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Resume Typos: The Definitive Rant

June 9, 2012

Ah, the resume typo. Fodder for thousands of career coaches and employment bloggers who don’t know what else to talk about. They’ll all tell you a typographical error on your resume or cover letter is the kiss of death, because after all, this is your only chance to impress an employer.

But that’s just it: this single sheet of 8.5×11 paper is indeed the only thing an employer has to go on. Let’s pause for a moment to consider how moronic this situation is. I’m supposed to make a vital hiring decision based on whether or not you can type and hit “spellcheck”? Why do I have to extrapolate your level of professionalism and skill as a human being from such a small amount of information? Resume typos only matter because employers don’t have anything better to judge you on. Simple as that. KarmaFile was created to solve precisely this kind of operational deficiency. So sign up.

Okay, we can stop there. That was the point I wanted to make. Actually, no - I’m not done. This old wives’ tale about the spooky resume typo needs to be put to rest. I’m not even sure who I’m more mad at about this, so I’ll just complain to all of you.

1. First off, your resume is supposed to be a representation of you, the applicant. I’m not hiring your English professor uncle or your friend who runs a blog, so if those people aren’t going to be helping you craft every single email at this job, why are they involved in your resume? If the job takes accuracy in communication so seriously that a typo will put you out of the running, then the fact that you have to rely on others to help you write means you won’t have the job very long anyway. Show me who you are, and if you can’t spell for shit, let me decide whether or not that matters to the company.

2. It’s quite possible that a typo on a resume is the result of using spellcheck on Microsoft Word. This is the tool almost all of us depend on to keep ourselves from looking stupid, yet it makes mistakes constantly. If you rely on the same tool, don’t judge someone for taking its word (pun!) as law.

3. The flip side of spellcheck is that, if you don’t use it, you’re much more likely to make mistakes. I don’t use spellcheck because I’m a pompous ass and believe I’m smarter than it is… also, I create resume PDFs in Photoshop, which doesn’t have spellcheck. So if someone like me were applying, a typographical error would be a concern, but it would likely be negated by the fact that the applicant is confident enough in his/her skills to write without training wheels.

4. Let us not forget how much the job hunt wears down applicants: if an employer comes across your resume, it likely means you’re sending a dozen resumes out elsewhere over the course of the week, after having pored over a hundred job listings. This is happening every single week. Double-checking your work only helps when you’ve got a clear head, not when you’ve been staring at your computer for three hours. Anyone expecting flawless execution in such a frustrating environment probably assumes that the resume and cover letter aren’t being customized… which leads me to my next point.

5. I’ve seen cover letters and resumes that were obviously written specifically for the job I posted and company I represented… and yes, some of them had typos. I don’t care. I’d rather see someone take the risk by putting together a brand new document to wow me than have someone pass along the 73rd version of their perfect little applicant package. A unique letter/resume with errors gets an A for effort, a C for execution, and spot in the “follow-up” pile.

6. I’ll end it with this, and then I’ll go get a massage to relax: anyone judging applicants on their typographical errors needs to look in the mirror. If “excellent written communication” actually mattered to employers, 90% of America would be unemployed within a week of spellcheck being disabled. You’re all horrible writers, and that’s okay, because writing is hard. Hell, I do it for a living, and I’m not even that good. But I’ve caught plenty of typos that other resume reviewers and HR personnel have overlooked, so riddle me this: if an applicant missing a typo doesn’t deserve the job, then does the reviewer who misses that typo still deserve theirs?

Setting Realistic Hiring Expectations

May 30, 2012

Have you heard the one about the company that didn’t want to hire the best candidate? Me neither.

Thing is though, the door swings both ways. The best candidate is looking for the best job… and chances are, your company isn’t offering it. Still want that rockstar on your team anyway? You’ll get a few months out of him before he ditches you for something better… or, he’ll slowly fall into the comfortable rut of mediocrity which you allow to fester in your business, and you’ll have an overpaid, unmotivated cubicle ornament on your hands.

No, you don’t want that guy, and he doesn’t want you. So get over it, and hire the right way.

Like everything else in life, it starts with honesty. Look at your team; where is it strong, and where is it weak? What’s the part everyone loves about this open position you have, and what’s the part everyone hates? What are the perks of your company’s environment, and what are the downsides? You don’t paint a picture of the person you want to see in the role… you paint a picture of the person who sees himself in the role. That is the key.

