Giammatteo - No Mistakes Resumes: How To Write A Resume That Will Get You The Interview

NO MISTAKES RESUMES:

Dont Get Caught in the Moat

Giacomo Giammatteo

Inferno Publishing

2013 Giacomo Giammatteo. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

Inferno Publishing Company

Houston, TX

For more information about this book visit: nomistakes.org

Edition ISBNs

Trade Paperback 978-1-940313-00-9

E-book 978-1-940313-01-6

Cover design by Maria Zannini of Book Cover Diva

Book design by Christopher Fisher

This edition was prepared by The Editorial Department

7650 E. Broadway, #308, Tucson, Arizona 85710

www.editorialdepartment.com

Check out these Mystery/Suspense novels by Giacomo Giammatteo.

Friendship & Honor Series:

Murder Takes Time

Murder Has Consequences

Blood Flows South Series:

A Bullet For Carlos

Finding Family (a novella, June, 2013)

Redemption Series:

Old Wounds (August, 2013)

Acknowledgments

The tough part of writing a book is not the writing, its all the stuff that comes after that. Ill take credit for the writing. For the tough parts I am honor bound to thank the following:

My great copyeditor, Annette Lyon, from Precision Editing Group.

A fantastic graphic designer, Maria Zannini, for the book cover.

Christopher Fisher from The Editing Department, for the amazing layout and formatting.

And most importantly the army of beta readers who worked overtime to help me get this book into shape:

Rose, Aliza, Missy, Paul, Seeley James, John Maynard, Woody, Otto and Ries.

Special thanks to my grandsons, Joey and Dante. And grazie mille to my niece, Emiliana, who kept me company and shared coffee with me on many late nights.

Lastly, to my wife, Mikki, who puts up with all of my nonsense. Without her, these books wouldnt be worth writing.

Ti amo con tutto il mio cuore.

Note to readers:

Ive seen resume books that were hundreds of pages long. Im sure you have, too. You might wonder why this one is fewer than 100 pages. Ill tell you whywriting resumes is not that complicated. It isnt quantum physics.

You might also be wondering if this book can help you. There are no guarantees in life, but Im confident that if you follow the advice in this book, youll end up getting more interviews. You wont get all of them, but you should get more than you did before.

With that said, if you read this and feel there was something left out, or something you would have liked covered in more detail, email me and let me know. I read all my emails and I consider all suggestions when looking at updates.

Contents

Introduction

I KNOW WHAT YOURE THINKING why should I buy this book? What is it going to do for me ?

This book has one purpose: to teach you how to write a great resume. A resume that wont get thrown in the trash, a resume that will help you get the interview .

This book challenges a lot of preconceived notions about resume writing. Many how-to books offer a variety of templates for writing resumes. Here we focus on one way: the perfect resume, the one gatekeepers wont dump in the trash.

Ive been a headhunter for more than thirty years, which means that Ive screened, scanned, skimmed, and perused tens of thousands of resumes. I learned a lot during those years, but the one thing that has stuck with me most is the frustration of seeing the same mistakes over and over again. I understand how much people struggle with resume writing. If youre writing one, it goes without saying that this is a trying time in your life, and youre probably filled with anxiety. The last thing you need is mistakes in your resume. Unfortunately, this is when mistakes show up the most.

The frustration for me was knowing the problem is so easily fixed, so I decided to do something about it. This book is the result.

Im going to be critical, but its all geared toward helping you. So put on your thick skin. Arm yourself with a shield if you need to, but lets work through this together. Well come out with the perfect resume.

This book is about language as much as it is about writing a resume; the two go hand in hand. Resumes and cover letters are where communication seems to fall apart. Sentences become bloated, words are misused, and ideas deteriorate. The lessons in this book will show you how to spot these problems and how to correct them.

Whats the harm in a few extra words, you ask? When you are trying to pare (not pear or pair ) your experience down to two pages that have impact , every word counts. More on that later.

Another thing youll notice are side comments after certain words, as the example above with pare shows. These are words that I often see misused or questionably used on resumes and cover letters.

So if youre ready to construct the perfect resume, one that wont get thrown in the trash, lets move on.

No Mistakes Resumes:

Dont Get Caught in the Moat

W HY IS THIS BOOK SUBTITLED Dont Get Caught in the Moat? Writing a resume is hard, and while I was thinking of difficult things, storming castles came to mind. I imagined a medieval castle surrounded by a deep moat, with a gatekeeper wielding a sword and knocking job seekers off the drawbridge.

Play along with that concept, and Ill introduce you to the cast.

Gatekeeper First guardian of the castle. Defender of the moatalso called Rose. She is the director of human resources for the castle. For those of you who may be wondering, I have a sister named Rose, who happens to be a director of HR. Other than that, they have nothing in common. (Except physical appearance, manner of speech, and they both say jackass a lot. A whole lot).

Me Narrator. Headhunter supreme. Always opinionated. Never wrong.

You the candidate for the job, aka the relentless one, slayer of dragons, savior of worlds, castle-storming knight-in-armorand sometimes reduced to humble job seeker.

Wastebasket How can a wastebasket be a character? In this story, anything can happen; in fact, the wastebasket is a primary character.

Now that you have been introduced to the main cast, lets get started.

Special note: At times you may think I come across a little sarcastic (or even a lot sarcastic) and that some of my examples and admonishments are harsh. I use this tone for one reason: to make a point. I want nothing more than for each and every one of you to have a perfect resume. Following the examples in this book will help you achieve that goal.

The Purpose of a Resume

N OW THAT WEVE FINALLY STARTED, lets review what you already know.

Ive seen people at the end of their rope, not understanding why they werent called in for an interview when they know they fit the job perfectly. Theyre clueless that their resume, the one they thought was magnificent, is the culprit that kept them from getting the interview.

Have you ever wondered how certain movies become blockbusters, doing in excess of a billion dollars in sales, when your favorite show languishes and doesnt even earn enough to cover production costs? Or how a book becomes a bestseller when it seems like it was written by an imbecile? Its the same reason why the most qualified person doesnt always get the job offer. You have to know how to sell yourself.

You may be surprised at the process; most interviews dont happen because the resume is so compelling it convinces a gatekeeper that she has to see this person. Most interviews are the result of the last man standing principle. ( Not principal) Whats that, you ask? Its the process whereby the gatekeeper trashes intelligently screens out all the other resumes, and the few remaining ones get interviews.