Determining Who Is Looking at Your Rsum

Determining Who Is Looking at Your Résumé

Just as an ambassador's message might fall on deaf ears politically, your résumé might be rejected. That's okay. The country might not be ready to hear the ambassador's message. The goal is to ensure that it is positively received by as many people as possible.

Also, an ambassador must understand his audience and the social and political mores of the country he is to visit, Likewise, your résumé must take into account its prospective audience. Who is the ideal audience for your résumé?

In short, it is the person who is responsible for hiring you. This might be an IT manager, an IT director, the HR representative, the owner of a small company, the CFO, or any number of other managerial roles who have been so charged.

The fact that there is seldom a single classification of individuals who are responsible for the hiring of IT staffor any staff for that matterforces you to carefully consider how best to reach the broadest number of people. You must find common denominators and attempt to build your résumé for those commonalities.

The following sections represent a sampling of common attributes for those who might view and review your résumé.

Busy Employers

The person who is responsible for reviewing incoming résumés is busy. In many cases, reviewing résumés is an ancillary function that has been dropped in this person's lap. Perhaps this person has some understanding of technology or technology terms. Alternatively, this person might simply be the only available HR representative.

Whatever the reason, the fact remains that in today's highly competitive environment, few people can afford the luxury of reading through someone's skills and experience and carefully picking up on the nuances brought to bear. The need for your ambassador to quickly and clearly tell your message is critical.

Disinterested Employers

The person who will receive your résumé is probably not that excited about the prospect of going through the entire hiring process (screening candidate résumés, phone interviews, live interviews, administrative paperwork, and so on). This person has other things to do, and résumé sifting detracts from his larger role in the company. When I say this person is disinterested, I'm not indicating that he won't assess your résumé correctly or that he doesn't take seriously the task at hand. It's just that he would rather have the process completed sooner rather than later.