Before the Web, resumes were our biggest avatars and careers were our beat. Online, there are more ways to express ourselves and employ our interests.
A resume is another mix of author and audience, just like the about page. A poor resume is filled with a jobhunter’s goals and anxieties. A good resume is tailored to the needs of each individual HR department and the open position they hold.
Which is why I recommend drafts again, one set of rewrites to help you answer your questions about your future and another set to speak to the different employers you contact.
LinkedIn, or any Web-based resume, is a third version. It’s not tailored to any particular employer, but a live and mobile personal statement that should catch the right eyes when discovered. Your Web presence expands on this third document with endless creative possibilities —if you are so motivated to pursue them.
A resume is also a timeline, a written document defining past actions and suggesting future ones. It’s our first step in class between writing that is personal and passionate and writing that is applied and logical.
I’m happy you took the opportunity to focus this resume on your pseudonym. It clearly defines you for one purpose and audience and shows off your creative abilities. It also helps you evaluate this version of yourself. You could tailor this to a more specific type of baking for particular job offers. Online, you could expand the document to reach a wider audience.
You hit all the right structural notes. First, a written summary, followed by skills and experience, and finally, your education is standard. This “thinks of the audience,” concentrating on how you fulfill their needs. This is also why a “summary statement” at the top works better than an “about you” or “objective statement” on your goals or needs.
The design of the piece as a cookbook is intended for an audience, but right now the writing is more for you, isn’t it? If I’m looking for a baker, I want that first page to summarize why you are the one baker I should hire.
Then, there’s the recipes. Your skills recipe defines you as organized, creative, and time-oriented. Those are fine skills, but everyday. Almost every resume lays claim to them. What if you instead included actual recipes from your life? One represented those years of devotion in your mother’s kitchen as your early education—hers and your favorite recipe. Another expressed the classic baking skills you gained at the CIA. A third articulated the unique tastes you sell in your shop.
Not only would the reader have a sense of your growth and abilities, they would have a bunch of great recipes to hang onto and remind them of you and your shop.
When it comes to resumes, we tend to think broad and even vague is best, so we appear open to many jobs and clients. But recruiters rarely look for jacks-of-all-trades and you don’t want all those jobs anyway. You just want to meet all the people who like your particular baking.
We already see how focusing on one beat improves your chances of an audience. Focusing on the specific baking experiences you’ve loved and the ones you want to pursue next—through the documents writing—illustrates the unique skill set that people will want to hire.
That’s how writing your avatars becomes taking your future into your own hands.
This is a really interesting take on the resume assignment. It is very cute and totally fits your beat!
One suggestion I do have would be to format the recipes in order of when they happened first to when they happened last, so its kind of like a timeline. Having high school on the last page made me feel a little confused since I was already learning where your current self is.
Another suggestion would be to make this into one recipe, instead of a book to shorten post and really emphasize the important information a resume is intended for. Maybe focus more on your skills of baking or what your shop specialized in too!
Great job Ms. Ava! Awesome layout with an interesting color palate. Very easy read and informative.
ReplyDeleteBefore the Web, resumes were our biggest avatars and careers were our beat. Online, there are more ways to express ourselves and employ our interests.
ReplyDeleteA resume is another mix of author and audience, just like the about page. A poor resume is filled with a jobhunter’s goals and anxieties. A good resume is tailored to the needs of each individual HR department and the open position they hold.
Which is why I recommend drafts again, one set of rewrites to help you answer your questions about your future and another set to speak to the different employers you contact.
LinkedIn, or any Web-based resume, is a third version. It’s not tailored to any particular employer, but a live and mobile personal statement that should catch the right eyes when discovered. Your Web presence expands on this third document with endless creative possibilities —if you are so motivated to pursue them.
A resume is also a timeline, a written document defining past actions and suggesting future ones. It’s our first step in class between writing that is personal and passionate and writing that is applied and logical.
I’m happy you took the opportunity to focus this resume on your pseudonym. It clearly defines you for one purpose and audience and shows off your creative abilities. It also helps you evaluate this version of yourself. You could tailor this to a more specific type of baking for particular job offers. Online, you could expand the document to reach a wider audience.
You hit all the right structural notes. First, a written summary, followed by skills and experience, and finally, your education is standard. This “thinks of the audience,” concentrating on how you fulfill their needs. This is also why a “summary statement” at the top works better than an “about you” or “objective statement” on your goals or needs.
The design of the piece as a cookbook is intended for an audience, but right now the writing is more for you, isn’t it? If I’m looking for a baker, I want that first page to summarize why you are the one baker I should hire.
Then, there’s the recipes. Your skills recipe defines you as organized, creative, and time-oriented. Those are fine skills, but everyday. Almost every resume lays claim to them. What if you instead included actual recipes from your life? One represented those years of devotion in your mother’s kitchen as your early education—hers and your favorite recipe. Another expressed the classic baking skills you gained at the CIA. A third articulated the unique tastes you sell in your shop.
Not only would the reader have a sense of your growth and abilities, they would have a bunch of great recipes to hang onto and remind them of you and your shop.
When it comes to resumes, we tend to think broad and even vague is best, so we appear open to many jobs and clients. But recruiters rarely look for jacks-of-all-trades and you don’t want all those jobs anyway. You just want to meet all the people who like your particular baking.
We already see how focusing on one beat improves your chances of an audience. Focusing on the specific baking experiences you’ve loved and the ones you want to pursue next—through the documents writing—illustrates the unique skill set that people will want to hire.
That’s how writing your avatars becomes taking your future into your own hands.
Wonderful work, Ava.
This is a really interesting take on the resume assignment. It is very cute and totally fits your beat!
ReplyDeleteOne suggestion I do have would be to format the recipes in order of when they happened first to when they happened last, so its kind of like a timeline. Having high school on the last page made me feel a little confused since I was already learning where your current self is.
Another suggestion would be to make this into one recipe, instead of a book to shorten post and really emphasize the important information a resume is intended for. Maybe focus more on your skills of baking or what your shop specialized in too!