In a version of the workplace as nostalgic and bittersweet as a Normal Rockwell painting, employees once took great pride in their job performance.  Far fewer errors slipped through the cracks, less merchandise was returned by irate customers, and it was virtually unheard of for our government to recall a product because it was unsafe or downright deadly.  In those days, employers also reaped decent profits.  So what the heck has happened to the pride that American workers once took in their jobs?

To gain a semblance of an honest answer, we need to scrutinize, realistically, the evolving structure of the workplace.  In decades past, job functions were much more clearly defined.  Employees paid to produce a product, for example, were relegated to one or two well-planned tasks.  For example, workers in a garment factory would be charged with laying out and cutting fabric according to master patterns.  Sewing machine operators would then assemble the cut fabric (i.e., the arms and body of a blouse). Once assembled, the blouses would pass to those workers responsible for finishing the items: attaching buttons and embellishments such as lace trim, or embroidering small designs onto the pockets.  A foreman or forelady oversaw these processes and assured quality at every stage, as well as timeliness.

Nowadays, employers expect a single worker to cut, sew, and finish X-number of shirts within a specific timeframe, police themselves for quality, and in between the shirts, manufacture X-number of skirts as well, to the most exacting standards.  At the risk of making an unintended pun, we are not embroidering here.

The average worker is not only commanded to multitask throughout the workday, she will be terminated if she cannot, and if she cannot do so properly.  Her incoming email chimes continually, simultaneous with the ringing phone. On the other end of those calls, including the four that she has on hold, everyone wants something now, and they want it done right.  They don’t care about the needs of the other parties hanging on the line.  As the employee keeps all of these balls in the air, an Excel spreadsheet burns on her computer, just waiting to be populated, and that pile of unanswered correspondence on her desk gets higher and higher.

In this quicksand of a workload, she’ll make valiant attempts not to sink.  She’ll shuffle schedules, pretending she’s not at her desk so as to ignore the electronic messages and meet deadlines.  But somewhere along the line, she’ll make an error, perhaps a fatal one.

If that error doe not tick off one of your key customer accounts, your harried employee may direct the logistics department to ship 60 cases of the wrong product.  Maybe your worker will neglect to integrate the costs of packaging that new product into a PowerPoint presentation she’s creating for you to deliver to your own boss, who establishes pricing.  One way or another, your multi-tasking, overtaxed employee will cost you, sometimes, irreparably.

Is it really her fault, and should you fire her?

If you terminate her, who will replace her?  An automaton, or another human prone to make the same errors under the same conditions?  And what will it cost you in time to train that new worker and throw him a learning curve?

Or — is the error your fault, for expecting too much of a single human being?

Are you and your employee merely casualties of an ever-tightening economy, and is this an argument as circular as a hamster’s wheel in motion?

A rotten economy means layoffs, and layoffs mean that the workers still standing are compelled to perform the work of three or four of their colleagues.

If you are an employer, you must weigh the costs of mistakes created by the necessity to manage an inhuman workload, against less productivity and better quality of work.

What happens if your productivity dips a bit?  Is it better to deliver a finer product, or the correct product, or a more personalized form of service, or is it better to get the job done faster, in a shoddy/costly manner?  When the competition for business is as fierce as a lioness protecting her cubs, what, truly, is the answer?  By putting yourself in the shoes of your clients, the solution becomes a lot clearer.

If, for instance, you, the hypothetical customer, have placed an order for 12 cases of lemon syrup with which to make lemonade for your casual restaurant during the summer months, is it better to receive the shipment four hours later than promised, than to receive 12 cases of blueberry syrup that must be returned as you wait another two days to get the correct flavor?

We’re not advocating that you bring your business to a grinding halt, and we’re not suggesting that you direct your employees to manage one single task at a time.  But you should not expect them to manage six tasks at a time.  And when you make your hiring decisions, do look all gift horses in the mouth.

Younger applicants can appear more energetic, and often are.  But energy does not necessarily equate to quality.  Consider hiring a mature employee whose work ethic may be more stringent than that young kid brandishing his brand new degree.  Not every kid fresh out of school is going to mess up, and not every older worker is going to be on the ball 100% of the time.  So, when you hire from among the myriad job hopefuls, do so with a grain of salt.

