By Brenda L. Peterson, The Layoff Lady

As you begin your job search, you need to identify key characteristics of your target job. To begin, make sure you do a little soul-searching and have a clear picture of what you want from your next role. For guidance on how to go about that process, check out my article entitled, "​Career Planning: Figuring Out What You Want To Be Next." 

Here are a few of the main pieces of information that will help you move forward:

• Your target job title
• Working arrangements: hours per week, job location, remote/onsite/hybrid
• Company size and industry
• Key skills you want to use
• Problems you want to help solve

​Now, let’s figure out how to take that information and make it into a clear statement outlining key components of what you want. Remember, the purpose of this statement is to help you clearly communicate what you are looking for in your next work opportunity. The more you talk with people about what you want, the clearer the details of what you are looking for will become for you. 

If you are targeting a specific job title, your What I Want statement might look like this:

• I’m seeking a full-time technical writer role with a growing software company. I want to collaborate with product management to document new and existing product functionality. I also want to use my skills in knowledge management to optimize knowledge base searchability. 

• I’m interested in finding a contract social media marketing consultant role where I can help a small to mid-sized business create their social media presence. I want to develop and execute a business strategy to grow audience size and engagement for TikTok and Instagram.

• I’m currently seeking a full-time technical project manager position that is 100% remote or hybrid/onsite in Baltimore, MD. I would like to work in the telcom or communication industries supporting cyber security projects.

Each of these examples highlights a job title, type of organization, and even the specific skills each person would like to use in their new job. 

If you are open to multiple roles within different types of organizations, you will write your statement differently. For one, start with the soul searching you did and pinpointing key characteristics of what you want in your next job. Review your list, and prioritize which factors are the most important to you. It could be the type of company you’ll work for, the geographic area, work arrangements, or specific skills that you’ll use more.  

Focus your statement on the aspects that are most important to you. Here are a couple of examples that I have used in previous job searches:

Earlier pandemic, I used the following What I Want statement: 

• I am seeking a 100% remote full-time learning and development position. I am interested in roles with larger organizations where I can be a strong contributor and leverage my skills in needs assessment, performance consulting, change management, instructional design, and learning facilitation. I am open to roles as a strong individual contributor, managing the learning function, or managing a team. Job titles that may be appropriate for me include Learning Consultant, Learning & Development Lead, or Training Manager. 

For my most recent job search, I used the following What I Want statement: 

• I’m searching for a Learning & Development role in the greater Omaha, NE area. I have a wide talent management skill set, and I am interested in roles that involve leading a team, player/coach, managing projects and programs, or acting as an individual contributor. My target job titles include Learning Consultant and Learning and Development Manager. I’m also open to similar job titles in the areas of L&D, sales enablement, or organizational development.

Overall, since I wasn't focused solely on one job title, I prioritized what mattered to me and went from there. Notice that I start with specifying the field, and the work arrangements that were most important to me. Then, I reviewed a few key skills I had that I wanted to use, and in one case talked mroe about the employer. Since the goal with these statements is to help communicate what you want, this is a good way to narrow it down so people are better able to help you in your job search. 

Writing a clear and concise What I Want statement can help you as you review job openings you encounter and empower you to prioritize your job applications to those that most closely align with your job search goals. You can also include a version of this statement in the following contexts: 
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• Your cover letter
• Your LinkedIn About section (while in career transition)
• Emails to recruiters, connections, or hiring managers inquiring about roles
• Posts asking for assistance in finding a new job

By Brenda L. Peterson, The Layoff Lady

While your resume is a concise 1-2 page marketing piece intended to showcase your skills as they apply to a specific job, LinkedIn is your professional billboard to the whole working world. 

When actively searching and applying for a job, you’ll include your LinkedIn profile on your resume. Hiring managers and recruiters will often view your profile to see which connections you might have in common and to learn more about you in general. Furthermore, recruiters may source you (invite you to apply or interview for an opportunity) based on the content of your LinkedIn profile.

Whether you are actively applying for a new job or simply building your professional network, it's a good idea to review your LinkedIn profile regularly and make updates to ensure your information is current and complete.

