Archive for May, 2010
Top 10 Resume Tips for Career Changers
Guest post by Katherine Jewell, author of New Resume, New Career
Millions of Americans have been forced into career changes by struggling industries and tough economic times. Theres a danger of appearing over-qualified, or not experienced enough, when competing for the precious few job opportunities out there. Here are the top 10 ideas successful career changers use to create resumes that are focused, sharp and hip to 21st century hiring demands.
1. Write your resume to a specific job description.
Including all your experience can be overwhelming and might make you look over-qualified. Pare down your job history achievements, including only those that are relevant to the position you are seeking.
2. Use the title of your desired job as a headline.
Choose words that describe you, or the job you are seeking, as the headline of your executive summary. A salesperson seeking a sales manager job might use “Sales Professional” as the headline. Make your self-description as close to the job title as you can, while still being factual. This replaces the out-dated idea of a job “objective.”
3. Create a Resume Billboard at the top of your resume.
The first three inches of your resume should be an advertisement, proving you can do the job. State 3 to 5 key career achievements, complete with results. Include a table of your career skills that match the job requirements.
4. Dont include “survival jobs.”
If you have been working part-time to put food on the table, dont lead with that job. Lead with the last professional job that relates to your current search. Or, consider creating a consulting entity and lead with recent freelance projects. Employers today understand a gap of 12, 18 or even 24 months in your work history.
5. Include volunteer work as if it were paid.
Make up a title for your volunteer assignment, and write achievements as if you were a paid employee. Work is work, and achievements count.
6. Shorten your work history.
A resume going back to the 1970s will date you and could cause you to be eliminated (unlawfully) for age reasons. The rule of thumb is to include your last 10-15 years of employment. Include jobs more than 15 years in the past only if they contribute to your sales message.
7. Lead with your most relevant job experience, even if its not your most current.
Show a job that is relevant, with achievements that are similar to the job youre applying for. If the work is really dated, include how many years you were in that job, instead of the dates of employment. Be sure to include a simplified year-by-year job history on page two.
8. Lose the jargon, but use the key words repeatedly.
Be sure to explain jargon that might not be understandable to a hiring manager in a different industry. Emphasize key words in your desired job and industry. You can find key words by collecting job descriptions and noticing terms that repeat.
9. Make lists.
A list of words can provide a quick read of your skills and achievements. Redundancy can be to your advantage — each use of a key word increases your chances of a compatibility match. Some possible list titles are: Core Competencies, Skills Summary, Industry Experience, and Computer Skills.
10. Make your resume easy to read.
Use boldface and larger type for emphasis. Use bulleted copy instead of sentences. Shorten all the statements to the fewest possible words. Give yourself two full pages, but no more.
Assume that your resume is going to land you a job worth $100,000 or even a million dollars in income over the life of that job. Treat it with the same work and attention you might give a million dollar investment. You are worth it.
Linked here are the Before and After resumes of a stay-at-home mom who was able to return — after 17 years — to her career position of civil engineer. Note the at-a-glance concentrated key information at the top; the groupings of experience, putting most relevant engineering experience first, despite it not being most recent; and volunteer work put on equal footing with paid work.
This is just one of the 50 career makeovers featured in New Resume New Career, by Catherine Jewell, available in book stores everywhere.
This guest post is by Catherine Jewell, The Career Passion Coach. Her book, New Resume New Career: Get the Job You Want with the Skills and Experience You Already Have
details the before-and-after resumes of 50 career changers motivated by the economic downturn. She can be reached at www.CareerPassionCoach.com.
Poway Employment Lawyer Arsenal for Damages, Severance Pay and Employment in Poway for Job Discrimination or Retaliation
Never have there been so many tools for Poway employment lawyers to help people recently fired to win damages for discrimination, to seek a better severance package, including not only a longer period of pay benefits, but also other items, most important of which can be a longer period of health insurance benefits following the termination, or even to save the employees job.
If youve been fired from your job as a result of discrimination or retaliation, been harassed or the victim of a hostile work environment, or paid less than a person of the opposite sex for the same work for no other valid reason, visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us at any of the numbers easily found on our website.
In Poway and throughout California where private employers and government offices have laid off people in the hundreds and thousands, sometimes on a weekly basis there is substantial fear among those who have recently been terminated and those who are in fear that they could be next to be let go. In areas such as the Poway area where unemployment and foreclosures are at their highest in the state, many employees who have been discriminated against or fired in retaliation for complaints of harassment and who previously feared making any complaint, now feel they have nothing to lose.
Some employees are filing class action lawsuits based on everything from age and sex discrimination to discrimination against veterans. Individual claims are being made for overtime pay that the employees never received and retaliation for whistle blowing or reporting harassment.
One of the best tools for Poway employment lawyers is often the employees company manual and other memos of the company which often lay out glowing descriptions of how fair the company will be in their employment practices. Such manuals often describe all of the types of actions which the company claims they will not tolerate including the various forms of harassment and how the company will never take a retaliatory action against anyone blowing the whistle on harassment at the company.
Such manuals provide a powerful tool to the employee and the employment lawyer to show the company exactly how they violated not only the law, but also the companys own employment guidelines. Faced with such violations of the principles the company itself laid down and promised to their employees, it is difficult for such companies to argue that they didnt realize how they were supposed to respond to an employees reports of harassment or that they didnt know they couldnt fire someone for making such reports.
Employees must keep in mind that under California law, complaints alleging discrimination or retaliation must be filed with the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement in California within six months of the alleged discriminatory or retaliatory action by an employer, except in certain circumstances.
