As a manager and executive over the past twenty years I have read thousands of resumes, looked at countless online resources, and hired hundreds of people to work for me, my fellow executives or for others in the organization. Unsurprisingly, I get a lot of people coming my way looking for work. I am, however, surprised at how often their “hiring persona” is in shambles. If you want your best foot forward in the hiring process you must be prepared with sharpened tools from both the offline and online worlds.

What is one’s “hiring persona”? It used to be your resume, your interviews and any references you provided. Today it is your resume, anything that can be found about you online, your interviews and the backdoor references that are readily found using online tools.

Online

Your online professional persona means a lot these days. It may be how you are found in the first place. Or it may be where your would-be recruiter or hiring manager stops looking at you and moves on to the next candidate. Bottom line: you should know what it is. Google yourself.

Some things you cannot control, such as old, cached company web bios or press releases (for you execs out there), articles about you or work you have done, and public records (e.g. court records). If there are questionable items, the best defense is a good offense. Be prepared to address these items up front. Do not take the chance that no one will ask. If they call you on it, you will be on the defensive and will look like you’re on the defensive. That is tough to overcome. If you lead with it you get to control the conversation and can get past it with more aplomb.

Every recruiter uses LinkedinThen there are things you can control. Every recruiter uses Linkedin. We go there to do primary research (who is the CFO of company XYZ), to find back-door references or to see how your online resume stacks up to your offline. If you are a business professional, you should be on Linkedin. Further, your Linkedin profile should match your resume. Less detail, but each job title, every company, the dates, etc. should all be there. Anything inconsistent will raise a flag. There are other professional networking sites but they are far less traveled. If you are on them, make them consistent with your Linkedin profile and your resume. There are also the Facebook/MySpace-like social sites. I will cover these with the following: Do not put anything a) incriminating, or b) idiotic out there. We have all read the horror stories, yet they keep on coming.

Resume

The resume is not new, but given how they have been around forever as the primary written record of your work, and their style and substance has been critiqued and analyzed ad nauseum, you would think people would take more care. Here is my short-list of tips and you can find many others online.

• Typos and grammatical errors are indefensible yet I find them all the time. Have a family member and a few friends read your resume or pay to have a pro read it (but not one of those useless resume mills – ProfessionalSourcing offers this service, by the way). Use someone known to have credible written English skills and solid real-world business experience. After you get them to review it then have someone else review it. You should also use spell and grammar check on your word processor. It takes an extra five minutes but can save you from a bad first impression.
• Be sure to use the final version of your resume. I have seen people send out resumes with Microsoft Word’s Track Changes or Revisions turned on so I can see all the latest changes in red.
• Objective: keep it short and do not use a mash-up of hackneyed, generic business terms which state the obvious: “I want a great job at a great company so that I may expand my copious skills and contribute to a great organization…”. Make it direct and to the point.
• Company information: that blurb next to the name of each company where you have worked. Keep it brief, but do not forget about it. Without it I feel off-balance reading the accomplishments because there is no context. Many folks include four or six sentences and some include nothing other than the company name. I believe you can get enough context in one sentence. For example, “XYZ, Inc.: ~100 person venture-backed producer of hardware and a service for TV-based consumer video-on-demand.” A second sentence may be appropriate if you worked for a Division or Business Unit which requires further introduction.
• Dates: Please include the month. We all know that there are usually perfectly good reasons for gaps between jobs on your resume. Do not make me assume the worst by not showing the months where you may have been between jobs. And please don’t tell me you were at Burning Man.
• Titles: Include every job title at every company. It is hard to know how you came through the ranks if you don’t show your career progression. I, for one, like knowing that you spent time as a Cost Accountant or a Financial Analyst. It tells me that you have (or should have) a very solid foundation in those areas. Those of us who actually spent time in industry (a very few of us in the recruiting biz) will ask about obvious gaps and then you will trip over yourself explaining their absence. Be proud of your early experiences. Make sure you translate any unusual titles into common references, such as “Director of First Impressions” = “Front desk admin”)
• Bullets: Up to five per job. You get three accomplishment bullets and one groundwork bullet. I call that last one the “scale of operation” bullet. It is where you say, “Managed team of six direct and thirty-four indirect reports, responsible for all areas of the monthly accounting close and financial reporting.” All other bullets should be accomplishments. Do not say what you were “responsible for”, say what you did to further your company’s business. Highlights would include ways in which you significantly affected: revenue, operating expenses, completed high-profile projects, M&A or strategic transactions, product launches and fundraising or other significant events. Use numbers wherever possible and make sure they have context. Do not say, “Increased sales 15%” with no other details. We need some other coordinate to do the math. So include the start and/or end points so we can determine whether you were a big part of a big number or a small part of a small number (in which case you may want to drop that bullet).
• Length: Two pages max for anyone but engineers (they get three pages for the litany of technical skills and projects). I don’t believe in the one page resume for those who have been senior managers or executives. Unless I can find out everything I need to know about you in the pages of Businessweek or Wired, I find that a bit more detail is necessary to get a feel for what you actually did at those companies. The one page resume is a conceit only a few of the most storied executives can afford. By creating a one page resume you are forcing the recruiter/hiring manager to research you and unless they know who you are they simply may not want to bother or may be put off. Given how many people vie for each position, do not assume you are the only candidate of note.
• Education: Don’t forget your minors. List majors, minors, and major accomplishments, e.g. summa cum laude, or President of XYZ. These things tell one a lot about a candidate. Occasionally I see a credential without an institution listed. What were they thinking?
• Activities: This can go either way. It can add some flavor and tell us something about you that is germane to your work persona (Boston Marathon = driven) or it can be TMI, that is: “Too Much Information”. Use good judgment and when in doubt, leave it out.

