The Granite State Human Resource Conference’s 2009 Human Capital Summit took place on Tuesday, May 12, in Manchester, NH, attracting nearly 300 professionals in HR, nearly 50 exhibitors, and a dozen or so sponsors. This year, the conference offered more HRCI credits than ever before- with a PHR or SPHR able to pick up 6.25 recertifications hours, and GPHR able to pick up 3.25. The day of professional development and networking was punctuated with a moving keynote speach by Bert Jacobs of Life is Good talking about the power of optimism.
After the 2008 conference, I was asked to join the volunteer board that organizes this event, and accepted a position as the Information Management Chair. Indeed, being part of the process this year has truly changed my perspective on the event. What I had seen as a one day event, which I really looked forward to, has become the culmination of so much work from my peers that it I now see the day of of the conference as a relief. Relief that it’s finally here. Relief that our hard work paid off. Relief that I could take a month off from thinking about it… or almost a month. Beginning in a few weeks, we’ll be working hard at putting together the pieces to execute the 2010 conference.
However, before we move ahead, it’s good to take a moment to look back and appreciate the highlights of the 2009 Human Capital Summit. We were able to offer a very well-received variety of presentations, including:
‘Managing your Talent out of the Gate; Trends and Best Practices’
‘What is a Green HR office?’
‘What is your Brand?’
‘Retaining and engaging the Older Worker’
‘Surviving a DOL Audit’
‘Workplace Whitewater’
‘20/20 Employment Branding’
‘How to Use Technology but not Feel used by Technology’
‘Strategic Development of Sustainable HR Policies’
‘The ABCs of Total Compensation’
Aside from the great sessions, there was a great amount of energy, enthusiasm, and camaraderie all around.
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Thanks to Debra Wheatman for sharing this excellent article on the truly important issues to consider when creating your resume. Whether or not you’re currently looking for work, this is definitely worth the read!
Drafting an effective résumé is key to contributing to a successful job search. Oftentimes, the résumé is the first thing a hiring manager reviews to determine your suitability for a potential opening. This first (and lasting) impression is critical; putting your best foot forward in creating a highly accomplishment-driven document will go a long way in ensuring that you are contacted. There are a number of things that should be considered to ensure your résumé works to your advantage:
Results - Everyone has responsibilities as part of their job. That does not engage or capture the reader though. It’s fairly boring to read ‘Responsible for…’ and whatever it is that you do on a daily basis. The key component is to provide the reader with an example of something you did that generated RESULTS for your employer. Consider the following acronym: SAR. This stands for Situation, Action, Result, and can help you define on paper what the situation was, the action you took, and the result that will demonstrate your ability to deliver. If you do this throughout your résumé, you will set a positive and proactive tone that you are a committed and productive individual who is able to serve as a change agent for a company.
It’s all in the Words - Using compelling verbs will serve to engage your reader. Try to come up with different verbs to lead the bullets or sections of your document. Avoid using the same words over and over again. The résumé is a marketing document. You need to take a step back and think “What would I think of this if I saw it for the first time?” Try to get inside the mind of the hiring manager. You want to impress and engage someone. Actionable word choices will help you do this. Some good résumé verbs: Spearheaded; championed; aligned; delivered; implemented. You get the idea – these words present a call to action.
Presentation -While ‘content is king,’ presentation plays a part in the recipe. People like to look at things that look nice – résumés are no exception to this rule. Your résumé should be presented in a consistent manner on the page. Ensure that the margins are aligned properly. Choose an appealing font like Book Antiqua in 10 pts. or something a bit stronger like Tahoma in 9.5 points. There are many fonts out there that hold more appeal than the totally boring Times New Roman. Once your résumé is complete, print it. Don’t just look at it on the screen. Printing it will give you a better sense of how you are presented overall.
Rules about Grammar and Spelling - If there are two things that will send your résumé straight to the circular file it is grammar and spelling mistakes. I recognize that we are not perfect – but, and there is always a but, your résumé must be perfect. If you know that this area is not your strong suit have someone else review it. It is also a good idea to have someone else look at it because the more you study it the less likely you are to catch small things that a fresh pair of eyes will capture. The Little Blue Book is a great resource to help with myriad grammar issues. Not sure how to spell something? Dictionary.com is there to help. Need another word for managed? No problem – check out Thesauras.com for synonyms. There are countless resources right at your fingertips. Gone are the days of heavy books; the online world allows access to the most inconceivable information, which you should use to your advantage.
The Downlow on Hobbies – Leave hobbies off the résumé unless a hobby for you is completing an Ironman Triathlon or climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. Simply stating that reading or running is a hobby is not very compelling. The hiring manager will learn about you in time. However, the aforementioned triathlon and climb is certainly of greater interest than reading books. In addition to being an icebreaker, which can set a personal tone to the meeting, those things also demonstrate a unique spirit and other traits that set you apart from your peers. The perseverance, commitment, and dedication needed for those things warrants referencing on the résumé. If not something really unique, leave it off.
