Resolution: Update Your Resume

Article, Kiplinger's Personal Finance, December 17th

The main theme at this time of year tends to be centered on rebirth and rejuvenation. Yes, its time for us to all start thinking about those New Year's resolutions. In a recent article from Kiplingers' Personal Finance, author Kimberly Lankford suggested that while recovering from the excesses of the holiday season, you might want to make it a tradition to revisit your resume each January.

Most of us have been faced with the challenge of updating our resume at the last minute. Career opportunities don't always pick convenient times to present themselves. Reworking your resume under time constraints sometimes hinders you from putting your best foot forward. By spending some time with your resume each year, you can spend more time molding it in a way that best represents you.

In her article, Lankford interviewed a man who lost his job right around the New Year. He had just gone through a job search and had the following helpful resume building hints: These days, most companies accept and prefer electronic resumes. Because some employers won't take the time to open attachments, it can sometimes be useful to have a resume that is formatted properly as plain email text.

Some employers get so many resumes that they do keyword searches to find the resumes that match a specific job. If you wanted that job but did not include certain key words, your resume might never be looked at. One way to avoid falling through the cracks is to look at the keywords used in a job posting. Make sure to include those keywords somewhere in your resume. Customizing your resume for each job application is a good idea. It may take a bit more time, but landing the perfect job will more than make up for the effort.