Page 51 - Marky Stein - Get a Great Job When You Don't Have a Job-McGraw-Hill (2009)

Get a Great Job When You Don’t Have a Job

Wow, congratulations! In less than the blink of an eye, you’ve
already told an employer your level of experience, a job title, and
an industry! Unlike with traditional résumés, the employer will not
have to go to all the trouble of scrolling down through the dates of
your job history to determine how many years you’ve been at it.
You already have at least one and potentially three hooks into
her.

Sentence 1, Three Blanks Marked 4:
My Skills, Strengths, and Specialties
The second part of the first sentence deals with your specialties.

• What are some of the things you do well and some of the
things you like doing that pertain to your job target?

Do you have a job description in front of you? If so, use it. It will
probably contain five to ten skills or areas of knowledge that the
employer is looking for.
If any of your skills exactly match the job description, pick out
the three that you most enjoy doing or are best at and write them
in the specialty section. This is great bait for a hungry employer.
If you’d like some more ideas for skill words, refer to the lists
of skills in Chapter 5. You’ll be pleasantly surprised to find that
you have many more skills than you’ve ever imagined. Every one
of these skills is a potential hook for the right employer.

• Now you have your first sentence, and just look at how
much information you’ve transmitted to the employer in
such a short reading/time span!

Sentence 2 (and 3—optional)

The next two sentences contain descriptions of past accomplish-
ments that you are proud of and/or that relate to the job you’re
applying for. What is the difference between a skill and an accom-
plishment?
Well, a skill is a word or phrase indicating something that you
can do, like management, assembly, diagnosis, or writing reports.
Accomplishments are specific ways in which you used your skills in
the real world.

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