Resume & Cover Letter Advise

Remember that the government official reading your resume is probably pressed for time, so keep your resume short and fill it with information that will make your experience relevant to the position in question.

Here are some useful tips to keep in mind while preparing a government resume.

Focus on the following:
• Accomplishments
• Areas of expertise
• Skills
• Certifications

Job Objective:
• Your job target must be clear as you develop your government resume.
• Create a brief headline that describes your career goal.
• List your qualifications.

Summarize:
• Summarize your qualifications and strengths in the top half of the first page of the resume under sections like "Professional Profile" and the "Areas of Expertise".
• Include your industry certifications and licenses.
• List keywords that are pertinent to your career choice.

Emphasize your accomplishments:
• Describe your basic job responsibilities and accomplishments.
• Show the results of your work.

Remember
• Your resume must be relevant for the specific position you are applying for.
• Demonstrate your strengths in the resume through job experiences, academic background, or volunteer/community activities.
• Always put your best selling points first.
• Do not misrepresent yourself or exaggerate; employers check information.
• Keep the resume short and clear.
• Make the resume easy to read. Avoid a cluttered look. Leave spaces between sections. Use headings to organize the details. Leave out irrelevant information and re-write until you think it is crisp and accurate.
• Instead of long paragraphs, distill the matter by creating bulleted, indented, focused statements. Short, powerful lines show the reader, in a glance, exactly why they should keep reading.
• Use the keywords pertinent to your job profile.
• Connect your skills to your job history.

Successful companies rely heavily on their Human Resources Department and the individuals that work there. The job responsibilities of the human resource professional are varied and include, but are not limited to, the hiring of new employees, dealing with labor disputes, compensation and benefits programs, union and labor relations and more. Human resource professionals must also, at times, play the role of counselor by offering assistance to employees dealing with personal issues, so as an HR employee you must also know how to interact on a personal level as well. A good human resources resume will reflect all of these responsibilities and roles and demonstrate that you have a clear understanding of how to handle them.

Creating an Effective Human Resources Resume
Your human resources resume should demonstrate your knowledge and understanding of HR policies and how they affect a business’ missions and goals. Your resume should highlight your understanding of your job responsibilities as an HR professional and the responsibilities that you have already had in this capacity. You can make your resume stand out by emphasizing more than just the responsibilities you have had and showing how your services truly benefited the organization under which you were employed.

Resume Titles:
Possible resume titles you may want to consider include HR, HR assistant, HR director, human resources manager, human resources generalist, payroll supervisor, staffing manager, human resource specialist, HRIS analyst, HR benefits analyst, personnel supervisor, recruiter, personnel representative, executive recruiter, benefits coordinator, human resources coordinator, director of recruiting, compensation analyst.

When designing your resume, you can help yourself specify your achievements and clarify your understanding of the job by considering the following:
• Did you initiate or develop a new HR policy or procedure?
• Was there a notable improvement in employee retention or satisfaction as a result of your job performance?
• Did you contribute in any way to improving morale in the company?
• Were you instrumental in improving the benefits program or in launching new employee benefits?
• Did you implement any effective strategies for screening and recruitment?
• Did you play a role in any HR systems that noticeably enhanced efficiency in the department?
• Did you play a role in training new or existing staff? If so, how many people did you train?
• Were you responsible for any organizational development initiatives, such as assisting in the integration of two organizations after an expansion, merger, or downsizing?
• What responsibilities did you have in special projects?
• Did you participate in any leadership initiatives with positive results?

How To Write A Great Resume

Your resume is the most important tool you can use to land a job. This means you must take great care in preparing it. Here are some tips to help you.