A worker who tells you up front that he may not be as fast as his younger competitors, but that he’ll get the job done right the first time, can be well be worth the costs and embarrassment of undoing the blunders of too-good-to-be-true multi-taskers. 

Laboring under the delusion that one’s resume must, at all costs, be contained to a single page, too many applicants make the mistake of boiling their accomplishments down to succinct, trite phases.  While it’s still perfectly acceptable to present yourself as “an avid team player,” “bottom-line oriented,” and “embraces challenge,” it’s far more effective to expand upon those concepts in the text of the resume.

And if you opened this article hoping to find some of those choice phrases, we’re sorry to say that you are out of luck.   For your resume to truly shine, you need to take an objective look at your career in order to differentiate specific accomplishments from day-to-day responsibilities, and then highlight those achievements.   If you don’t, your resume will wind up sounding too much like those of your competitors — the very people you’re aiming to beat out for a job!   For example, instead of saying, “Reduced costs,” you might indicate, “Saved $1,500 annually by identifying and utilizing an alternate vendor,” or “Reduced labor expenditures by $65,000 annually by cross-training staff in diverse work procedures.”

If, for instance, your forte is sales, you are expected to increase sales and sustain existing business; that is your primary job function.  So, hone in on an accomplishment, such as, “Secured the business of a $500K per annum account on the verge of signing with the competition.”  Or, “Convinced a new account to sign a long-term (four year) sales contract.”

Oops; we just gave you some choice phrases after all!  They are simply to illustrate how you might best craft a powerful resume by expanding tried-and-true phrases to include your own personal accomplishments.  Every single employee, regardless of job function, has accomplishments.  Dig deep, if you must, to unearth and examine yours objectively.  Polish the words that will highlight your achievements, and your resume will shine like a diamond among a pile of coal. 

Just this morning, I called a client to confirm his appointment with me.  The only number he’d given was his cell phone, which I dialed.  For approximately three full minutes (I timed it), I was constrained to listen to a piece of music the man obviously thought would entertain his callers.  Although the music was pleasant, I found it rather excruciating.  I had to listen to the piece in its entirety until his actual voice mail kicked in, allowing me to leave a message.  But that, too, was another minute’s wait as I was treated to the man blessing me in two languages and asking me to have an absolutely wonderful day in the light of the Lord.  As he represented business, I found the patience to hang on … by a thread.

That was four minutes of my life that I will never get back.

Had I been a potential employer contacting the man to schedule an interview, I would have hung up long before those four minutes were up.  I’d have granted the interview to someone else who

           a.       Displayed some common courtesy for my time, or rather, the lack thereof, and

           b.       Had set up his voicemail in a much more professional manner.

As much as it astounds me that self-professed serious job applicants demonstrate this type of behavior, I feel compelled to point out the obvious. 

Many job seekers have deep six’ed their landline phones, and have done so in order to

          a.       Reduce their expenses in this sinking economy and

          b.       Remain available to prospective employers round-the-clock.

If you are one such job candidate, please engage your gray matter; be considerate of the hiring managers.  Imagine the employers’ annoyance should they reach voicemails such as the one my client currently prefers.  If you are using a system similar to my client’s, do yourself a favor if you do not wish to sabotage your job search.  Change your voicemail!   If your friends and loved ones cannot deal with the lack of “warm and fuzzy” from your message mechanism, you have two choices:

          a.       Allow them to locate and secure a job for you or

          b.       Tell them to get real.

You are seeking employment.  You are supposed to be a professional.  Project that in your electronic message! 

Given the plethora of often conflicting advice emerging from self-professed career specialists, one would assume that the answer to this pressing question is “Yes.”  Thankfully, in accessing this site, you benefit from our thirty years of experience in crafting career-advancement documents, including our expertise in monitoring and implementing the resume writing trends that make sense.  Therefore, our answer to this question is, “No!”

Think about it.  If you were to totally customize your resume for every single job in which you are interested and qualified, you would never get a moment’s sleep.  All you can honestly do is highlight your skills and accomplishments to fullest advantage.  If you invent proficiencies or lie about your successes, how will you support these fallacies during an interview?  More importantly, how will you support them if you ace the interview and land the job?

