Alternatives to the traditional CV

It's probably safe to say that most jobseekers at present have their two or three page CV created and saved in Microsoft Word. It's also equally safe to say that if you're a jobseeker, you're in the same situation as a large number of similarly qualified and experienced candidates, who have similar MS Word based CVs.
A question to ask yourself is, how are you standing out?.
If the answer is that you're not standing out, then perhaps you may want to think about it from the perspective of a hiring manager with a job to fill.
This manager will have a large amount of CVs to sift through, all of them in MS Word or variants. However, here are some simple steps to help your application stand out from the rest.

1: The World Wide Web
There are a number of ways of hosting your CV on the internet, and rather than just emailing your CV to the hiring company, why not consider emailing a link to your online CV or Resume as well?
My favourite site in this area is www.visualcv.com. They allow you to host your CV for free, creating a custom url or web address based on your name, e.g. www.visualcv.com/ruadhri where you can view an example that Ive created.
Also bearing in mind that more and more people are using mobile devices to view their email, why not create a version of your CV that can be easily used and designed for mobile devices?
Here at mynewcv.ie we are pioneering this method, feel free to get in touch to learn more about this service.
Don't forget about sites like www.linkedin.com and www.xing.com, not only are they great networking tools, but they are also places to get recruited!

2: Portable Document File
Also known as PDF, Adobes product is an excellent way of creating a static, read only version of MS Word documents.
They print better, look better and cannot be manipulated, plus as they are effectively an image rather than a standard file, they hold any and all formatting, irrespective of the software being used on the hiring managers technology.
The only caveat Id mention about PDFs is that if youre sending the document to a recruiter or to a large company to be held on file, most recruitment searching technology is geared towards MS Word, rather than PDFs.
That's not to say that they're not searchable, but only that its easier not to.

3: Consider the Resume
Especially in Western Europe, the mindset has been to use the CV as the main sales document, however, feedback from hiring companies, bearing in mind how quickly they must decide on candidates for specific roles, a one page resume can get you to the top of the pile.
If your communication skills are such that you can condense your career into one page, then what are you waiting for? It will guarantee that you stand out from the other applicants, and if well written, will leave the reader wanting to know more. Plus its an excellent interview tool, just one page, with space for notes by the interviewer of course can be very useful.

If you require more information on converting your CV to a Resume, feel free to contact us.

Using Social Media for Jobsearching

Firstly, how would you define social media. In my view it simply boils down to the whole web 2.0 concept, interactive web based marketing if you will.

Depending on where you are in your jobsearch you can have different avenues open to you, but if you’re already in employment, its not necessarily a good idea to have your CV absolutely everywhere including in front of your current bosses, who tend to take a dim view of this kind of behaviour

So for this exercise we’ll take the point of view of someone who has their CV ready but is not currently working and attack the market using the web and social media.

For jobsearching using these tools there are three big sites that you need to become acquainted with, namely www.LinkedIn.com, www.Twitter.com and www.Facebook.com.

LinkedIn I believe to be the most effective as it’s purely professionally based, theoretically about business relationships and not fun! Although that’s a matter of perception!

If you’re not on LinkedIn and you are looking for a new role, what are you waiting for? It’s a great place to have your details, even if you’re not looking for a role and allows people to find you or your skillset. It’s also very much a recruiting place to be for hiring managers and recruiters alike. It’s very user friendly and you can import your CV, however, a resume or one page abridged version of the CV is much more useful for this purpose.

There is a guide to help you to create a full profile, but essentially once these steps are followed, you will have entered your career and educational history, plus what kind of contact you’re looking for, job opportunities, contact from old colleagues etc, you can then start to use it in a smart fashion using the following steps.

Use your gmail and or hotmail etc. accounts to find existing contacts who are already on LinkedIn and connect with them. Recommend someone who is not expecting it. This means writing a short paragraph on them and how wonderful they are which they can then display on their own page.

Grab a personalised url, that is, linkedin.com/Ruadhri for instance. This can then be used on your email signature. Get a photo up, not so much because of how you look, but because its now de riguer to do so and you will stand out for the wrong reasons if you don’t have one. But remember, this is a business website so the Xmas party photographs are not the ones to use!!!

Once you have these mechanics created, start getting into it. Use the comment box to say what your current situation is. Those who view your profile will see this as well as those who are connected to you already.

Start seeking out those whom you know and connect with them, browse their connections to see who they know. Of course etiquette as always plays a part so be sensible rather than taking a blunderbuss approach to connecting. Always write a brief note to the person, rather than use a default I’d like to connect paragraph provided.