Overall, keep it tight and make sure it is a catalog of how you helped your companies create value.

Interview

If you don’t bother with the research, don’t waste the company's timeInterview prep is so easy these days. Take advantage of the wealth of online data surrounding most companies. For all but the most hidden companies you can readily find out what they do, who backed them, who is on the board, who the leaders are and what space they are in (which tells you who their competitors are). There are all sorts of information about what technology underlies the product and whether it’s cool or not. You get the idea. Show that you are truly interested and do your homework. The interviewers will immediately notice you did. They will also immediately notice if you did not. Those interviews are guaranteed to not go well. If you don’t bother with the research, don’t waste their time.

Dress appropriately. If you are an engineer, you know what that means. If you are any of the “professional” functions (finance, sales, HR, etc.) dress at or one level above your audience. Once again, research. If you are using a recruiter they should give you this information.

Get good sleep and be high energy. People gravitate to those with good energy. You can see it in any room full of people and the same holds for interviews.

Always understand the question. Let your interviewer complete their question (no jumping the gun). Then pause. Consider the question. The pause lets them know you are giving your answer due thought and it will emphasize your words when you speak. Then be succinct. Interviews can be nerve-wracking and some people handle (or don't handle) nerves by over-communicating. Avoid this by applying energy towards economy with your communication.

Look them in the eye when talking.

Don’t blow the deal during the “casual conversation” that you have at the start and end of your interview. Be friendly but don’t relax too much. Every word is being evaluated. I have given many interviews where the candidate put themselves out of contention before we got through the first five minutes.

References

I like to see references from two bosses, one peer and one person who reported to you (if you are a manager). Bring good ones, but expect that they won’t be the only ones used. Even if you don’t have your own Linkedin profile, it is very easy to find others on Linkedin from your past companies and even in your very department. There is every chance that your old managers will be contacted. You might want to prepare your managers from the past half-dozen or so years. It is good to keep them in the loop on your job search regardless, as they may be able to help you within their own networks. This will also prepare them should they get that surprise call.

Summary

That is my overview of the new world of recruiting. There are many articles out there with different insights and angles, but this is one executive-turned-recruiter's opinion and I hope you find it useful. Recruiters and hiring managers are fully wired and you should be as well. Use all of this data and technology to your advantage and you will be one step ahead of the competition for your next job.