Some pundits believe that hybrid style resumes work best.  This format begins with a strong summary or profile, flows into a functional (skills-based) resume, and then follows with a traditional chronology (employers and their locations, dates of employment, job titles, and bulleted job functions).  While a hybrid strategy does seem to cover all the bases, you can kiss that so-called “one page resume rule” goodbye. Proof positive of how the “professionals” offer you conflicting, confusing, and erroneous information.  In truth, there is no such thing as a cookie cutter resume; no one resume will be an exact fit for each and every job.

How, then, do you give employers the information and phraseology that they seek when culling the thousands upon thousands of resumes that cross their information systems?   One way is to pepper your resume liberally with keywords that “pop.”   We recommend that you include keywords and key terminology early on in the resume.  Use bullet points, and then expound upon these keywords in the actual text of your resume.  Understanding that job descriptions use very specific terms, know that you are allowed some “play” with these terms, provided your job responsibilities truly reflect what the employer seeks. 

Therefore, if you have engaged in direct sales, as in a retail environment, you may not have been required to cultivate long-term relationships with customers.  But, you executed your job in a manner designed to invite repeat business.  So, if the job description reads “business development” and not “sales,” you may substitute “business development” for “sales” as one your keywords.

Similarly, if the job description calls for “logistics and warehouse management” and you were an inventory control supervisor, you may substitute the phrase “supply flow process,” which requires the same essential skill sets as “logistics and warehouse management.”  Odds are, you not only controlled cycle counts but you received and stored the inventory and facilitated its movement through the warehouse, onto the loading dock, and out to customer locations.  

“Marketing” is also an extremely broad term.  It can mean the planning of major marketing strategies as new product/service roll-outs, or the actual execution of these plans, which is more sales-oriented in nature.  When speaking of in-store marketing, the correct term is “visual merchandising” (design and set up of product displays in accordance with the company’s standards).   The term “merchandising” has, over the past fifteen or so years, come to demonstrate more of a purchasing and product allocation function.  So you see why you have that play with your words, provided your skills essentially fit the job description!

Instead of beating your head against the wall the next time you are tempted to totally rewrite your resume for one particular job description … and do it again and again, ad infinitum … take our advice and simply edit what you have on your resume.

If you feel that a job is absolutely ideal for you, reflecting skills you may have gained in another industry, the cover letter is the place for you to explain why you are that perfect fit.  Unlike the resume, the letters flows in narrative form, providing you with opportunities to really sell yourself and secure the interview.

Is a thank you letter a nicety or critical business protocol? 

In days gone by, guests of dinner parties penned thoughtful little thank you notes to their hosts and hostesses, in gratitude for their hospitality.  Nowadays, those notes have gone the way of the fifteen-cent subway token, as have most of the genteel manners that we as a society seem to have lost, ignored, or simply trampled in our daily rush through our lives.  Sometimes, however, the tried and true remains valid, and that is the case with thank you letters (also called “follow up letters”) to your prospective employers.

It is not only courteous to thank the person or people who took time from their busy schedules to interview you; it is considered good business protocol.  Of the many would-be employees that flow through the offices of hiring managers, those managers are most likely to remember, and give serious consideration to, a select group of candidates.  Yes, those candidates must display the skill sets required to get the job done.  However, there are subtle differences that set job seekers apart from one another, and the thank you letter is one of those differences.

Keep your thank you letter relatively brief, and try to personalize it as much as possible.  Include the job title for which you had interviewed, and something that you had discussed with the potential employer.  Keep the tone professional and polite; you wish to be considered seriously for the job.

The timing of the thank you letter is important, so write and send it out as soon as possible after your meeting (a 24-hour turnaround time is ideal).   A quick response to the employer’s generosity will show that you are truly interested in the available position.

You can send your letter by email or fax, but for maximum impact, don’t!  Employers are besieged by electronic messages, and chances are, their secretaries will put the thank you emails and faxes at the bottom of the pile.  Instead, send the employer an actual letter (remember those?), written on nice, professional stationery such as 24 pound bond paper of a heavy cream or ivory or white stock, in a matching envelope upon which you place a postage stamp.