Some of the laws enforced by the Labor Commissioner in the State of California which prohibit discrimination and retaliation include discrimination or retaliation for threatening to file a complaint with the Labor Commissioner, for taking time off to serve as a juror, be a witness in court or to attend judicial proceedings related to being a victim of a crime or related to a victim, for discharging victims of domestic violence, for taking time off to seek medical or psychological treatment related to domestic violence or a sexual assault, for taking time off to go to a childs school at the request of a teacher, for disclosing his or her wages, for engaging in political activity, for being a whistle blower (not the real whistles), for being paid less than employees of a different sex for the same work unless based on a bona fide factor other than sex, or for complaining about safety or health conditions.
For Poway Employment Lawyers such as myself who are also Womens Rights Lawyers, when President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 in late January, he remedied a great injustice and provided employment and womens rights attorneys with yet another tool in our arsenal to fight for employees and womens rights.
Now women in California and the rest of the nation have a law that gives them the ability to redress the wrong suffered upon them by society in allowing men to receive more money for the same work from an employer and limiting the rights of women to bring a claim for pay discrimination.
In the past, women were required to file suit within 180 days after first being paid unfairly, even if the discrimination of being paid less than male workers in the same jobs continued. And if a woman failed to discover that male workers were being paid more for the same work, a woman still could not hold her employer accountable if she didnt learn of the unfairness and take action within 180 days of first being paid the lesser rate.
Under the Fair Pay Act of 2009 signed into law by President Obama, the statute of limitations of 180 days starts with each discriminatory paycheck, rather than when the employer starts to discriminate. So long as a woman in CA files her claim within 180 days of receiving any discriminatory paycheck, not just the first one, she is considered timely in bringing her claim.
An important aspect of the Act is that the effective date of the Act is retroactively set at May 28, 2007, which will allow it to apply to all compensation discrimination claims that have been filed on or after that date.
Women can sue for back pay awards for up to two years before she files her employment discrimination claim under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Fair Pay Act of 2009 does not change the two-year back pay limit.
Under the Act, an unlawful practice occurs when a discriminatory compensation decision or other practice is adopted, when a person becomes subject to the decision or practice, or when a person is affected by the decision or practice, including each time wages, benefits or other compensation is paid.
California also has its own version of the Federal WARN Act which in certain circumstances requires 60 days warning before laying off workers. Under the 2003 California version of the Act, the requirement of 60 days warning applies to establishments with 75 or more employees who have been employed for at least 6 of the previous 12 months, who layoff or relocated 50 or more employees within a 30-day period. There are also various exceptions to the rule.
For the elderly employee laid off, an important ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court has given added protection to older workers. Elderly persons who file employment discrimination lawsuits no longer need to prove that an employer acted intentionally. It is enough that the employee can prove that the layoffs had a disparate effect on the elderly workers.
Layoffs of caregivers providing care to sick family members may also violate federal law.
And all of these tools are still in addition to the tools Poway employment lawyers have against employers who practice discrimination based on sex, religion, race, age, or sexual orientation, or who subject their workers to a workplace that constitutes a hostile environment.
Visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us if you have been discriminated against or are the victim of retaliation by an employer in Poway or if you have been receiving less pay than a person of the opposite sex for the same work by your employer for no other valid reason.
It is thus imperative that an employee being laid off who is provided with a separation agreement and release of all claims against his employer consult with an employment attorney to determine if there werent violations of any of these laws and others that can assist the employee and his or her attorney to negotiate a larger severance package.
If you have recently been fired, are in fear of losing your job or if you have been presented with a separation agreement or severance package and have been discriminated against, harassed or are the victim of retaliation in Poway by your employer, we invite you to call our office.
5 Important Tips Regarding Employee Supervision when Opening a Dollar
Many of those opening a dollar store have no prior business experience. In fact many have never been involved in staffing or supervision of employees prior to starting their own store. Those who have never supervised before often find all of the demands associated with supervising employees to be overwhelming in the beginning. Some choose to ignore everything and allow other parts of the company to take all their time. Others recognize long term success depends on assembling a skilled team of employees who are all focused on the right priorities, and who all work together to make the business a success. As the team leader you are instrumental in providing the training, leadership and support your employees need to achieve that success.
Read on to discover more. In this article I present 5 important tips regarding employee supervision when opening a dollar store.
Tip #1) Clearly define the tasks associated with each position in your store. It will take some time and effort, but having everything clearly defined will be helpful to you and your employees. Complete this effort prior to even opening your business. Then as new roles and responsibilities emerge, add them to the list.
Tip #2) Document all job roles, responsibilities and expectations you have defined for your employees. These expectations should include general expectations for all employees as well as the expectations associated with a specific position in your firm. Be sure to communicate all expectations to your employees prior to holding them accountable to those expectations.
Tip #3) Measure employees against documented and communicated expectations. If youve done a good job of documenting everything and then clearly communicating everything, you will find the majority of employees will be doing everything possible to meet your expectations. They want to do a good job.
Tip #4) Conduct routine face to face meetings with every employee. Dont turn these meetings into a time for you to gripe about performance. A true leader doesnt focus discussions on everything employees do wrong. This is a time to reinforce positive performance and to reinforce the performance you wish to see in the future.
Tip #5) As noted in Tip #4, it is important to focus your meetings on the positive. Focus on providing specific feedback with examples to reinforce doing the right things and the fact that you recognize the employee is doing the right thing. However, if there are areas of concern, or even areas for growth, balance the discussion by providing feedback regarding those areas of performance as well. Discuss performance highlights and lowlights regularly with every employee.
To your success when opening a dollar store!