Career advice

[resonant]

OK, I've just had a blinding flash of the obvious, which I want to share in case there's anybody else out there who, like me, didn't already know this.

As many of you know, I'm job-hunting. Now, for years I was working as a journalist and looking for different journalist jobs, and each time I went hunting, I'd break out the previous resume and add the latest job and move forward.

Now I'm changing careers, and I'm learning that a resume is not an adequate tool for career record-keeping.



Because that position as a feature reporter? The aspects of it that I stressed on my resume when I was trying to find another reporter position are not the same aspects I need to stress now that I want to be noticed for business analyst/project manager type jobs. And since that job was quite a while back, a lot of the day-to-day accomplishments that I could have used on a resume with a different emphasis are long since forgotten.

What I really need -- what I'm going to create for each job and volunteer position from now on -- is a file that goes like this:

My title
Organization
Date the work began/ended
Supervisor: name/title/contact info
Other mentors: name/title/contact info
Others who knew and praised my work: name/title/contact info
List of the tasks I did
Significant accomplishments
List of the skills I used
The most important things I learned
What I liked doing most.
What I hated doing most.

And when the time comes to make a resume, I'll go back to that file and pull together the information that's relevant to what I want to do next.

That way, if ten years from now I'm looking for work as, like, a cake decorator's apprentice, I won't have lost track of all those hours on the hospitality committee, measuring out powdered sugar by the pound.

(If anybody wants to offer me a job in Iowa, be my guest.)

Comments

[spuffyduds]

...OH.

THANK you.

[resonant]

Just wish it had occurred to me when I started my first job in high school -- maybe I would have observed the patterns and not been such a fool as to go to journalism school ...

[azurelunatic]

I keep three spreadsheets: job info, skills, and references.

[resonant]

That's smart. What kind of information do you keep on each one? -- if you care to share.

[azurelunatic]

Job information:

Name of business, start date, end date, job title, supervisor name, phone number, address, starting pay, ending pay, reason for leaving -- and as various impertinent job applications ask me for more information, I record those things in there too.


References:

Name of person, type of reference, relationship to me, contact information, approximate date we met, and any other random thing that seems useful or turns out to be useful.


Skill:

This is the fun one. I keep it organized like a database table, with a column for job, a column for skill, and a nice beefy column for an example of a time when I used that skill. Practically speaking, the "example of a time when I used that skill" column is basically for anecdotes about times I was really awesome at work. Then I go through and fill in the skill or skills that this little bit of awesome exemplified, and the job I was in when I did it. Then when I'm building a resumé later, I can either sort by skill or sort by job, and come up with examples that are suited to whatever I'm applying for. It saves me writing because often I can either copy bits out and put it into the resume, or if there's a really awesome resume and I don't want to lose a particular bit of it, I put it straight back into the table where it can sit among all the other awesome.


Then when I go to an interview, I have hard copy (in duplicate of the stuff I don't mind giving to the interviewer) in addition to hard copy of my resume, so in case there are questions I will have the reference right there. Also soft copy on an otherwise-clean USB drive.

[resonant]

Wow.

This is amazing, and I am so going to steal this from you.

When I started thinking about making a career change, I went through all those exercises in What Color Is Your Parachute? and I was particularly fond of one that had you write seven little stories of things you did that you enjoyed doing and were proud of the results of -- and then break them down into transferrable skills. This sounds like it's sort of using the same lens to look at work -- what was I doing, and what skills was I using?

Also: I love spreadsheets.

[fanofall]

I have also only just realized this, but you have managed to summarize the list of things that need to be kept in a much better way than I was able to. I'm totally stealing your list, BTW.

[resonant]

These are things they should probably teach in high school, aren't they? I'm definitely teaching them to the kidlet, for whatever that's worth.

[out_there]

I think that I, like many people, ignore the resume until it's suddenly needed again and I've never really thought about the information that should be kept. I mean, it makes complete sense but I never thought of it before. I'm going to try to do this for myself (and still live in hope that I don't have to use it).

[resonant]

Just lately I'm recognizing in myself this attitude that I might be able to do the job-hunt thing so well that I would never have to do it again? Like getting married means you never have to date again?