Filling in these fields on your LinkedIn profile will make it an even more valuable tool as you build and grow your professional network:
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• Profile Photo: This is the primary image, displayed in a circular frame, that represents you on LinkedIn. It should be a headshot—a photo featuring a recent picture of you focused on your face. You don’t need to suit up for this either. Just make sure you’re pictured solo and you look pleasant and hirable.

 

• Background Photo: When someone views your LinkedIn profile, they’ll see your Profile Photo, front and center, and your background photo along the top of your profile. Be sure to include a background photo aligned with your professional brand. You can even use a tool like Canva to add personalized details to your background. 

 

• Headline: Your headline defaults to your last job title. I suggest updating it since this is such a high-value space. Consider including your target job title first, then including additional keywords (like skills, focus areas, and your field). Realize that when you comment on someone’s post, they will see your name and the first part of your headline. 

   

• Experience: Here, you can highlight your recent work experience. For each job, fill in the required fields, including dates of employment. For the description, I suggest putting a sentence or two about what you did and including keywords to highlight your skills further. 

 

• ​Education: Include the schools attended and degrees earned here. I suggest leaving off years since they are an indicator of your age. Including your schools here is a great way to later connect with people who attended that school.

Here are a few ways to make your LinkedIn profile even more impactful: 

• ​​About Section: The About section is at the top of your LinkedIn profile and gives you a chance to tell. If you're job searching, this is a great place to include details about who you are and what you are looking for in your next role. You also have room to add additional bulleted points if you like. Write this in the first person (using “I” language) and further showcase who you are professionally. 

 

• Customize Your Profile URL: By default, your LinkedIn profile's URL (web address) will be long and not very meaningful. You can customize your URL to make it friendly. I suggest using some version of your name. This minor update will look more professional on your resume—and make your profile easier to find. 

 

• Emojis: While you don't want to add too many cutesy emojis, using these tiny graphics is a nice way to break up longer  bodies of text. By using a unique graphic for a bulleted list, an envelope next to your email address, or a splash of color to divide up long bodies of text, you can leverage emojis to liven up your profile and posts. 

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• Skills: Within LinkedIn, you can select up to 50 skills that will be included on your profile. This is another great opportunity to look at keywords included in your job listings for your target role. You can even indicate which skills you used in each job you listed. 

By Brenda L. Peterson, The Layoff Lady

When applying for jobs,  customizing each resume is one way to help you stand out. Unfortunately, it’s easy to spend a lot of time and effort updating your resume. Let's look at shortcuts for customizing your resume that is less time and labor-intensive.  

Remember, when you're at the point when you're applying for jobs, you should have already done some prework. By now, you should know what specifically you're looking for in a job. This includes details like your target job title(s), industries, core work responsibilities, geographic location, day-to-day responsibilities, pay rate, and work arrangements (onsite, remote, hybrid).

​If you don't have a clear idea of what your target job looks like, it makes everything else harder. I encourage you to take a moment to figure out what your target is. This act will help you be more efficient as you search for a role, decide what to apply for, create your target job resume, and everything after that, too. 

For me, in a previous job search, here is how that looked: 
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• Full-time Learning Consultant role at a company in the fields of software/healthcare/finance
• 100% remote or hybrid in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area
• Managing learning projects, completing needs assessments, designing comprehensive training programs for customers and employees 

To start, create a target job resume. You could also share this resume with those people who say, "Can you send me your resume?" who may not have a specific job description to share. This resume should be a solid representation of your skills, the type of work you do, and the unique value you would bring to the role. Your target job resume should also include keywords commonly appearing in job descriptions for the type of work you do.

To be clear, this IS NOT the resume you use to submit whenever you apply for a job. Instead, this is the resume you customize just a bit for each job for which you apply. Let's look at what to include so you have a robust resume that you'll only need to customize in a few ways for each role. 

Your resume should start with a professional summary section. The goal of this summary is to let the reader know if it's worth reading further. This summary is comprised of a few sentences that summarize who you are, what drives you, and how those factors align with the available role. This is also an opportunity to highlight important keywords that will resonate with employers.

