What does the employer want?

How do you know what the employer is looking for? What does the employer want?

If there is a job ad, it's relatively easy as in that the employer will tell you what s/he wants.

But if there is no job ad, and you are putting together a resume to go cold calling on employers, how do you find out what they want then?

Well, one of the best ways, is to search online for jobs of the type for which you are looking. It doesn't matter where they are, you just want to find the ads, so you can see what skills and experience to highlight.

Even if you have a pretty good idea of what to put in, reading a few job ads can help you notice one or two more you hadn't thought of.

Another place to find skills and experience to highlight is in occupational classifications, which most countries, states and provinces have. However, one general site that can be used by anyone anywhere to get good information on what is involved in any specific job is the US Onet site.

This is huge site with very detailed information on a very wide variety of jobs and a good place to start looking for skills to mention in your resume.

More great resume writing help.

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Resumes: what to put in and what not to in

What to put and what not to put in your resume

You do not have to put everything you have ever done in your resume.

The only information that belongs in your resume is information that is relevant to the job for which you are applying, and enough work history to show continuous employment, wherever possible.

You don't have to go back to when you left school, unless you are still very young.

The last ten years is all you have to put on your resume, unless previous to that you had experience which is highly relevant to the job for which you are now applying.

You do not and should not include any personal information such as your date of birth, weight, state of health (unless specifically asked, ie "must be able to lift 100 lbs."), or weight.

What you should include are all the skills that you have which make you qualified for this job.

Notice I said skills, not job duties.

To perform any job duty you use various skills. The job duties, if you are applying for a different type of work, may not be relevant, but perhaps the skills you used to do the duties are relevant.

For example: if you used to be a server in a restaurant and now you want to work as an event planner.

The job duties would seem pretty irrelevant, but the skills of being well organized, able to handle multiple tasks, meeting tight deadlines, working in a busy environment, excellent communication and people skills.... etc etc.

There are a multitude of skills a good server has that would transfer easily to the work of an event planner, but if you don't tell the employer what they are, s/he probably won't take the time to work them out.

Think about your skills. Write them down and make sure you include the relevant ones to each resume you write.

Need more help with your job search.

Great resume guide that will get you the interview.

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