If more than one person interviewed you, be certain that every one in the group receives a letter.  Chances are, they are not going to compare your thank you letters, but you never can be 100% sure of that.  Therefore, edit the letters to some degree so that each recipient gets an individualized letter.

Must you write the letter out by hand?  You don’t have to, and if your penmanship leaves much to be desired, we don’t advise it.  But if your handwriting is legible and even pleasant to behold, you may go ahead and pick up your pen instead of pounding your keyboard.

A speedy and well-thought out thank you letter can indeed be the “make or break” factor in securing that great new job! 

Do you remember this scene from the great old movie, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?  Pursued by the law, anti-heroes Butch (Paul Newman) and Sundance (Robert Redford) arrive at a bluff overlooking a long drop ending in churning waters.   Butch screams, “Jump!”  And his partner hollers back, “I can’t swim!”  Confronted with personal questions on interviews, job applicants can be made to feel like Butch and Sundance at the end of that cliff: damned if they do, and damned if they don’t.

Decades ago, the EEO (Equal Opportunity Commission) enacted legislation to protect job hopefuls against discriminatory practices of employers.  Nevertheless, many companies — either through live interviewers or printed applications — demand to know the following about the candidates who pass or attempt to pass through their doors:

1.       Nationality

2.       Religion

3.       Age

4.       Marital status

5.       Parental status

6.       Financial status / Salary history

7.       Service within the U.S. military

8.       Penal record

9.       Distance lived from the job site

None of these questions are legal.

Some employers ask them “innocently.”   These are the companies that, ironically, must report such statistics to the government, in an effort to demonstrate that they are not subscribing to biased hiring practices.  Others, including certain organizations and institutions, must disclose this information because they rely upon governmental funds to stay in business and cannot afford to tick off Uncle Sam.  Still others ask such questions because they are seeking to weed certain “elements” out of their work force, including but not limited to women who have young children and are thereby deemed liabilities.

The best way to answer these questions is with one of the following responses:

1.       “As the EEO prevents you from asking such a question, I prefer not to answer it.”   It is easier to respond in this manner when filling out an application; you can simply refuse to check off the various categories on the form.  But if led down this road on an actual interview, you are within your rights to give the same answer.

2.       “This question has no bearing upon the duties of the job.”

Queries about ethnicity, religious affiliation, age, and marital and parental status can be addressed in the above cut-and-dried manner.  Employers seriously interested in you will conduct an investigation into your finances; it’s an ugly fact, but true.   As it’s done to gauge how responsible you are in your personal life, it is a cruel paradox for those seeking to clean up their credit histories through gainful employment.

While questions regarding service to the military are unlawful, the employer is allowed to ask if you anticipate the need to be away from the job for extended periods of time (as a member of the Reserves or National Guard might).  Inquiries concerning your criminal record are only sanctioned if the type of crime that you’d committed could impact the business conducted by the potential employer.  And the question regarding, “How far do you live from this company?” can best be answered with, “I will be on time for work, as I have been for my previous job(s).”

If you are seeking employment and feel that the interviewer has been prejudiced against you, you are within your rights to contact the EEO, which will have to make a determination about the legitimacy of your claim.   Understand that no job applicant is truly exempt from some form of bias, including reverse discrimination.  Reverse discrimination, which can be particularly insidious, always recalls a story that a friend relayed to me in the late ’70′s, along with the lesson that he’d learned from it.

Chuck, as we’ll call him here, was a young, healthy Caucasian man seeking a technical position in Washington, DC, where he had recently relocated to be with his fiancé, whose own job had transitioned there.  Chuck possessed the requisite training and experience as well as a glowing recommendation from his former employer.  However, he kept hitting a brick wall in his job search.  Frustrated, he finally asked an employer what he was doing wrong.  “This is Washington, DC,” he was told.  “We are bound to uphold certain legislation, and quite frankly, you are not a member of a minority.”