KarmaFile can be a big help here: a member’s profile can tell you if they’re strong on talent and weak on motivation, or if they’ve got the drive but are a little rough around the edges, or if they’re an unproven yet high-potential option. These people will be easier to sell on the opportunity, they’ll seek more appropriate salaries, and best of all, they’ll have something to improve on, in an environment that nurtures their growth.

It’s rare for a bunch of all-stars to win the game. It’s a team effort, and that’s not just lip service. Know your team, and find the pieces that fit.

How To Know When Employees Are Jumping Ship

October 6, 2011

Think you can spot a flight risk at work? You may be missing some of the less flamboyant signals. Check out our tips below to get a head start on employees who are thinking of leaving the cube farm for greener pastures.

Now, it doesn’t take a genius to know something’s up when a co-worker keeps showing up late, dressed in a suit for no apparent reason, and taking personal calls in the janitor’s closet. Unfortunately, the signs are usually a bit more subtle than that:

They make hard copies/backups of their work. Can’t pad a resume if you don’t have any padding on-hand… you may find employees requesting copies of files they took part in creating with others, or downloading the contents of their PC to a USB drive as “backup.” Might want to keep an eye on those people – especially if they ask for copies of other people’s work.

They ask for more money. There are several schools of thought regarding how to deal with employees who request raises outside of their annual review periods, but the predominant school is to let ‘em go. It isn’t about the money, it’s about being frustrated with their current situation.

They keep showing up on your LinkedIn updates. This one is, frankly, amazingly accurate. In both a nod to the value and a knock on the engagement of LinkedIn, the vast majority of its users only use the site when they’ve landed a new job or are looking for another one. If the guy next to you has connected with 20 people in the past week and written a handful of recommendations, that guy is a goner.

They mentally check out of group-based work, OR they start taking a more active role in mentoring others within the group. This facet really depends on why they employee is leaving, and how close they are. It’s understood that a co-worker who has stopped participating is probably unfulfilled, but once that person feels they’ve secured a new gig, don’t be surprised to see them helping others out like they never have before.

They take anything off their desk that has sentimental value. If you see that a mom took home a photo of her son or a painting by her grandkid, you may want to get the paperwork going on a replacement. Just saying.

Any of these ring true in your experience? Can you think of some more clues? Hit the comments!

Free Candy. Eye Candy, That Is

September 22, 2011

What are these for?! Patience, pretties… you’ll find out soon enough.

Service Update: More LinkedIn, Fewer Emails

September 11, 2011

Good news for KarmaFile users: we’re in the middle of implementing two new things, one of which is pretty notable.

New Thing #1: Those of you who, for whatever reason, haven’t added your work history or resume will no longer get the weekly email reminders to do so. Yes, we can see how they’d be annoying. Though we’re scratching our heads as to why you wouldn’t just import it from LinkedIn and call it a day. Ah, the mysteries of life.

New Thing #2: Speaking of LinkedIn, you’ll now be able to search for people to review even if they aren’t on KarmaFile. Your list of LinkedIn connections will populate in the search results, so you’ll be able to evaluate those users as “provisional” members, and whenever that person eventually signs up for KarmaFile, they’ll receive your review. We’ll keep it in a safe place between now and then, no worries.

Well, that’s the news. David Letterman is up next. Goodnight everyone!

Just How Much Is Your Resume Saying About You?

August 24, 2011

One of the reasons the folks at KarmaFile don’t put much stock into the lip service regarding “equal opportunity employment” is that the resume is still held as the standard requirement for measuring job applicants… so say the EEOC and HR departments around the country. Fact is, it’s horribly naive to think that resumes keep the playing field even.

We’re all aware of the really glaring bugs that put your resume at risk of landing an early date with the shredder: gaps in employment, spelling errors, etc. Think that’s it? Take a closer look, with a trained (and prejudiced) eye:

Your email address. Applying for an I.T., design, or marketing job? You@yourname.com says you understand the web and personal branding… mandyluvvz76@yahoo.com says you’re an amateur. On top of that, the fact that you aren’t using a GMail or Facebook Mail account is a bit of a tip-off that you might be unaware of trends in email providers – possibly pegging you as middle-aged or older. And of course, if you have “76″ in your address as our friend Mandy does here, it’s going to be assumed that you’re 35 years old. Oh, and one more thing: how polished could Mandy’s communication skills be if she feels totally comfortable using an address with the word “luvvz” in it?