• Design your resume so that it is eye catching.
• Keep your resume concise. Avoid lengthy descriptions of projects of which you were only a member of the team.
• Check and proofread your resume after you have written it. Your resume must contain no spelling or grammatical errors.
• List your qualifications in order of relevance, from most to least. Only list your degree and educational qualifications first if they are truly relevant to the job for which you are applying. If you've already done what you want to do in a new job, by all means, list it first, even if it wasn't your most recent job. Abandon strict adherence to a chronological ordering of your experience.
• Make sure your resume is ‘aimed’ at the job you are applying for.
• Identify key words in the job ad and use these keywords in your resume.
• Create your image so that it matches the salary you are expecting.
• List your technical knowledge in an organized way. Your strengths must stand out clearly at the beginning of your resume.
• Don’t be shy about your experience. Cite numerical figures, such as monetary budgets/funds saved, time periods/efficiency improved, lines of code written/debugged, numbers of machines administered/fixed, etc. All these show progress and accomplishments due to your work.
• Use action verbs. Portray yourself as someone who is active, uses their brain, and gets things done. Use the past tense, even for descriptions of currently held positions, to avoid confusion.
• Don't sell yourself short. Your resume is your best advertisement.
• If you're over 50 or 60, remember that you don't have to present your entire work history. You can simply label that part of your resume "Recent Work History" or "Relevant Work History" and then describe only the last 10 or 15 years of your experience.
• Don't go too far back in your work history. About 10 or 15 years is usually enough - unless your "juiciest" work experience is from farther back.
• What if you never had any "real" paid jobs? Give yourself credit, and create an accurate, fair job-title for yourself.

The company closed down. It was all very civilized. I wasn’t fired or replaced or downsized or made redundant. It had nothing to do with me. They never even bother to consult me on the matter!

But now, all of a sudden, it is my business and I’m right in the middle. I have to find a new job. What I dread and hate the most. I have to get super-organized. I have to open a list of companies I have applied to. I have to list my contacts and their contacts. And I have to update my resume.

Perhaps the most important item in this exercise is the resume. It must be neat and all items and especially names, must be correctly spelled. It must be modern looking and up to date. It must be truthful - don’t forget that the interviewer may check out your information. The format should be simple and plain, but it should highlight your accomplishments.

You need to write a cover letter to go with the resume, and the resume, cover letter and envelope should all be on the same matching paper. The font should be clear and easy to read and in an easily readable font. I make everything in size 12 New Times Roman.

Use positive words to describe your skills. Make the document ‘reek’ of confidence. Your resume should be one page only. Present the information as concisely as possible. There will be a place in the cover letter, and possibly an interview, to elaborate on your skills. Resumes that are too long are often put aside because employers simply don't have the time to read them. The information must be relevant to the position you are applying for. Do not forget to attach your cover letter.

There are sites on the internet where you can find ideas about the format of your resume. Outline your skills to show your best accomplishments. The categories that you include on your resume must be relevant to the position for which you are applying.

Skills: List some of the things you do reasonably well that are relevant to the position. Are you going for a position as a teacher's aid? List the duties you had in baby-sitting or list the duties you undertook while tutoring. If you have worked as a volunteer, list that experience as well.

References: Say that you will furnish these upon request. But be prepared with a list of three to five people that have consented to give you a recommendation. Include those who are familiar with your work as it relates to the position.

Finally the resume is about selling yourself. Give them just enough information to make them call you for more details.

When people ask if they must send their resume with a cover sheet, I stress how important this is. Many employers won't even consider resumes without cover sheets these days. Then I go on to tell them how important it is to write a good letter to send with their resume. There’s not much point in sending off a great resume with a hopelessly written cover letter.

So how does one write a good cover sheet for a resume? To make sure you have the greatest prospects in securing that new job, read this guide on how to write a good cover sheet for a resume?

The requirement of a cover sheet for the resume is relatively new and has become necessary through the increasing complexity of the job market. Cover sheets have even became vital when applying for some jobs, with employers requiring a cover sheet before even considering your resume.

A cover sheet must include several items of information.
o Your name.
o The position number and/or position code of the job you are applying for.
o The name of the position you are applying for.
o The date you are available to begin employment
o Your signature of acknowledgement.

Go for it!