Once you’re more comfortable with LinkedIn use the Groups Function to get in touch with likeminded people in your sector or position or even use the careers advice group, one great one is Paul Mullan’s Measurability jobs club. Ask questions, or even better answer questions, become an authority and before you know it you’re having lunch with people and discussing opportunities.

The second mentioned site, and of course there are many but we’re focussing on the top three, is of course Twitter. If you’re not familiar with it, well where have you been but it’s a micro blog where you have 140 characters to post on what’s happening. The idea is that you follow people, and they can follow you. However, there is a facility to private message and have conversations off the main site which is where the genius is.

In terms of personal branding it’s important to stay on message and as mentioned in previous podcasts, try to stay away from being controversial.

Anyway, get yourself a username and a good image or picture of yourself and begin to follow people. Do this in a similar way to your LinkedIn profile, find people you know, respect and or like and follow them. Chances are they’ll follow you.

However, the popular idea abroad is that Twitter is some kind of game where you try to get as many followers as possible. I don’t buy that, the trick is to create a dedicated news channel if you will, following what’s going on in your sector by getting the smartest people in it to tell you. Also, many many recruiters and job boards and hiring companies “tweet” their jobs so keep your eye out.

Going even deeper into twitter, I recommend downloading the free tool TweetDeck.com where you can have various columns of styles of tweets, predefined searches, so that as soon as someone tweets “Project Manager, Dublin” you’ll know about it in real time. Get your application in first! Also, check out Tweetdeck’s integration with TwitJobsearch.com, this is a tailored job search engine using whoever is already on Twitter. It’s a tiny bit technical if you’re not that way inclined but give it a go, it’s really easy once you get into it. There are lots and lots of roles out there, but if you don’t know about them…..

Feel free to email me on sales@mynewcv.ie if you require hints and tips, for instance who’s good to follow. Bill Gates tweets now, but chances are he won’t tell you about a job, but people like mneylon from Blacknight hosting or the aforementioned Paul Mullan may!

Finally on the big three Facebook. This comes with a health warning as if you go on Facebook with only the aim of getting a new role, and your boss sees you there and requests to befriend you and you either let her see what you’re doing or say no…..you can guess the rest.

Having said that, there are tons of groups, lots of people to get back in touch with and so many people to whom you can communicate your current situation to.

For instance, if you search “job” “Ireland” under the business drop down list, there are 95 dedicated groups including support groups, recruiters, hiring companies and job boards. Facebook themselves have sourced a large proportion of their employees through this method.

Another health warning with Facebook is that it can be great fun, very time consuming and you may find yourself sidetracked with getting that email out to the guy you were in secondary school with and saying aaaah over pictures of his honeymoon when you’re supposed to be finding your dream role. But if you must go all social, make sure your contacts know that you’re looking for that dream job and write down what it is on your “wall” or homepage. Because you can bet your life that someone is looking for you but will they find you?

Some quick hits here Monster.ie The best CV database (bar enigmasearch.com of course) many many hiring managers and recruiters have access to this database so get the CV there and make sure that you fill out the correct parameters. If you can’t get to the job you want, you should take pains to make sure that it can come to you!

Visual CV.com is a favourite of mine, this will allow you to create your own CV, looking rreally good and professional using a series of templates, and a printable PDF Adobe document page too. More and more hiring companies are viewing Visual CV, so get your bespoke URL or web page, e.g. visualcv.com/Ruadhri and put this on your email signature too!

Moving onto Blogging. Anyone can go to bloggertone or google’s Blogspot and create their own page. The trick is to talk about what it is that you are an expert on. Blogging can be time consuming and you often can find yourself thinking about what it is that you’re supposed to say! Having said that, if you’re not going to position yourself as a subject matter expert, why not use a google based blog like blogspot.com to get your CV online on a platform that’s supported by the biggest search engine! Makes perfect sense and of course, as more CVs go on the internet, more people looking for strong candidates are using google and bing etc to find them. Bespoke tools like enigmasearch.com and CVfox utilise google’s Custom Search engine to find these exact candidates for free, so remember the Irish Sweepstake Slogan, “if you’re not in, you can’t win”.

Forums such as boards.ie and askaboutmoney.com have excellent places to ask questions, but again, be conscious of your internet profile, always vanity search, that is put your name into a search engine and see if there’s anything up there that a potential employer will view as a negative.