Dates. Depending on the job you’re going for, age could be a an important consideration – though of course, no employer would ever admit it. Some job-seekers are smart, and remove the graduation date of their college or high school information. But of course, the date of your first job pretty much exposes your age anyway (years of employment + 18 years + 4 years for your Bachelor’s degree if applicable.) If you’ve got a handful of jobs under your belt, it’s feasible to simply show the last 3-4 positions and thus hide the date of your first job… but then, with no dates for reference to your age, you run the risk of having employers think that the most recent jobs you’ve provided are indeed the only jobs you’ve held. It’s a crapshoot, I tells ya.

Phone number. You know who has a land line phone? Old people. It’s becoming very hard to find people under 30 who have land lines, and in places where your area code gives away whether your phone is a cell or land line it can be a pretty telling sign of what age bracket you fall into (NYC, for example, has 646 as one of its cell area codes, while 212 has always been land lines.) So again, if you really want to hide your age, just leave the cell # on your resume… everyone has a cell. It won’t be questioned. Oh, almost forgot: some jobs – city jobs especially – prefer to hire as local as possible. Your land line area code will give that away too, and we can use NYC as the example again there: a midtown marketing firm might just overlook you if your area code is 845 instead of 212 or 718, because 845 means you live at least an hour and a half away from the office.

Address. Man, it just gets worse and worse! If your area code can be used against you for location purposes, then you know address could be as well. But it’s not just the distance from the office that your address gives away: it can also set expectations about your age, ethnicity and socioeconomic status. I don’t even have to have visited your city to know that any address with an apartment number in it means you’re probably not married, nor do you have a family. And if you live in “Upper” anywhere, it’s typical for those towns to be more well-off, and well-off in this country usually means white. Certainly more white than someone who lives on Martin Luther King Blvd., as it’s the heartbreaking fate of most streets bearing that name to be located in downtrodden ghettos.

Name. Doesn’t get more prejudiced than this… do you want to hire a Steve over a Tamika? Or maybe over an Ahmed? It’s baffling to think that we push for equal employment opportunity, yet still expect Americans to put their ethnic background right out in the forefront by placing their name on a resume.

So, how about you? Any ideas as to other areas of the resume that can expose your personal background? Talk it out in the comments.

College Grads: You’re Nobody ‘Til Somebody Loves You

August 10, 2011

Hey. You graduated. All that studying and hard work paid off, and now you’ve got the sheepskin to prove that you’re a force to be reckoned with. Congratulations are in order. So, what comes next (after the celebratory heavy drinking, that is)?

For some of you, the beginnings of an illustrious career are just a step outside your door. Unfortunately, that’s a rarity. The vast majority of you will wallow in a lengthy stretch of unemployment (“pre-employment”, if we want to be more positive about it), peppered with seasonal appearances as a cashier for Panera Bread – which is, after all, the Harvard of fast food joints.

Is it starting to sink in? You and 100,000 other people are about to be loosed upon the “real world”, vying for the few jobs that are available armed with your total lack of experience in one hand, and your degree that has basically become America’s “OK to work” stamp of approval in the other. It will take a big leap of faith for any company to put you in a role with any responsibility, and as such, what you’ll hear most often is that you don’t have enough experience for the job. But of course, that’s the conundrum: how are you supposed to prove your work ethic and employability if no one will give you a chance in the first place?

Well, guess who loves you. KarmaFile.

Do yourself a favor, and get in touch with the bosses and co-workers you’ve known throughout all those seemingly trivial summer jobs and internships. Have them rate you on KarmaFile, and you’ll be on your way to differentiating yourself from the herd of college grads faster than you can say “keg stand.” See, it’s because we stick with the basics of employability that your boss from the pizza place can provide valuable input about your worth as an employee, just as a supervisor at a big company would. Granted, the “Expertise” section of the review would probably be skipped if the job wasn’t relevant, but “Motivation” and “Professionalism” are traits that people can easily perceive and judge others on, no matter what the work.

Listen, standing out from the crowd of job applicants is no small feat. But KarmaFile hopes to make the hill a little easier to climb, and whether you realize it or not, you do have what employers are looking for. Don’t hide it – polish that baby up and put it on display.

