles, then providing both the creative and standard title is important.

There are many reasons why a job title might not align with an employee’s real-life responsibilities. In your case, you have filled in after your boss left. In other cases, an employee is simply handed extra work and responsibility without a title change, or the organization may be so flat that job titles are meaningless. In all those cases, parenthesis can work to explain the additional functions. For example, as a Vice President of Marketing who is actually fulfilling a CMO role, you might write Vice President of Marketing (CMO-level).

But it is also important to explicitly state in your job description that you took on the role of your boss and to clearly describe achievements that reflect that higher level of responsibility.

When you are applying for positions, you will find that even standard titles cover a wide variety of actual responsibilities. Read the job description carefully to weed out positions that may not be on your preferred career path as either Idea Builder Extraordinary or Vice President of Marketing and potential CMO.

If you are still feeling frustrated by the gap between your title and real life, contact me at Robin’s Resumes®.

Transitioning from Business Owner to Employee: Helpful Resume Hints

Owning your own business is exhilarating, but also exhausting. Many owners consider transitioning from business owner to employee, especially when a vital partner leaves the business, the economy shifts, or the overall strain of ownership grows too great.

Here are some tips for creating a resume that helps spur the transition from business owner to employee:

  1. Emphasize your teamwork and relationship building skills. Employers may worry that as a former business owner you are used to running the show and will not fit into a corporate culture. Your resume should emphasize your ability to build relationships and, when necessary, act as a member of a team rather than the leader. Often, volunteer and board experience can help position you as a team player.
  2. Enjoy the freedom of choice. As a business owner, you have probably handled everything from painting the walls to hiring and firing employees and from balancing the checkbook to negotiating an acquisition. Because you have such varied experience, you now have a certain amount of choice in the jobs you look for. What did you consider your greatest talent and what you enjoy most: marketing, finance, negotiations, sales, project management, proposal generation? Create a resume that reflects your first choice of careers.
  3. Focus your resume on the job you want. The point of your resume is not to list everything you can do, but to show that you can do everything the employer requires for a specific position. Read job postings and advertisements carefully and frame your resume, LinkedIn summary, or other online presence to emphasize the most important skills, accomplishments, education, and experience for the job you want.
  4. Be open about the transition. In your cover letter and resume, make sure you convey that you are serious about transitioning from business owner to employee: You are not looking for a temporary position before founding your next company. It is important to allay the fears of potential employers.
  5. Do not apologize if you lost your business. You honed a lot of skills even in a failed business and are bringing an “intrapreneurial” mindset to the employer.
  6. Use your network. Whether your network consists of people you worked with in former employee situations or people who know you from your time as a business owner, they are all potential sources for job leads. They are also a great source of testimonials about your ability to work in a corporate environment, and they may be able to smooth the way with a potential employer by emphasizing how ready you are for this transition.

If you are transitioning from business owner to employee, please contact Robin’s Resumes® for help creating a resume that shows off your value while reassuring potential employers.

Ten Easy Searches to Improve Your Resume

Word’s search feature can help you improve your resume by searching for the most common mistakes in spelling, punctuation, and grammar. This check is a vital step in making sure your resume is error-free. In response to a CareerBuilder survey, 58% of hiring managers and recruiters refused to read a resume with typos, immediately dismissing those candidates from any consideration for the job.

The following 10 easy searches will help track down typos on your resume.

  1. Search for “lead”—if the job is in the past, the word you want is “led.”
  2. Search for double spaces. After a period, you only need a single space.
  3. Search for a period outside the quotes (”.) In U.S. English, the period normally goes inside the quotes (.”).
  4. Search for the dollar sign ($). Make sure you are always referring to dollars the same way, preferably either million or M and either billion or B. If you use $200K in one place, do not use $200,000 in another place. Writing “$2,000 dollars” is wrong because the $ is all you need.
  5. Search for “company.” Word has a bad habit of wanting you to capitalize company any time it follows a noun (for example, “this insurance company…”). Company should only be capitalized if it is at the start of a sentence or part of a company name (BBB Insurance Company).
  6. Search for % and percent. Both are correct but choose one.
  7. Search for a hyphen after the letter e (as in e-commerce and e-mail). These days, the hyphen is rarely required. The preferred spellings are ecommerce and email.
  8. Search for United States, US, USA, and U.S. Again, any one of these is correct but be consistent in using one.
  9. Search for any punctuation mark that comes in a set. For example, you always need two quotation marks (“ ”), and you always need two parentheses ( ).
  10. Search for question marks (?). Normally, they should not appear in a resume.