The next time Chuck was asked to fill out a job application, he came across the question, “Are you a member of a minority?”   He wrote, “Yes; I am an Italian-American,” and was hired on the spot.  Was this luck or coincidence?   We’ll never know, but we do know this. Chuck used his brain, including his knowledge of EEO regulations, to land the job.   Regardless of your skin color or any other superficiality unrelated to the job, you must do the same if you feel that you have reached a similar brick wall.

Oh, happy job hunter, your search has ended!  Your tenacity, ingenuity, professionally written resume and cover letter, and savvy interviewing techniques have paid off.  After what seemed an interminable search, and despite stiff competition, you have landed the job and are about to let your breath out.  Our advice is: “Don’t!”

Don’t take for granted that the position you’ve secured will be safe from future and even deeper economic downturns than the ones with which we’ve been plagued since September 2008.  As the last to be hired, you could very well be the first to be terminated.  To hedge your bets, continue with the strategies that proved successful in locating your new position.

1.       Update your resume to reflect your current position, including new skills and/or accomplishments-to-date.

2.       Do your research to determine which industries and companies are currently hiring or have announced plans to do so (and are therefore already compiling resumes and pre-selecting candidates).

3.       Post your resumes online, on industry-niche boards, company websites, and social networking sites as well as the more obvious mega general job boards.

4.       Keep networking with fellow alumni and members of industry associations as well as anyone who actively participates in the same charitable, community, or special interest organizations as you do.

Back at the office, demonstrate to management why, if worse comes to worse, the axe should not fall upon your neck.  You may balk at some of these suggestions, but it’s better to cringe than to be laid off again.  More to the point, it’s better to grin and bear it.

1.       Eat lunch at your desk; if at possible, pack it at home.  A homemade lunch shows good time management skills, resourcefulness, and thriftiness.  Even if you don’t work (produce) during lunch, you can peruse manuals or an intranet to learn more about the company and its systems.  Informed and armed, you will be less of a target than another new hire who frolics at lunch.  You don’t have to do this each and every day; use your discretion.

2.      Spring for coffee for your manager and co-workers every now and then.  Learn how each person likes their coffee (you would be surprised how far this small, thoughtful detail goes in the office).  You don’t need to be a “brown nose” about it; do it simply because it’s a courteous thing to do.  Take every opportunity to appear to be the team member that you are.

3.       If a co-worker’s child is peddling something to benefit his or her school, buy it, even though you may have no need for it.  A good team player would.

4.       Offer to take on more responsibility, if you honestly feel that you can handle it.  A night or two of overtime per week over the course of a few weeks or months is not going to kill you. Your boss will remember how you went to the wire for the department and the company.

5.         If you offer your employer a new idea that you feel may improve efficiency or cost-effectiveness, follow up face-to-face conversations immediately with emails to your boss.  Print these out and save them to support any claims you need to make in the future as to your proactive attitude and problem solving skills. 

As God is my witness, I once dated a man who admitted on our first (and consequently, last) date that his goal in life was to become a professional student.  When I asked him to clarify this oxymoron, he explained that he’d hoped to achieve the highest level of education and continue to pile on more academic qualifications so as to delay his entry into the “real world” for as long as possible.  The man was intelligent as well as serious.  He was also obviously far out of touch with reality.

Most of us sketching our blueprints for long-term career growth include higher education in our plans.  Over the last few decades, many employers have refused to view candidates for growth-oriented positions if they did not possess Master degrees.  More recently, hungry job seekers have trumped their post-graduate peers through attainment of Doctorates. While a PhD may appear at first glance to be the crème de la crème of academic achievements, it is not feasible, due to time considerations and/or finances, for every job seeker to achieve a Doctorate.  If you are hunting for a job in this economy, then, how do you compete with your more learned peers?

The first step is to examine what, specifically, is needed in terms of additional training/education for you.  If there is a specific discipline that must master in order to appear more competitive and attractive to potential employers, it may mean returning to college in the evenings or perhaps enrolling in an online university.  Such undertakings can be costly.  You will have to weigh not only your current finances against the school’s terms and timetable for remuneration, but the odds of landing a job, upon completion of your education, whose salary will be worth your blood, sweat, and tears.