For me, here is how the Professional Summary in my target job resume looked:

Proactive learning consultant driven to help organizations succeed. Thrives when partnering with leaders and stakeholders to improve performance. Able to think strategically and execute tactically while managing multiple projects. Committed to constant learning, continuous improvement, and delivering training that drives results.

Look at your list of terms included in job descriptions that interest you. Prioritize the ones that you really want the hiring team to know about. Include those in a Relevant Skills section near the top of your resume. Limit what you include to a couple of lines. Here are key skills that I seem the most generally relevant: 

Here are keywords I saw in multiple Learning Consultant Jobs and included in my Relevant Skills section: 
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​Blended Learning, Coaching, Collaboration, Communications, Consulting, Facilitation, Instructional Design, Needs Analysis, Onboarding, Project Management, Relationship Building, Strategy, Video Production

For each role, I include bulleted points describing responsibilities common to people who do this work. This includes a wider variety of keywords to help even the least experienced recruiter see the tie between what I describe and the words used in many job descriptions. 

Here are examples of bulleted points under job descriptions that include keywords relevant to my skills:
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• Implemented a knowledge management strategy for a fast-paced B2B company. Drove platform adoption, standardized training materials, leveraged best practices, and managed a remote team of 5-8.

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• Developed a blended learning solution to onboard new SaaS customers. Incorporated virtual instructor-led training (VILT), eLearning, hands-on practice, and post-class assessments. Decreased instructor classroom time, customer wait time, and implementation project length.

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• Managed enterprise-wide training initiatives: producing a library of best-in-class microlearning videos, implementing a Digital Adaption Platform (DAP) for in-tool software support, and creating online user communities based on personas. 

The words in bold are keywords pulled from relevant job descriptions. 

First, I pull up my target job resume file in a word processing file format. Then, I save a copy of my job-specific resume using the following naming convention: 
[My name] Resume, [Job Title] with [Company name]. 

For a Lead Learning Consultant role for ABC Inc, the name would look like this:​
Brenda L. Peterson Resume, Lead Learning Consultant with ABC Inc

Now, I'll edit this new resume so it aligns more directly to the job for which I'm applying.

Now, I will customize the Professional Summary Section to align with the language used in the Lead Learning Consultant role. 

Remember, here is how the Professional Summary in my target job resume looked:

Proactive learning consultant driven to help organizations succeed. Thrives when partnering with leaders and stakeholders to improve performance. Able to think strategically and execute tactically while managing multiple projects. Committed to constant learning, continuous improvement, and delivering training that drives results.

Here is the Professional Summary would look for this Lead Learning Consultant role:

High-performing lead learning consultant who thrives when delivering engaging employee performance solutions. Thrives when partnering with internal and external stakeholders to design innovative talent management programs. Able to think strategically and execute tactically while managing multiple projects. Committed to constant learning, continuous improvement, and delivering talent initiatives that drive engagement.

The sentiment is similar, but now I'm conveying my value add using the employer’s words to describe this position. Note the bolded words were pulled directly from the job description. 

Do you customize a resume for each role? What are your tips, tricks, and strategies? Include your thoughts in the comments. 

By Brenda L. Peterson, The Layoff Lady

Whether you’re considering making a career change, are currently in the midst of a job transition, or want to be more effective in your role, increasing your self-knowledge is a great place to start. 

In other articles here on The Layoff Lady, I’ve outlined ideas for exploring your values and discovering your strengths. Knowing more about what you truly value and what you are good at will help you think about the why, what, and how of the type of work you are driven to do. Reflecting on your findings will also help you have better conversations about your skillset and what motivates you personally and professionally.

 It’s incredible how our strengths and values also show up when we are in challenging situations—often in good ways, but sometimes in more destructive ways. Learning about how you can get in your own way is a valuable strategy for making better decisions when you’re mid-crisis.

