Wang - The resume is dead : how to use new media to land your dream job

ISBN: 978-0-615-58967-1

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This book is dedicated to my parents and sister for their incredible support.

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Table of Contents:

What Does Matt Know That We Dont?

One summer day, Matt Epstein applied to 20 different companies on LinkedIn to find work. He waited.

And waited.

He never heard back a single response. Fear began to creep in.

He couldnt find a job because of one simple reason: He was blending in with the masses.

Panic began to race through his mind. Maybe I dont know what Im doing. Seriously, what the hell am I doing here?

He took a deep breath, stepped back and assessed the situation.

And then a stroke of genius hit him.

He was going to be bold. Inspiring. Outrageous. Awkward. Funny. Unbelievable.

It was in this moment Matt Epstein created the most viral and successful job campaign of our lives.
Googlepleasehire.me was born.

By the time his campaign was finished, he had amassed these results:

Received 80 interview offers from companies like Google, Salesforce.com, Microsoft, Amazon, Etsy and SigFig (among many more)

R eceived over 400,000 unique visits and 720,000 page views for www.googlepleasehire.me

Received 36,000% increase in visitor traffic for his personal blog www.matthew-epstein.com

Received over 450,000 YouTube views

Received 20,000 Facebook Likes, 4,800 Tweets and 4,100 Google +s

Received over 3,300 new Twitter followers

Received over 20 offers to monetize his brand/viral success

Received over 550 LinkedIn requests and e-mails

Received and personally responded to over 2,000 e-mails from people all across the world thanking him, wishing him luck and giving him words of encouragement

Received print, online and TV coverage across the world. From TV news appearances in Atlanta and San Francisco to online news articles in TechCrunch, Gizmodo, Hacker News, UOL (the biggest newspaper in Brazil), Sueddeutsche (a big newspaper in Germany) all the way to Social Media Berlin where hell be used as a social media case study. Theres literally dozens upon dozens of other articles and interviews as well (Washington Post, Wall Street Journal)

How is it that Matt was able to get publicity from just about every big name media outlet, generate a massive fan base and garner 80 interview offers from top tier, innovative companies while so many of us have to beg for a single interview?

What does Matt Epstein know that we dont?

Its simple really.

Matt acknowledged one fundamental fact

The Resume is Dead

Weve become zombies.

Mustknowsomeonetogetajob

Mustsubmitapaperresume

Mustusecoverlettertemplates

Since the day we were born, our schools and colleges have brainwashed us to live in a standardized world. Nearly everything you can imagine was standardized. From textbooks, lessons, and tests to our personalities and even our creativity.

We mindlessly march to the orders of being on time, getting our homework done and scoring high on tests, only to find that in the real world this is far from enough to prepare us for a successful career.

Theyve taught us that if we follow the rules, well get the dream job weve always asked for. And year after year, so many of us continue to follow these rules like a sea of mindless zombies.

The rules were:

• Get good grades (as close to 4.0 GPA please!)
• Write a resume (that looks like everyone elses)
• Submit it to a company (online or in person)
• Interview
• Rinse and repeat with multiple companies
• Cross your fingers and hope someone hires you

Admit it, youve gone through this process before, havent you? Its not hard to understand why. After all, its easy (and we all love the big red easy button dont we?). But thats exactly why its ineffective. Its so easy that everyone does it . And by following these rules, youve put yourself squarely among the masses.

Mass is boring. Mass is typical. Mass is average.

Guess what.

It pays to be different.

If you want to land your dream job, youve got to think outside the box.

How about writing a blog thats so compelling that readers pass it onto their friends?

How about filming a funny YouTube video on why youre the best fit for the job?

How about telling your story through a website?

Recruiters are yearning to hear a unique story they can tell their friends about. In the era of Youtube, Twitter, and Facebook, these stories are told faster than ever before.

People want to be wowed. People want to be entertained. People want to be inspired.

Out with the mundane and in with the extraordinary. Let go of all the traditional information youve been told about job hunting. Disregard the robotic cover letter templates. Toss out the incredibly boring resumes that fail to tell your story. Its time to come to terms with understanding how the world works for those that are extraordinary.

The era of the resume is officially over.

The resume is dead.

The Rules Have Changed

The job hunting process described above was a decent method for landing your dream job years ago !

The problem today is that EVERYONE is doing it this way.

Why?

Well, its because this is the way its always been taught at most major college institutions. When I first went to the career center, I received a pamphlet outlining how to write a resume. And that was extent of the job-hunting advice I received. Fantastic. (Note the dripping sarcasm)

Have you tried the traditional job hunting approach recently? Because if you did, it probably went something like this:

Youve spent hours poring over your resume scanning each and every word. Times New Roman font. Check. Size 12. Check. 1 inch spacing on each side. Check. Name at the top with your contact information. Check. A list of your work experience in chronological order. Check. Your education, grade point average, and extra curricular activities like volunteering at the local hospital. Check, check and check.

You think to yourself, This resume is golden theres no way I wont get hired!

Or so you think.

And then the applying begins.

You eagerly scour websites of companies you want to work for and begin firing off copies of your resume online like a carnival game . This job looks remotely interesting . BAM! A generic resume gets sent out! This job looks like itd pay decently. BAM! Another one. Gosh, Im running out options, Ill take anything at this point. BAM! And it just keeps on going.

You feel like youre in a great rhythm, heck youve sent out 15 resumes in ONE day!

And then you wait. And wait. And wait. And nothing happens.

Want to know why?

Your online resume is among potentially THOUSANDS of other electronic documents floating in a companys online database

How the heck can you differentiate yourself when that happens?

Guess what? Everyone is pulling from the exact same set of 10 resume templates you find in a Google search (admit it, youve done this or copied a friends resume format before)!

And thats the problem in this electronic database more often than not - youre just a number, a set of bits and bytes to the company. John Smith becomes resume #450,342 in the database. Oh boy.

What happens when you stick thousands of resumes together in a single pile?

They all begin to look the same.

And you end up sitting there in front of your computer, praying and hoping the HR person searches for the specific keywords that would cause your resume to show up (along with many others).