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Debra Wheatman, CPRW, CPCC is the founder and Chief Career Strategist of http://ResumesDoneWrite.com, a premier career services provider focused on developing highly personalized career roadmaps for senior leaders and executives across all verticals and industries. Debra is also the CareerDoctor (www.ResumesDoneWrite.blogspot.com)
Debra can be reached at DWheatman@ResumesDoneWrite.com
It crossed my mind recently that employers should pay very close attention to which companies are hiring employees away from them. These companies represent your market competition. Two things you should be asking yourself:
1. If you are losing top talent to one specific competitor, why and what can you do about it?
2. Are you also hiring away top talent from you competitor, or is this a one way street?
There's really no way around this simple truth: Great companies are built by great employees.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry
Okay… I’ve officially become a TwitterGeek! While I originally found this app to be a complete waste of time and silly creation, I’ve certainly come to admire it. There really are many ways in which Twitter can be of value, both personally and professionally. Yes, it can seem a bit odd. But if you give it a try, and be thoughtful about why you’re in this space, I think you’ll find it to be more than you expected. Sorry, enough of the plug…
Check out this app that I just learned about called Twitter Mosaic. It’s not all that exciting, but it does give a visual of your individual Twitter network. Here’s mine:
After complete laryngitis a couple weeks ago, I’ve been battling with a raspy halfway voice for two weeks now. That’s right, I haven’t been able to use my normal voice for just over three weeks now… and YES, IT’S KILLING ME! Finally, confronted with the fear of losing my voice permanently, I visited a doctor. Thankfully no complications. I just have to got two days without talking… simple, right?
Well, I’ve certainly learned a lesson about communication today, my first complete no talking day. It’s true what they say- when you feel that you can’t communicate, frustration sets in quickly. As I stepped out for lunch today with my pencil and paper to communicate, I realized quickly how much talking I really do. It was a pleasant surprise to see just how friendly and helpful strangers are, and make me think just how innate our desire to help is.
But I’ve made my way through one day, hoping to ease into the end of the week by completing some training presentations. Finally going to be delivering a structured LinkedIn training internally, should be fun.
Quick thanks to J. William Tincup, of Starr Tincup, for highlighting me on his blog. Here’s a quick excerpt below, click here for the full version:
4 Questions With… Jason Blais
March 5th, 2009
Jason Blais
Twitter || LinkedIn || HRM Today
What’s your personal favorite blog post and why?
“I just found this through Twitter. Every time I start to question the value of microblogging services like this, I am smacked in the face with a truly valuable link to important and relevant info. This blog post goes above and beyond in providing volumes of knowledge in a very clear, well laid out, and quick to scan format.
Either that or a much more personal one that I posted recently. Sometimes it just feels good to put yourself out there and share some pride you work.”
What’s your favorite personal online brand and why?
“Without sounding like a suckup to the host, I think William Tincup has this hands down. I had thought of this before I met him in person recently, and our face to face on served to reinforce my feelings. The cigar-smoking photo he uses consistently, along with the images used on his blog really represent the man. Additionally, I’m always happy to see people with enough self-awareness and internal confidence to be who they are. Great job with your personal brand consistency Mr. Tincup!
Out of all the folks online, who would youl ike to meet in person and why?… continued at jpie.com.
Set sail even though your friends stay in harbour. Know the route, know the soundness of your ship and the favour of the day
-Miyamoto Musashi, A Book Of Five Rings.
I’m happy to report that here at JobsInTheUS, we are moving in the right direction…. at least, I think so. I recently accepted a new role, or a slightly modified version of my previous roles, as the Director of Business Development. -that’s not why I think we’re moving in the right direction, though, of course, promoting me is the sign of a very intelligent business ;0).
In this new capacity, I’ll be focusing on developing our brand and identifying new revenue streams. While many in our industry have taken the easy step for short term revenue gain- charging job seekers in some fashion or another-, we have remained focused on our long term prosperity and stability.
(Believe it or not, my writing this is truly just a strange coincidence of timing with the philosophy and message put forth by President Obama in his Address to Congress, which is really just sound business practice.)
We believe that counsel, confidence, and content are the most important things we can give to both job seekers and employers right now, and that through those efforts, we will maintain and grow our brand loyalty and remain the premier recruiting resource in the markets we serve.
My new role is one example of how we’re backing up our brand promise with actual business practices. I have been a member of SHRM for 5 years now, am an active member of the Greater Monadnock SHRM chapter that meets in Keene, NH, and the HR Management Association of Central Massachusetts, and currently sit on the board for the Granite State HR Conference as the Information Management Chair. Over the past 4 years I have written and delivered numerous HR Certified internet recruiting seminars to employers in person across New England and New York, and via webinar to HR professionals across North America and Europe. During the past couple years, my focus has been on our Outreach and Education programs, providing PR, Marketing, and Sales support to our company, through experiential campaigns. These include exhibition at over 200 career oriented events in 2008, participation in B2B expos, and partnership development with trade associations and chambers of commerce. In addition, through this program, we presented dozens of Internet Job Hunting workshops directly to groups of job seekers through college career centers and state agencies.