If you explore distance learning, here is a caveat that comes from a source I trust implicitly.   Said source enrolled in a very popular online educational program, via an accredited school that advertises heavily in mixed media.   Schools are hurting in this economy along with businesses, and what this university did to my friend was fraudulent.  Claiming that she did not fulfill the requirements of specific assignments … a claim they’d made, interestingly, as her graduation date drew near … they demanded that, if she wished to receive her degree on time, she had to complete additional assignments, all of which carried additional fees for “processing and grading.”  I reviewed my friend’s course requirements and determined that she had indeed met every one of them via the assignments that she had completed and submitted to the school.  Between a rock and a hard place, she agreed and complied with the school’s demands. 

At my suggestion, she also reported the school to the BBB (Better Business Bureau), having saved, as evidence, all of her email correspondence to and from the faculty and student adviser.   The moral of this story is, if you are considering continuing your education online, conduct a thorough investigation of the schools of your choice.   And please note my use of the plural: schools.   Do not limit yourself to a single institution; give yourself options.  Check with consumer protection agencies, such as the BBB, to see if others have lodged complaints against the school.  Compare the scope of the educational programs, the costs of tuition, and if at all possible, the statistics concerning the graduates of the programs in terms of their career advancement.  You don’t want rhetoric on this last point; you want hard, supportable figures.  You want some accountability from the school.

If your educational needs do not require as great an investment of time and finances, consider a community college.   Such institutions are beneficial if you are pursuing a more finite training program, for example, one that focuses on a particular software application.   Although usually less expensive than four-year colleges and universities, community college tuition rates are not cheap.  Another option, therefore, would be to check out what local technical-vocational institutions are offering; their rates can be significantly lower.

Before you sign up for any course of study, do examine the qualifications of the teaching staff.   If the instructor(s) or professor(s) have careers that encompass the business world as well as academia, their dual acumen is an obvious benefit for job hunters wishing to apply their newfound knowledge to the world of commerce.

Depending upon what you are striving to learn and the requirements of your target industry, you may be better suited to a Certificate program sponsored by an industry-recognized expert or credentialed organization.  The hours are finite (usually no more than 40 training hours per course) and the programs result in Certificates, which some job seekers refer to somewhat erroneously as “Certification” in a specific discipline (i.e., Hazardous Material Training, Level One, via OSHA).

Bottom line:  you must research what is truly needed to help you reach the next rung of the employment ladder.  Take the school’s promotional literature and sales pitch with a grain of salt.  And try to get referrals from past students, if at all possible, so that you will maximize your time, effort, and hard-earned dollars.

To be perfectly blunt, the economy looks bleak.   American manufacturing jobs sold to foreign corporations, a flailing stock market, and companies paring staff down to the bare minimum: none of this paints a rosy future for job seekers.  Those who are pragmatic will craft alternate plans as their idealistic counterparts search desperately for employment in once-familiar and now deserted quarters.

 The practical among us will begin by asking themselves what they are willing, and what they are not wiling to do, in starting over.  Their questions will include:

1.       Am I willing to relocate?  If so,

a.       How far, within the United States?

b.       Is Europe or another country a viable option?

c.       Am I ready to move permanently or will I accept a project-dictated position for a finite length of time?

d.       How will any type of relocation impact my family?

2.       If I remain Stateside, am I willing to

a.       Learn a new skill or skills to make myself more marketable?

b.       How will I pay for training, and what is the most viable avenue of education?  Does the government provide me with tax credits in return for  tuition or fees that I will incur for new training programs?

3.       Is it feasible for me to open my own business?

a.       Is there a genuine (verifiable) need for my services?

b.       Who are my competitors and how can I capture a share of their market?

c.       Am I eligible for a grant?

d.       If I am eligible, where will I turn for funding (i.e., a bank, an philanthropic organization, the government?)

4.       If my financial situation is truly dire, what are my options until I can secure gainful employment?

a.       Do I have assets that I may sell off?

b.       Should I liquidate investments that I may still have?

c.       Am I legally able to rent part of my house to a tenant, and would I do so?

d.       Am I willing to move in with a friend or family member for a specified, finite length of time?

e.       Am I willing to move in with a friend or friends, or family members, for an indefinite period of time?  Are my partners willing to pool their resources, along with mine, in order to ensure that we will all have a roof over our heads and food on the table?