Unfortunately, I don't really think that's true; I think my fantasy that I could write one perfect resume, get one perfect job, throw away the resume and be done with it is a fantasy that's not so good for me.

Hence no longer throwing away information but keeping it in a form that will be easier to get at!

[jedusaur]

I have a file called "resume fodder" where I keep all that crap. It's nowhere near as neat as yours, but it gets the job done. So to speak. :P

[resonant]

Yep. I wish I'd had one for years now. It's a pain to have forgotten things but not to have forgotten that they existed, if that makes any sense? -- like, I keep looking at phrases in sample resumes and thinking, "I know I have accomplishments that would demonstrate this trait, but they're from the late eighties and I can't remember them!"

[fullygoldy]

Hmmm. That sounds really useful. And never would have occured to me because I've never changed fields in 27 yrs. It's not even 0700 and I've already learned something new today!

[resonant]

Wow, that's hard to imagine. I went into a field that was badly wrong for me, and have been bouncing around trying to find my way into a better choice.

[sam_storyteller]

For what it's worth, I learned to keep a CV with every job I did ever, including the names/numbers of references from it, and then pare the CV down for resumes.

[resonant]

Yes, that's exactly what I wish I had!

[greyeyes]

That's a really good idea! I'll get to work on mine and have them ready for next year when I job-hunt!

[resonant]

How I hate job-hunting ...

[metaphortunate]

Ooh. That is smart. *steals*

[resonant]

Yay for pooling all our various smartnesses!

[riverlight]

This is really good advice. I've been doing something similar for a while—a loooong list of everything I've done, with bullet points of the sort one tends to include in resumes—but I keep forgetting to update it. Your post has reminded me that I probably ought to go update it now, before the details get any hazier in my mind...

(And good luck with the job search!)

[resonant]

It's really tough to keep these things up to date when you don't need them.

Thanks for the well-wishes -- I need all I can get.

[wanted_a_pony]

:: admires your organizational skills ::

It's a damn good thing, in a way, that I have to find a new career. I used to keep a similar collection of my jobs that lasted more than a few weeks (I only had two permanent jobs in 25+ years of office/computer work; the rest were temp) but I recently realized the old folder was fairly useless. None of my contact people still work at the company where we met, & some of the earlier ones are dead. The only workplaces that even still exist as the same entities are two universities.

It's very good to think of a new career & set of jobs & people!


(... Nothing like job-hunting & digging up ones past to depress one. Sorry. :-P)

[resonant]

It is depressing, isn't it? But I've been stagnating here, so it's time I had a kick in the pants.

[resonant]

Coming back to add:

None of my contact people still work at the company where we met, & some of the earlier ones are dead.

This is actually saving me some trouble on the current job hunt -- I was fairly miserable in my last-but-one job (worst boss I ever had, plus work that was repetitive and extrovert-oriented) and as a result I didn't do it very well, but the company has gone out of business and I wouldn't know where to find any of my bosses from there!

[wanted_a_pony]

...but the company has gone out of business and I wouldn't know where to find any of my bosses from there

Heh, I admit I used to enjoy a moment of schadenfreude at times like this: perhaps, if they hadn't employed such asshats (the boss) & had recognized what a mis-set diamond I was, they would've done better.... But I expect you're a better person than I. I'm very glad it eases your current task. I love it when I can honestly say of a position I hated, "I'm sorry, I have no idea how to contact my supervisor, but I can tell you some details of what I did!" -- finishing off brightly & enthusiastically. :-D

...I'm definitely teaching them to the kidlet, for whatever that's worth. (reply to fanofall)

What a fantastic parent you are! That, & the idea that s/he's likely to have lots of jobs & two or more careers, will put hir several steps ahead of hir peers & save lots of grief.

[resonant]

& the idea that s/he's likely to have lots of jobs & two or more careers

So much yes! I suspect the loyal lifetime company man was never as common as the literature suggests, but he's certainly gone now; the rest of us really need to be thinking about making a life as opposed to finding a place to be and never moving out of it.

Making job-hunt-related phone calls with the kidlet listening gives me a bit of stage fright, but I do it anyway because I can't help feeling that she's storing it all away and will remember how it's done when she needs to. Fingers crossed.