As a company, my appointment as the Dir. of Business Development shows our commitment to growing our business through increased connection to our local markets, as opposed to selling more meaningless content on our web space or merely finding ways to capture revenue from job seekers. We have thoughtfully determined that our long term value and stability is based squarely on our ability to provide the best service to our customers, both employers and job seekers, and continue to establish our presence as thought-leaders in the world of recruiting and staffing management.
While we will continue to grow our base, developing our platform to connect the best in-state candidates with real in-state job opportunities, we will also expand to offer greater support to both job seekers and employers. Since 2004, we have hosted more real, in-state jobs in Maine, Vermont, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire than any other resource available, generating real content that attracts large numbers of the local job seekers. We have also successfully launched new markets in NY, CT, PA, LA, MS, and AL.
I’m proud of the brand loyalty and integrity we’ve established, but am even more proud of our continued decision to build on our success in thoughtful and valuable ways. I recently attended an HR meeting presented by the Central RI Chamber of Commerce which we sponsored. One of our long standing clients went out of her way to share with me that while they’ll be cutting many of their recruitment advertising methods, they will continue to use JobsInRI. She continued to explain that they realize the best value from our site, and that the support that we give through our participation in the community and the expertise given by our Recruitment Specialists is unparalleled.
We take the responsibility of providing value to the employers that advertise with us very seriously- and will continue to develop the counsel, confidence, and content we provide to help businesses make great hires. We also take great care in our engagement with the job seekers who rely on our service to find career opportunities, and will continue to develop the counsel, confidence, and content they need to find their next great career.
Because of this dedication to provide value, knowledge, and positive experiences in our markets, we believe the future is bright.
Set sail even though your friends stay in harbour. Know the route, know the soundness of your ship and the favour of the day.
Thanks to all of those who have utilized our resource over the years. We hope we can continue to meet your expectations and provide you with valuable counsel, confidence, and content.
Best Regards,
Jason C. Blais
Forget Corporate Social Responsibility, What About CONSUMER Social Responsibility!
I believe it’s time for us all to take a step back, and remember the value of human interaction both in life and in business. Businesses shouldn’t simply depend on automation solutions or online applications or e-commerce strategies to grow and build market share. Unfortunately, it’s up to consumers to demand more, and it seems that the majority are just too busy with their mobile devices listening to music, watching videos, texting, and calling, or going online to see how popular they can be on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, or a Ning network. If, as a country, we’ve already given away our status as a producer of goods, then the burden of our domestic value and economic strength falls on the shoulders of our consumers. That being the case, we must all become smarter and more thoughtful as we consume.
Somehow, online businesses have succeeded in convincing the masses that avoiding human interaction and local contact is a GOOD thing. And that we’re better off not having a local insurance carrier or bank or anything else for that matter. For a few dollar savings, we’ve allowed ourselves to accept that it’s in our best interest to pay less and receive less service.
In the world I operate in, recruitment advertising, this issue is growing out of control. Some larger employers have become to time-sensitive, they’ve removed human contact from parts of the recruiting process, relying solely on applicant screening applications. Try speaking with a hiring manager at a Borders, Sears, or other multi-national giant. It’s likely that you can’t even hand in a paper resume any more, let alone speak with someone about the job opening to find out more. Not too long ago I asked the store manager at a Sears who looked at the applications once they were completed at the in-store kiosk. Surprise! She had no idea. If the applicant was cleared by someone “at the home office”, the store would get a call to let them know when the applicant would be coming in for an interview.
Ever have a question about the validity of job postings on an internet job board? Who did you ask to get more information or confirm that the job was legitimate? I didn’t think so. While I am truly proud of the success of the job boards I work with, I am most proud of our focus on the local markets we serve. I’m almost embarrassed to share this, but once I was told that the only reason an employer used our site, was that when she called, she spoke with a live person who was familiar with her account, and that we gave her assistance over the phone to help ensure her recruiting success. Since when did answering the phone and giving advice to your customers become a unique sales proposition?!
Anyway, I’m getting off track. Today I just wanted to ask everyone to be thoughtful about how you consume.
Is it good or bad to pay $10 more for a running shoe that’s made in the USA (yes, there’s still one company making shoes on US soil- keep up the good work New Balance!)?It it better to physically go to the bank that employs 20 or so of your neighbors who, in turn, buy from the local grocers, attend local theater, and pay taxes to support the local schools, than it is to get an extra tenth of a % on your savings account and enjoy the convenience of using an online bank?
The decisions we make do matter, in life and in business. Whether you’re buying goods, or recruiting staff, remember this: There are always unintended consequences for every action. Will your actions more likely produces positive unintended consequences, or negative?
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