Finding a job can be hard, especially if you are an independent contractor. You want your resume to stand out in the crowd, but how do you do that? These experts give their advice on how to get your resume at the very top of the pile. They’ve used these tips themselves and have become success stories!
Robin Smith, CEO and Co-founder of WeGoLook has these great ideas for you to use!
- Translate your experience into real-life skills. Many tasks with WeGoLook require you to professionally meet with an on-site contact and complete detailed requirements of the task. These skills easily translate to: excellent customer service, strong attention to detail, etc.
- Include your licenses and certifications. Even if it doesn’t relate to the position, including licenses, such as being a notary, could give you the edge to other candidates during the interview process. Don’t leave these important skills off your resume that you may have picked up doing some gig work.
- Don’t be afraid to include contract work. Group your contract work together, whether you are an Uber driver, rent out your home for Airbnb or are a Looker for WeGoLook, it shows you are able to multi-task and successfully plan your day.Talk about the important skills you learned from each of the tasks.
Bianca Jackson, Career Happiness Expert has these tips!
- In the professional summary, include the years of experience you’ve spent practicing your specialty and highlight the relevant industries where you performed the work. In 6-8 seconds, a hiring professional will get a sense of the type of work you do, how long you’ve been doing it, and for whom.
- Place a short, 1-sentence description of the listed company underneath each company name. It gives the reader context if the company is small or not well known.
- Highlight your key accomplishments and include metrics for each contract position. You want to show that you’re an asset and the candidate to hire for the contract.
Dave DiVerniero from Black Chip Studios has this bit of advice:
- ‘Freelance’ on a resume tells me exactly nothing. List some of your more impressive clients and mention what type of projects you worked on. For longer term contracts (over a year), give it its own job line.
- No one is reading the cover letter of a freelancer. So instead of gassing on your job heroics, create 3 to 5 bullet points with your highest job achievements. If you’re responding to a listing, these should address the requirements stated in the listing.
- Independent Contractors don’t get a learning curve. You should be able to prove you can do the job a client is asking you to do with no on-boarding. If you are questionable on a required skill, don’t apply.
And last but not least, we have these helpful tips from Mike McRitchie, Career and Small Business Strategist
- Keep a diary – noting your accomplishments or items of note, while you’re in a job or working in a contract role, is critical. You should be doing that at least quarterly (you can work on it in parallel with preparing for your annual review). You can keep a text file going or send yourself emails and file them away in a “Career” file for later use. But if you don’t log it you won’t remember it six or 12 months later.
- Make each word earn its place on the page. Like any good movie, you must aggressively cut anything that doesn’t contribute to your story and sell the hiring manager or purchaser on saying “yes” to you. Only the best words and best accomplishments will make your final draft.
- Find the “golden thread” that ties together your skills, expertise, and accomplishments. Often you have a sense of this but can’t put your finger on it. This is where using outside assistance is critical.. You can start with family, friends, coworkers. But ultimately this is where having a trained professional resume writer or coach or consultant who can dig in deep into the recesses of your mind will extract the best of the best and help you create your own personal brand. The brand that is crystal clear to anyone reading your resume. And a brand that sells you and what you can do for anyone who hires you.
We hope that these tips give you some ideas on how to spice up your resume and make it easier for you to stand out from the crowd. If you have any other suggestions, please leave a comment!
