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Creating a “Best You” Resume’

Presenting the picture of you to a potential employer requires a careful, accurate and quantifiable selection of words that will pique their interest and provide connections to their need and purpose for hiring you.  Many times over the past several months I have referenced the importance of measuring natural ability. In so doing, it is possible to quantify characteristics which are valued by employers and most especially in today’s job market.

Just as there are jobs that no longer exist, the words once highly effective in resumes have also changed.  There was a great article on MSN Careers about writing an eye-catching resume’.  Click here to read the article.  Click here if you want to know more about measuring your natural abilities.

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Shortchanging Ourselves

If you sat down and began identifying the dreams and goals you have had, what would you list?  How many have you achieved?  Now think about you today and what goals or dreams you have for your future?

In one of the presentations that I make for career directions, I address the importance of having, writing and achieving goals.  Edgar Mays said, “Failure is not, not reaching your goal, but in having no goal to reach.”  I find it interesting that statistically, the majority of the population does not write goals and yet research has proven that writing goals significantly increases our achievement rate.  Just look at the number of weight loss programs advertised on TV and what they offer.  They are centered on a goal, baseline data, a set of strategies and a monitoring plan.  Success ensues as long as the plan is realistic and maintenance and monitoring occur.  But all too often success is diminished because the plan is not maintained or monitored.  Goals must be realistic, updated and the rest of the plan accordingly.

Now transfer that same rationale to career direction or anything we do in life that we want to improve upon.  A friend, great golfer and talented Mind and Sports Performance Coach says it this way, “We can become afraid to raise the bar and set high expectations for ourselves so that we don’t have to feel the frustration and disappointment of what we mistakenly think of as failure.  We can also set unreasonably high standards that we don’t really believe to be true and sabotage our efforts by becoming very unkind toward ourselves.  Fear only exists because we don’t believe that we have the power inside of us to achieve absolutely anything that we want and desire through the power of the Mind.  If we knew beyond a doubt that we could direct our focus, imagination and intention to create anything we wanted, we would never be afraid again.” – Tim Kremer  www.myspiritofgolf.com

Creating the best you requires that you reflect on your own achievements, goals, talents, dreams and fears.  Creating the best you requires a commitment to writing a plan.  Have you shortchanged yourself by not having goals or giving in to fear of failure?   What’s stopping you today?

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Creating the Best You

George Bernard Shaw once said, “Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.”  I would never argue with Mr. Shaw, but I would certainly modify and apply his quote to the current college and career market and say this,

                 “College isn’t about finding yourself; it is about understanding yourself and creating your best life.”

That being said, there are two questions that follow:  Why isn’t college about finding yourself and how does one better understand them self and create a “best life”?

 Twenty years ago, students could go off to college with no specific career goal and spend four years finding themselves while acquiring a degree in the process.  But in the last twenty years, the cost of college has increased 163% and the average household income has increased only 23% according to College Board and the National Bureau of Labor Statistics.  It is no longer “affordable” to go off and “find” yourself at college.

Today, understanding yourself and creating your “best life” means investing in yourself.  Getting a college degree or attending a trade school are investments in yourself.  But those investments need to be directed.  Would you simply hand your savings over to an individual and say, “Do whatever you like”?  No!  You would give them a directive to be aggressive or conservative with your investment.  So in creating your best life, you need to have the tools and the plan just like a professional who invests your savings uses tools and has a plan to help you achieve your financial goals.

You can choose to continue on a path of uncertainty or you can choose to direct your path, invest in your future, and create your best life.  Creating that life doesn’t happen by accident or by default.  It happens because you make informed choices about how to spend your valuable time and resources.  That investment may include a career direction specialist, use of specific tools that measure natural abilities, interests and values, and guidance by a professional in creating a plan that helps to define and direct your life goals.

Creating the best you requires an investment.  What are you willing to invest in yourself or a loved one to be able to define and direct a career direction?  Contact me if you would like to know more, or make a comment below if you have had a great experience Creating the Best You!