Enter Shirzad Chamine. He is a professor, professional coach, and the author of the best-selling book Positive Intelligence. He introduces strategies for how to be mindful of what we know (IQ) our overall emotional intelligence (EQ), and how to leverage our positive intelligence (abbreviated as  PQ). The end result is learning to be more effective and increase our overall.

Here arer the nine saboteurs outlind in Positive Intelligence listed in alphabetical order along with my brief description of each:

1. Avoider: Nope. Not dealing with it. Hey—look over there!
2. Controller: I’m scared and taking charge! I’m impatience and I will run over everyone else to fix this.
3. Hyper-achiever: I will work day and night with no breaks to finish all the things by myself.
4. Hyper-rational: I’m going to logic my way out of this no matter whose stupid feelings get hurt.
5. Hyper-vigilant: I’m fighting any and all possible catastrophes non-stop. Sleep is for the weak.
6. Pleaser: I’ll make these people like me even if I make myself sick doing it.
7. Restless: That other thing looks cool. And that one. And that one. So many shiny things!
8. Stickler: I’m going to get this all exactly right to the letter if it takes me all night and day.
9. Victim: Fix my problems because I can’t (or won’t). I’ll be over her brooding and suffering.

Yikes. We're certanly not our best selves when we show up this way. Let's look at how you can identify your saboteurs and use that information to improve how you show up.

Set aside time to take the 9 Ways We Self Sabatoge Assessment from Positive Intelligence. The assessment takes 5-10 minutes to complete. In addition, I suggest giving yourself 30-45 minutes to review your results and reflect. 

This assessment consists of 45 questions. Each question includes of a statement, and you'll rate your agreement with that statement on a 5-point scale ranging from strongly agree to strongly disagree. The directions encourage you to answer each question relatively quickly and go with your initial response. 

The final 7 questions are about demographics and finding out where they will send your assessment results. 

The results you receive include a ranking of your top sabateurs and your score for each. In addition, you will receive the following information about each of your saboteurs:
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• Basic Description
• Characteristics
• Thoughts
• Feelings
• Justification Lies
• Impact On Self and Others
• Original Survival Function

I find these types of assessments fascinating. As someone who is committed to ongoing professional development, I appreciate getting insights that might be hard for someone else to share. These insights are valuable, and also help me understand why I do what I’m doing as well as helping me to recognize those non-helpful patterns so I can adjust my approach going forward.

Not at all surprising to me, my top three saboteurs are as follows:

1. Controller, 8.1
2. Hyper-Achiever, 7.5
3. Restless, 5.6

Here were my initial thoughts as I saw my top three identified saboteurs: 
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• Controller: In other assessments, Bold and Driver have been my identified characteristics. I'm someone who tends to keep things to the point, hold people accountable, and help move projects forward. Consequently, under stress, that tendency to lead a project may become overly tight-fisted control. Not good.

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• Hyper-Achiever: Achiever is on my top CliftonStrengths, so it makes sense that I may have a tendency to overfocus on that strenght and work to personally achieve my way out of a situation. 

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• Restless: I'm always excited about learning new things, and my brain is always going a million miles an hour. On the flip side, this means I sometimes take on too many new things or even interrupt myself mid-flow to work on something else because of an idea I can not clearly articulate yet. ​

Under Controller, here are a few statements resonated with me from the details included  within my report:
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• Characteristic: “Comes alive when doing the impossible and beating the odds.” Most definitely. I am SO the person who digs being able to solve the unsolvable problem. Never tell me the odds!

 

• Thought: “If I work hard enough I can and should control the situation so it goes my way.” Whereas some people need to be motivated to do more to solve a problem, I needed to learn when to stop and either let someone else jump in or realize it might not be readily fixable. I appreciated the reminder.

 

• Feeling: “Angry and intimidating when others don’t follow.” In my area of expertise, I get pushy and controlling when we’re up against the wire and something needs to get resolved. Earlier career, I never realized that my determination and confidence in getting something done was perceived as intimidating. However, after learning that a bunch of my daughter’s friends were scared to death of me when they were little, I realized I need to be mindful of how my determination comes off to others.  

