The Shimmering Careers Blog

Create Your Brand When it Counts the Most As a sales and marketing professional are you prepared to promote yourself with an effective resume that will land you an interview? The average human resources manager spends less than 30 seconds reviewing a sales resume before deciding to keep it or throw it away. Needless to say, the vast majority of resumes end up in the trashcan. In the current job market, your skills do not matter if no one reads your marketing resume. “Your bra

For special situations, such as gaps in your career or frequent moves from one job to another, your resume and cover letter have to work overtime. You have to handle your resume in the right way, and you have to make especially good use of your cover letter. If you do that, you’ll keep your application in the running, and that’s your goal: Just get one step further down the road to an offer. Employment History Gaps There are gaps—and there are gaps. Not every period of unempl

There’s a skills gap in today’s mid-pandemic job market. Companies are struggling to attract applicants who have the skills they need. If you keep that situation in mind, there are ways to use the skills gap to your benefit in a job interview. You can also gain some leverage even if you don’t already have the specific skills that are on the wish list of an employer. You don’t have to be the perfect candidate. You do have to consider why they want to see you and what that mean

Your resume is the best supporting actor in your interview presentation for several reasons. But here I have a chance to emphasize the single thing that’s most important in eliciting the performance of a lifetime from that supporting actor. It’s a resume tip that bears repeating, especially because it works so well as a template for a great interview. Without further ado, here it is: A good resume is one that emphasizes achievements, and a great resume happens when those ach

Consider a Hybrid Most resumes follow a reverse-chronological format. This is a great way to showcase steady experience in the same field. For people reentering the workforce or changing fields, this structure may not be perfect. An alternative is a functional resume that highlights skills and achievements first. However, there’s a problem with the functional resume that you need to understand: Rightly or wrongly, some hiring managers view it with suspicion. They like the id

Elon Musk buys Twitter, immediately imposes massive layoffs, tells those employees who remain that they’d better adopt hard-core, I live for my work habits, and mires the service in next-level controversy as soon as he walks in the door. Meanwhile, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg tells his staff en masse that company growth is slowing, that they’ll have to do more with less and, by the way, that those who think the world of Meta is not for them should act on that sentiment and head ou

This year, I’ve been working with a growing number of clients who are actively considering or already in the midst of changing careers. If you are contemplating such a shift, rest assured, you’re not alone. Career transitions are a normal part of the professional journey. When writing a resume for a career change, in general, I focus on highlighting transferable skills, relevant experiences, and the capacity for adaptability. No matter the industry or job title, there are ski

Ah, the ever-evolving English language! Just when you thought your resume was polished to perfection with action verbs and quantifiable achievements, along comes "rizz" – the Oxford Word of the Year for 2023, originally coined by a Twitch streamer. For those of you who've been too busy tailoring your cover letters to keep up with Gen Z lingo, "rizz" refers to an individual's style, charm, or attractiveness, particularly in the context of wooing romantic interests. But the bur

In today’s competitive job market, hiring managers are seeing something curious: a flood of resumes that, despite coming from different people, all kind of sound the same. It’s not that they’re poorly written. They’re just generic. The Problem with Polished but Impersonal Thanks to resume builders and AI tools like ChatGPT, it’s never been easier to create a clean-looking, keyword-optimized resume. (Whether “artificial intelligence” is even the right term is debatable; tools

Imagine Sir Paul McCartney, the legendary musician and former member of The Beatles, pursuing a role as a Music Director. How can he quickly demonstrate his expertise in his resume? One effective strategy for Sir Paul is to include an impressive Core Competencies section near the top of his resume document. What is a Core Competencies section and how does it add value to a resume? The Core Competencies section is a valuable tool for job seekers looking to make a strong impres