Get a clue- Know what you can do

I facilitate resume workshops at least 2 times a week.  In every workshop I deliver, there is always at least one person when asked “what is your objective” states:

“I don’t know” or

“I am keeping my options open” or

“I can do almost anything” or

“A good paying job”. 

I want to scream, but instead I ask, what do you really want to do? Most of them still can’t answer this question.  They shouldn’t be in the resume writing workshop.

If you can’t specifically identify what you want to do or what you like doing, then it is time to sit down and do some serious self assessment.  Self assessment stinks.  It is painful and hard work.  Sorry.  You have to do it. Not just for the resume, but for the whole purpose of job search.  How do you find the job amongst the myriad of job posting boards if you aren’t entering in the right key words.  Please, don’t tell me you are reading every job listed for the day on Indeed.com.  That’s got to be time consuming, not to mention frustrating. Ok, let’s say you can find a job to apply to and you submit your general resume and by some miracle, you are called for an interview.  Great, now, the interviewer will ask “why are you qualified for this job?”, “what are your strengths and tell me about a time you used one” and “why should I hire you?”. Good luck answering these questions if you haven’t done some serious self assessment.

Self assessment books are all over the place. “What Color Is Your Parachute” by Richard Bolles, is probably the most comprehensive. Though it’s updated every year, the info hasn’t really changed.  If you have the discipline, sit down and read it. 

There are other assessment tools on-line.  O*Net  http://online.onetcenter.org/ or http://www.onetcenter.org/tools.html has several assessments with a pretty neat connection to over 800 occupations.  So how it works is, you take the assessment of your interests and values and skills and it matches your answers with the requirements of hundreds of occupations.  Then you link to the occupational descriptions to learn more about the duties and skills required.  It can be quite helpful.

Another, perhaps easier, self assessment is to document Accomplishment stories.  Think of a time you were proud of something specific you did.  Perhaps you solved a problem, made a customer really happy or saved the company money.  Once you’ve recalled this story, begin to document it.  Use STAR template Download Accomplishments.doc to organize the story.  STAR is an acronym that stands for Situation, Task, Actions, Result.  Start with one story, but don’t stop there. Remember as many as you can.  There will be a pattern. You will see you use the same skills over and over.  These are your strengths.  This is self assessment. 

So next time someone asks you, what are you looking for, give them an answer. 

I’ll write more about why those answers are so dangerous to the search process.   

Comments

[Career Sherpa]

TypePad HTML EmailGreg, thank you! You must be a fan of Alice in Wonderland too!

[Greg Gotts]

Great article Hannah .... If you do not have a destination in mind to begin with, it really doesn't make any difference what direction you take!

Greg Gotts

[mike lally]

I found that personality assessments to be a good tool. I remember the day Alex R. beat the value of the DISC assessment into me.

I like the DISC assessment. You can get them online.

You can also use the Marcus Buckingham tool - Discover Your Strengths. Buying the book gets you an online code.

I find that those tools give a solid foundation/idea of who you are. No, they are not 100% accurate. But they get very close. They at LEAST give you an idea of the types of activities you like doing.

Me - I like to fix stuff. :)