The first step of job searching is figuring out what kind of a role you even want. Instead of jumping right into the job you did before, taking a little time for introspection is wise. One good step in this process is finding out more about your strengths. Learning about what you are good at--and how to tell the story of your talents and successes--can help you position yourself well as you apply and interview for a new role. 

If you ask many people what they are good at, they would need help putting their natural abilities into words. Taking the StrengthsFinder assessment was a great starting point for me to better understand what I do well.

Often, individuals are blind to their own unique talents. In the past, I have wrongly assumed that EVERYONE does the things I do. Like (of course) everyone takes notes regularly in everyday conversations when they learn something--and (of course) everyone makes a seating chart whenever they are in a group of new people to remember names. 

​Turns out--NOPE! These are things I did that not everyone does. This was a huge breakthrough for me. So how do you figure out what you do that not everyone does? 

The CliftonStrengths Assessment (previously known as Clifton StrengthsFinder) is a wonderful tool for identifying what you are good at, how that manifests, and how your version of each strength shows up. 

The 30-minute online assessment includes 177 questions, including paired statements. Then, on a scale, you select which of the statements is more like you. From there, you'll receive a report identifying your top five strengths along with a more detailed description of how those strengths are exhibited in how you interact with the world. Reading a report about yourself (one that is freakishly accurate, by the way) is downright life-changing.

After taking the assessment, you'll be able to see your unique talents and have language to explain how what you do sets you apart from others. Having a way to put your abilities into words can translate directly into your resume and how you talk about who you are and what you bring to the table.

My identified strengths, in order, are Strategic, Learner, Arranger, Achiever, and Individualization. Here are a few details I learned from my report and reflecting on those results:

• As someone who is Strategic, I tend to quickly find the path through the wilderness. Then, I see how the pieces fit together and what action might make sense. 
  
• As a Learner, I have taken roles in multiple industries, knowing that I'd learn the business along the way. Through different jobs, I now know how travel agents upsell excursions to cruise customers, the value of the windshield to the structural integrity of a vehicle, the strategic value of the clergy housing allowance exclusion for pastors, and best practices for mortgage underwriting. 
• As an Arranger, I look at factors in play and determine how to optimize efficiency. For example, when creating a class, I choose the best way to organize course content to ensure each activity introduces the next. Next, I figure out how to adjust my content in the moment so the audience can get the most relevant information. Finally, I make sure that I make the most of the time I have to get the optimal amount of content covered effectively for the audience.   
• As an Achiever, I thrive when making a to-do list (aligned with my higher-level goals) and checking off items to know I've accomplished something useful in a given day. I also achieve by meeting deadlines and being able to note each goal met. Winning!
  
• Individualization helps me to be a good people manager. For example, I know that one employee would love to be given an award in front of his coworkers, while another would prefer to have his work affirmed privately. It also helps me know that one person needs ongoing feedback and another needs just a broad suggestion of the work to be done, and both will be successful.  

​Here are a few other strategies for identifying what you're good at and how you show up in the world:
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• Talk with a trusted colleague or former coworker. As for their feedback on what they think you do well, where they have seen you excel, and times when they have seen you struggle at work. As them what your superpower is. You'll learn lessons about your unique skill set from someone who has had several opportunities to observe you in action.
• Review job descriptions for your desired job title. See how they describe the skills needed to be successful and match your previous work experience to those outlined skills. Think about times when you've exhibited those skills and how you have solved problems using your expertise.
• Think of past work projects. Identify projects and work you enjoyed and times when time seemed to fly because you were "in the zone" and making progress. 

​by  Brenda L. Peterson, The Layoff Lady

Recently, I have talked with many colleagues who are proactively updating their resumes. After we talk a little about what type of a position interests them, I usually give them additional feedback about preparing a resume to apply for a specific job. 

​As a many-time hiring manager, I have seen lots of bad and lots of sort of okay, and just a few resumes that were really, really good. For me, a resume needs to answer three fundamental questions. Having a resume that addresses these questions gets you out of the no pile and into the “I am excited to talk with them” pile.

