Career Tips Guides

With every resume submission, you should have a cover letter that accompanies it and presents you as a positive and qualified candidate for the job.

A cover letter should highlight areas of your resume which promote your professional experience, and should address any questions an employer may have about hiring you for the job.

There are 5 common cover letter mistakes outlined below that you must avoid in order to get through the first round of resume review and move one step closer to getting the job that you want.

1.Addressing the cover letter using a generic greeting, or misspelling the name of the personal contact or the company. The address line is the most prominent part of the cover letter; it should be included even if the cover letter is sent via email.

Generic greetings are not favored; they make it seem like you have a template for your cover letter and you simply send it to all employers you are interested in working for. Do the research and find out who the appropriate contact is for the cover letter.

However, make sure that they name and the company name is spelled correctly. If your address line contains errors, your cover letter is likely to never make it to the hiring manager.

2.Telling the company what they can do for your career. Simply stated, employers care about your qualifications and what you can do for the company. Do not spend your time telling the company how working for them can be great for your career. While that could be true, it certainly is not what the employers want to hear.

Your potential employers want to hear how you can benefit their team; they want to know what you can bring to the table that is innovative, and focused on results. Make sure that your resume lets your employer know just why you are the best candidate for the job.

3.You re-state your resume. Do not go over the information that is in your resume in your cover letter. Your cover letter is meant to entice, and provoke the employer to review your resume in great detail.

Re-stating the information in your resume doesn’t address what the employers want to know, which concerns reasons why you are the best candidate for the job. Highlight certain areas of your resume but do so in the context of your career goals and how such qualifications benefit the company.

4.Starting every sentence with “I”. While your cover letter is about you, starting each sentence this way will make your employer believe that your communication skills are not up to the level of your professional background.

Discuss your qualifications, your goals and what you bring to the table in terms of the company, and your professional attributes.

5.Asking the employer to call you at their convenience. The most generic closing statements in cover letters ask the employer to contact you at their convenience. If you are truly excited about the opportunity with the employer, you won’t want to wait for them to call you back whenever they feel like it.

What you should do instead is let them know when you want to follow up and then do follow up. Close your cover letter by letting your potential employer know that you will contact them, as well as the manner in which you will do so. This shows your interest, and your take-charge attitude.

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One of the biggest concerns in creating a resume has to do with your professional experience. Before you begin your resume, consider the following questions.
- What is your career objective?
- Are you changing careers or looking for professional growth?
- What experience have you had so far that will help in meeting your professional goals?

To get started in developing your resume, list all of your previous experience, in chronological order, starting with your latest job on a piece of paper. List the dates of employment, your job title, the full company name and the location of your employment.

Now, consider just how much experience you have had. In recent years, it has become more commonplace to change jobs more frequently and not build your career in one place.

As such, it is possible that someone with ten years of professional experience following college has had over three jobs. That doesn’t seem all that much to include on a resume, right?

Consider someone with over 30 years of experience. It is important to set limits on what you include and what you can freely exclude from your resume under your professional experience.

Ideally, your resume should not exceed two pages. Depending on the type of jobs you have held and your responsibilities, having only two pages doesn’t account for a lot of space. The best practice for listing your experiences is not to exceed the most recent five jobs you have held.

Again, keep the mind the length of the resume when you are deciding on the number of jobs you will list if your last five jobs and their accompanying responsibilities will take over one page alone, than consider narrowing the experience down to the three most recent positions you had.

Also, consider the time you spent at each organization you have worked for list up to the last ten to fifteen years of experience. It is not necessary to list every job you’ve ever had to showcase your qualifications and years of experience.

If you have a long professional career, focus on the last three to five jobs, but use the profile or summary at the beginning of the resume to highlight the number of years you have spent working, or the number of years you have spent in a certain industry, acquiring specific skills.

When listing your experiences, it is important that you do so in chronological order without skipping any of the jobs you have held. While you may feel that certain jobs are not particularly complimenting to your current career objective you should not avoid listing them on your resume.

Work on highlighting the responsibilities that are transferable across various industries. Leaving any unexplained gaps in your work history will raise questions by your potential employer thus don’t create those gaps on your resume by listing your experience out of order or by skipping jobs you have had.

Finally, make sure that your cover letter accounts for any additional qualifications you would like to bring to the attention of your potential employer that you didn’t include on the resume. Your resume should be concise, well written, and sell you as the best candidate for the job. Just remember that it is quality over quantity that counts.

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There is a special style of resumes called Internship resume. As its name implies, this style of a resume composed with a goal of getting an internship in a desired field. While Internship resumes are usually chronological in format, they have different goals than a resume created for purposes of acquiring a full-time professional position.

First, your goal is not furthering your career but gaining experience and skills in order to expand on your education and later obtain a position in the industry.

Second, internships do not require professional experience; this is a way for you to gain such experience so that you can later get a full-time job using what you learned during your internship.

Third, your resume is more focused on your academic achievements than on your work background, because you have to demonstrate that the desired internship is a logical extension of your studies.

With this in mind, college students, new or returning, typically utilize this resume style to get their foot in the door with the companies they may ultimately want to work for after graduation.

Much like any other professional resume, the internship resume should contain an objective. Here you should let your potential employer know how their internship aligns with your studies, what you can bring to the table, what you hope to gain out of the experience and how you will apply your newfound skills once you are out in the professional world.

Essentially you are convincing your potential employer that you are the best candidate for the internship, that you will learn the most and that the experience is critical for your professional growth.

When composing your resume for an internship, you will need to highlight your education first. You should do more than just list your previous degrees or degrees in progress. Point out the classes you have taken that qualify you for the internship. Indicate how your major is in line with the internship and how this experience will help you in your future studies.

After you indicate your objective and your education, list your qualifications. Make a list ahead of time of all skills that qualify you for the internship. Review the list and prioritize it. Most commonly made mistake in resume writing is not prioritizing the information included, so you that your strongest skills fall at the bottom of the list. Consider what qualifies you for the internship. List those qualifications first so that your employer recognizes that you are a great fit for the position.

Your work experience can help, but is typically not a breaking point in getting an internship. If you have any work experience, include it in your resume. Make sure to prioritize your responsibilities as they relate to the internship.

Make sure to indicate any experience you have in sharpening your employability skills, those skills that extend beyond your education and technical abilities such as communication, customer relations, team work, taking charge, etc.

Applying for an internship is somewhat different than applying for a full time job. Along with your internship resume, you will want to submit references. For any employment experience you’ve had to date, include your supervisor’s name, title and contact information so that your employer can obtain recommendations. In addition, it is of great benefit to you to have recommendation letters from your professors.

Your professors can identify your skills in terms of your dedication, worth ethic, enthusiasm, interpersonal communication and interaction with others in your classroom. Employers look for these skills because they want to assure that you will be a good fit for their team, even if your role is a short term one. Ask two or three of your professors for their recommendation.

Provide them with the contact information of your employer, including an email and a physical mailing address, so the letters can be mailed to your potential employer directly. Or, ask your professors to place their recommendation letters into sealed envelopes before giving them to you to assure that the information is confidential. If possible, include your transcripts with your resume. This will be a great indication of your commitment to your education, providing your grades are good. Your transcripts can only help in getting you the internship.

As a final step, proof your application materials. Feel free to seek assistance from your school’s career center. You have only one chance to make a great first impression do it well, and you are sure to get the internship of your choice.

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