Are you feeling overwhelmed by the many roles you have to play in creating a resume: marketing guru, expert writer, and master finder of typos on your resume? Contact Robin’s Resumes® for some much-needed help.

Is a Professional Resume Writer Worth the Cost

When most people are deciding whether a professional resume writer is worth the cost, they usually calculate the length of time they saved in hunting for a job. Get hired a month or two earlier, and they have a lot more income in the bank—far more than a professional resume writer costs.

But payback for using a professional resume begins earlier: A professionally written resume renews your confidence in your abilities, reminding you of how much you have actually accomplished over your career; gives you the right words for dealing with any problems in your work history; and helps you project a stronger, more accurate image during interviews.

When you are considering if a professional resume writer is worth the cost, take note of these important points about resumes:

  1. A resume is a marketing document. Are you confused about the line between marketing, bragging, exaggerating, and outright lying? Are you wondering whether to mention a gap in employment, how to handle a career transition, or write about another employment anomaly? Are you confident that you know what should be on your resume and what does not need to be there? A professional resume writer will give your resume focus, take care of anomalies, and highlight those parts of your employment record that will get you the job you want now.
  2. A resume is more than a history of tasks—it is a record of accomplishments. Do you have a brag book where you have kept track of your accomplishments? Do you remember how much you learned from each job in your past and how much you contributed? A professional resume writer will help you recall your achievements and put them in context.
  3. A poorly written resume is a reflection on you as a potential employee. Are you sure about punctuation, grammar, and spelling? Are you ready to double-check every acronym and company name in your resume or will you just assume that they are correct? Do the dates of employment lining up and have you consistently used the past tense for former jobs? A professional resume writer will make sure that your resume is error-free.
  4. A resume must communicate. Is your resume able to pass through Applicant Tracking Systems so that recruiters and hiring managers actually have a chance to read it? Are you able to present technical or scientific information in a way that recruiters and hiring managers can understand? Does your resume align with your social media presence, or do you need to rethink your online image? A professional resume writer can help you bridge any communications gap.

At Robin’s Resumes®, our professionally written resumes have been worth the cost to thousands of job seekers. We prepare resumes that propel our clients from inquiry to interview. Contact us today.

Cultural Fit: What Does It Mean for Your Resume

The words “cultural fit” have had a checkered past, sometimes being used to bar groups of people (women, minorities, anyone not Ivy League educated, anyone of a certain age). At its best, cultural fit refers to a company’s values and the way a job applicant matches up with those values. In fact, a JobVite survey found that 60% of recruiters look for cultural fit on a resume, right after experience.

How can you figure out the culture of a company? Look for the words a company uses, especially the adjectives, to describe itself. Often, those words will appear on the website in a mission or values statement. Sometimes job descriptions will include words like “transparency” or “customer-centric.” Articles in the company newsletter or profiles on LinkedIn may reveal what the company finds valuable in long-term employees and managers. Sometimes company photos posted on social media will offer the biggest clue to the culture.

What can you do to make yourself a better cultural fit? When you finish reading about the company, you should know if you are a cultural fit in the best sense—you volunteer in the community, and the company believes in volunteering; you like to work independently, and the company values independence; you want  continuing education, and the company has a strong training program. Make sure that any of your own social media posts and photographs put you in a positive light.

How can you write your resume for cultural fit? Try to use the company’s cultural keywords, like volunteer, lifetime learner, creative thinker, and so on, appropriately—and honestly—in your resume. Search in your career for examples that illustrate those qualities: when you volunteered for a community project or met with community leaders, when you explored a new country or got certification in a new subject, or when you innovated or recommended a change—whatever that quality is.

How do you know when you’ve found a cultural fit? You will want to look for companies that come close to having the same values that you do. However, what you discover during your job search and interview may be more revealing than anything the company writes about itself. If you are told you are a candidate and then are ignored for weeks, that says something about the company culture. If you go for the interview and everyone you meet is friendly and outgoing, that says something about the company culture.

Cultural fit is an elusive quality, but it may make the difference between loving and hating a job. It is worth taking a look at your resume to see if it projects cultural values that you hold dear, whether that’s cooperation or independence, a fun atmosphere or a clear organizational structure, a commitment to meeting quotas or a commitment to giving back.

At Robin’s Resumes®, we try to make every word in a resume count. Let us help you figure out your cultural fit.

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