In a previous job, I was working on filling an instructional designer position on my team at a software company. I received one resume where the person’s career objective stated that they wanted to be a curator at a museum. The good news: this person knew what they wanted and made it clear in their resume. The bad news: they didn’t want the job I had available.

Most (like maybe a good half) of resumes that end up in the “no” pile are so nondescript that they could be applying for any number of office positions. Once, when I was hiring for a technical trainer position, I received a resume for someone with a lot of experience working as a corrections officer. The good news: this person had many potentially transferable skills. The bad news: I didn’t know if this person was interested in this particular role or was mass applying for anything that wasn’t their current job.

For many people, it may be easy enough to tell if a person wants the job based on their past job titles. For example, if they have always been a project manager, and this is a project manager position, or a senior project manager position, it’s a pretty good bet that they are interested in this job. 

​Then there are the rest of us, who are decidedly less well-behaved. Some people have a variety of job titles that don’t necessarily flow together (like people who have changed careers). Others have careers where positions went from managing people to being an individual contributor, to freelancing, to being at a VP level, to being an individual contributor again. Again, no career path is wrong, but when applying for a job, clarify what you are looking for now—and that it is the open position.

​Overall, do just enough tailoring on your resume, so the hiring manager knows you are interested in the available job and applied for it on purpose. Given how costly a bad hire can be, help the hiring manager know that you want to do the job in question.

Once I know a given candidate wants the job, I look for some indication that the person has the skills to do the job. Some candidates’ work experience is neat and tidy and points logically toward the open role. For example, they were a call center representative, then a senior call center representative, then a call center supervisor, then a call center manager. If they were applying for a call center manager position, from their job titles alone, I could be reasonably sure they could do the job. With that, adding in keywords from the job description and adding details about their previous education and work responsibilities as they relate to this specific position, it’s not a stretch to think they are qualified.  

If the candidate didn’t have much experience in a similar role, I’d expect them to describe what they did in previous positions and show how their work experience prepared them for this role. For example, if I’m hiring for an instructional designer position, the job description might include “collaborate with subject matter experts to create learning materials for client-facing courses.” If someone with a background as an elementary school teacher applies, they should show how their previous work experience relates to the available position. For example, they might include “collaborated with subject matter experts in the media center to create learning materials for a course for parents on encouraging their children to read more.” Without emphasizing those transferable skills, I might not be convinced they could perform the required tasks.
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Overall, be sure to make it apparent that you can do the core tasks that the job requires.

Filling an open position takes a long time and is a huge gamble. The goal is to find someone who wants the job, can do it, and will want to be in that position (or a part of your organization) for a good long time.

This part of resume assessment is teeing up the phone screen and helping me determine the questions I need to ask. For example, will this salary be in line with their desired salary range? Will they be happy working from the office or working from home for the amount required? Will they work well with this organization's structure and formality level? Will they want to travel as much (or as little) as is needed with this job? Are they going to be happy managing or not managing people? As a hiring manager, details in the resume are helpful as a starting point for those questions. 

As someone who has been laid off a lot, I have applied for about three bijillion jobs throughout my career. I've become a resume nerd through this whole ordeal. I’m always learning about the best format, writing a punchy introduction, tailoring my resume to each position, and having the right level of detail on my LinkedIn profile. Which leads me to...

On the other side, I’ve also been a hiring manager searching for new computer trainers, instructional designers, technical support specialists, and technical writers. 

​As a hiring manager, believe it or not, I very much want you to be the perfect candidate for the position I have open. However, while searching for a new career opportunity is no picnic, being on the other side of hiring is also challenging.

​Unfortunately, many candidates who apply for a job are either not qualified or represent themselves poorly on a resume. Which brings me to my...

As a job candidate, it may often feel like you are at odds with hiring managers, and the companies trying to fill open positions. Want to know the truth? 

​As a hiring manager, I’m really hoping that you are the right candidate for the opening I have.

I’m trying like crazy to find just the right person who can do what I need done and who will enjoy working at my company. Each time I come across a resume that includes a great list of skills, but who makes one or more of the mistakes listed above, you're making it harder for me to sell your skills to my boss and get you the salary you want.