Discussion on:

Does your resume say what the hiring manager wants to know?

I am always concerned in how my resume, cover letter and interview are seen by the hiring manager. For each job I apply to I change each to fit what I think the hiring manager should know about me. Seems like I have too many resumes floating around as well.

You've clearly expressed the Flip-Side of modifying every application to "fit" a certain job. I think this is all intentional smoke and mirrors, since many of the jobs I see people have (The good ones, of course) are had by someone who knew someone who knew someone that could have their resume considered...or through a recruiter of some sort.

Since many jobs don't have a real hiring team to fulfill the job, the least qualified, most FOS candidate gets the job because their drive is different than the person who may actually do the job well and enjoy doing it.

In the end, although your strategy isn't a bad one, it sure is time-consuming...and by the looks of things, even following their guidelines to a "T" has not rendered much success...

Is this a fair assessment?

I agree that the "someone who knew someone" element is alive and well in the hiring process (which is a shame, when it's used incorrectly). But I try to drive the point home about writing your resume for the reviewer because so many people are hung up on what they think are they're best qualities without taking in mind the job description. The person looking for a job is, obviously, his or her only focus but that's not true for a manager trying to fill a job. You have to make the path for a manager looking for a skills match as easy as possible to increase your chances.

You nailed it, Toni! It's vital to frame your experience, skills, and accomplishments to speak to the needs and wants of your audience. To a large extent, it doesn't matter what you think, just what they perceive. Of course, you need to be comfortable and confident in the material presented so that you can back it up unequivocally during the interview process.

To play the devil's advocate here, wouldn't general statements lead to questions about the details at the interview? That way you could expect questions for which you have intelligent answers.

The most basic error most job applicants make is they think the job interview/resume is about them. It isn't, it is about the employer (hiring manager).

Many people think a resume/interview is about showing how good of a worker/person they are. Instead ALL hiring processes are about how you will fill a specific need of the interviewer. Teasing out what the interviewer is looking for is everything. You shouldn't be thinking about yourself at all or how to make yourself look good, you should be actively thinking about what the interviewer wants and is looking for, well assuming you want that job anyway. Once you understand what they want the rest is trivial, well again if you actually have anything close the skills they want.

Oddly this is much harder than it ought to be, and to a great extent much of the blame is on the hiring manager or HR. After all, their most basic and first task is to accurately and thoroughly define what the position expects. This isn't a simple task, but it *is* the one they have been assigned. Their task isn???t helped by people who spam resumes thinking that is the right strategy, but there needs to be some kind of internal test that assures serious applicants will genuinely understand what is expected.

If you don't belive me, read the average job advertisement, try to imagine the job it descibes. Now go and look at the actual job.

Strongly agree with you. Executive resumes should be employer friendly so that they can easily find the person as per their requirement.