Discussion: The Worst Buzzword In Business

August 4, 2011

Surely you’ve all got a handful of business terms that you’d love to see wiped off the face of the planet. My personal favorite is “verbiage”, simply because its real meaning is fairly ironic. So, let’s hear ‘em! Give us your POV, and don’t be afraid to reach out proactively.

Hit the Facebook discussion and contribute to the poll.

A Love Letter To Investors

July 30, 2011

The funny thing about startup investors is that, for all their experience and knowledge, most of them are wrong more than they’re right. Not their fault really; it’s just the tumultuous nature of the world they operate in.

So, while some investors will be straight up with you about whether or not they’re interested in the company you’re trying to build, most will kick a response back that allows them to walk away from the discussion without actually admitting they don’t want in… something like, “it’s a unique approach, but we’re hearing a lot of noise in the market right now. Keep me in the loop.” This is done so that, if you do end up succeeding later on, the investor can come back to the discussion, or at the very least save face from having to admit to colleagues that he/she simply didn’t see the value in the company.

Thing is, KarmaFile has a no-excuses policy – it’s pretty much the reason we built the site – so we tend to be more than a little perturbed when we get responses like the aforementioned. To that end, we decided to make it super-easy for investors to provide their faux feedback, and to save them the trouble of having to feign sincerity over email. We’ll now be sending this note in every investor pitch… it’s the same system that worked way back when you asked little Becky out to the 7th grade dance, except this time, the corsage is going to cost $200,000.

For the record, we greatly appreciate the investors out there who are willing to come out and say that they think we’ll fail – and even more so, the investors who are willing to take time out of their schedule to tell us specifically why we’ll fail. We wouldn’t hesitate to give an investor like that another chance if KarmaFile’s success changed their mind. Honesty: the breakfast of champions.

Why Weighing Reviews Is So Valuable

July 21, 2011

Want to see something neat? We figured it might  be a good idea to illustrate just how valuable the KarmaFile review system is by showing you how the concept of weighing reviews could work in other areas. Full disclosure: we understand that we’re dorks for thinking this is neat… but perhaps we’ll bring out the dorkiness in you.

Reviewing Car Dealers

Ah, the lowly car dealership. The one business every city resident can band together and jeer into oblivion. But here’s something you probably didn’t know about the auto retail industry: in aggressive sales areas (like NJ/FL/CA), the turnover rate for employees can be as high as 70% per year… and up to 90% in three years. Think about that. You buy a car from a dealership in 2008, and when you go back in 2011, not a single person you interacted with is still there. So what about that scathing review you wrote online back in ’08? It probably no longer applies to anyone working there, so is it fair to have the new guys’ names dragged through the mud based on what their predecessors did? Of course not. So improving the quality of car dealership reviews is simple: the more recent the review, the more valuable it is. You decrease the weight of a review (the impact it has on the overall score) as it gets older, and that shows everyone a better representation of current customer satisfaction.

Reviewing Movies

Do you have one of those friends who always talks about how “bad” a horror movie is, when what they really mean to say is that they were scared half to death? Never understood those people… getting scared is the whole point of a horror movie. Point is, if you’re out to see a flick, you want the reviews to come from people who know the genre well. You don’t want grandma’s 1-star review of “Death Blood Highway: 3D” to affect the 5 stars it got from every scary movie buff who saw it. So again, we can get better reviews here by vetting the people who submit them; the more movies you’ve reviewed in a specific genre, the more valuable each of your reviews would be, and the more they would impact the overall review scores of those films.

Reviewing Nightclubs

Everyone wants something different out of their night life: some want to hang around with friends, some want to drink and socialize, some want to dance, and some want a whole slew of things we won’t go into on this blog. So, when a review website says “89% like this club”, who are those 89%? Are they like you? Do they enjoy having sweaty, scantily-clad people spilling drinks on them? Maybe that’s your bag, and maybe it isn’t… so rather than leave it up to luck, it would be smarter for a nightclub review site to ask you, the user, what kind of experience you’re looking for, and then split all of a club’s reviews out to show how each personality type feels about it. That way, clubs that get good ratings – but aren’t your style – wouldn’t be touted as highly in your personal search results. Sure makes things a lot easier… but for the record, we maintain that everyone should own at least one zebra-print dress for special occasions. Yep, even the guys.