5.       Am I willing to work for the U.S. government?

a.       Can I survive and possibly thrive within a new and restrictive environment in which job functions are extremely well defined and do not usually provide much room for creativity?

b.       If I make this move, what skills do I currently possess, or can possibly enhance, to make me more attractive to Federal employers?

c.       Do I know how to write a resume highlighting my current skills relevant to a governmental agency?  Do I know the proper format?  Will my wording entice employers to take me seriously?

d.       Can I write KSA’s (Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities): essays required by many governmental employers?

e.       If the answer to b., c., and d. is, “I’m not sure”, do I know where to turn for professional assistance in writing such documents?  Will I trust my financial future to an experienced and knowledgeable professional that I have researched and can trust, as opposed to a friend or another non-professional?

Admittedly, none of these questions are comfortable.  However, their answers will help to create the roadmaps that can guide job seekers through new and inevitable territory. 

It may take a village to raise a child, but it takes only one individual to land a job — and that individual is the job seeker.  If this concept seems elementary, as the old song goes, “It ain’t necessarily so.”   Recently downsized job candidates as well as those who have been pounding the pavement for a while are subject to a natural, albeit counterproductive anxiety.

If you are a victim of your own worries, take steps to ensure that you are nobody else’s victim as you conduct your job search.  Protect yourself against those hoping to con you out of whatever may be left in your bank account.

1.       Don’t yield to the heavy-handed tactics of all-purpose resume writing-slash-recruitment firms.   Not all, but many of these companies, tread the tightrope of legality and have already pitched themselves headlong over the ropes in terms of morality and genuine accountability.  Most will actually promise to find you a job within a certain timeframe.  Unless they themselves are empowered to offer you a job and are willing to pay your salary, don’t fall for this one; realistically, no one can make that claim in today’s economy.

2.       Said all-purpose firms will offer to create a dynamic resume for you, adding that their team of “experts” will put their heads together to write something that reflects your individual qualifications and accomplishments.  Should you get as far as actually sitting down with that group, think “snake oil salesmen.”  If a group of people truly needs to collaborate on your resume, rest assured that no single one of them has a true handle on the nature of your job, nor how to accurately portray you through your most critical career document.

3.       The all-purpose firms will support their claim above (1.) by designing an email blast campaign for you.  This means that they will blindly shoot your resume off, via email, to several hundred employers either within your target geographic area or nationally (and they’ll push for nationally to hedge their bets).

 While this strategy may, at first, appear to be a sound prospecting tactic, it’s not.  Employers are already besieged by resumes that they have solicited; they won’t bother to scan the resumes of hopefuls bold enough to try to sidestep the normal procedure — which is, to respond to a job posting.

4.       The price tag for this all purpose service will knock you back on your can, prevent you from paying your mortgage for at least the next two months, and prompt your spouse to walk out on you.  The usual and customary charges, for the actual work involved, are unsupportable.  These services must justify the salaries of that group of resume writing-cum-career experts, and that’s why they can cost as much as $10,000 and even higher!

5.       That spouse we just mentioned?  His or her name will be raised by the all purpose services, in tandem with a not so subtle guilt trip.  You will be told that you have the opportunity to discuss your investment (read: rip-off) with your spouse and that you have 24 hours in which to make up your mind.  The last time I looked, this was still America, the land of the free and the home of the brave.  Be brave enough to walk away and you’ll find yourself home free.

6.       Refuse to use the services outright or after that 24 grace period, and be prepared to be peppered with all manner of insults, much as if you would have taken advantage of two days in the Bahamas and refused to buy into that timeshare.  This is a particularly insidious and wicked stance, as the service reps know full well how vulnerable you are and how desperate to find a job quickly.  Think about it.  Would anyone who is truly reputable seek to cut you down to size and rob you blind in your weakest state?

7.       Your best job hunting strategies are both are time-honored and fairly new.  Seek out a resume writing service of integrity; one that has a long history of satisfied clients and an expansive base of knowledge concerning various industries, job titles, and job functions.  Use the brains that God gave you to network socially and professionally, and to cull the Internet, posting and searching for jobs that reflect your actual skills and accomplishments.