Ask Liz: Proof of Income?

Recently I received a job offer that was contingent upon a drug test and credit
check.
It turns out that they now want "proof" of income, and made me send in my w-2
forms from five years back. In addition they asked me to supply a copy of my
school records that showed that I did indeed graduate from College. (A college
degree was not even required for the position)
I feel like my privacy has been invaded, but don't see any other way around
this.
Is it legal?
Sue

-------------------------- LIZ'S REPLY--------------------------

Dear Sue,

It is legal --- and horrendous, and I encourage you to back out of the deal and
walk away. Imagine what it would be like to work for people who have so little
respect for your privacy? Best of luck to you -- Liz

More on boilerplate resume language

So Liz...you leave us hanging. Your observation of the "10 deadliest" only tell us what NOT to do...can you help those of us struggling with how to replace these?

lizryan 8 hours ago
Hiya Dan, there aren't any stock phrases to replace the boilerplate ones we're going to excise from our resumes. We want to be very specific about what we've done, and if we can talk about accomplishments that are especially relevant to the opportunity we're going after, all the better.

Let's think about the resume Summary. Here's a corporatespeak Summary:

"Results-oriented professional with a bottom-line orientation and twenty years of progressively more responsible experience in Finance and Accounting. Superior organizational and communication skills and experience leading cross-functional teams."

Yuck. Let's back up. Who(m) is this resume written for? It doesn't look as though it was written for anyone in particular. It's pure sludge. What sort of job are we going after? There are millions of different types of Finance and Accounting jobs. Our resume plan must start with our job-search direction - otherwise our resume isn't targeted to the audience we're pursuing!

Let's say we're going after Controller jobs in medium-sized manufacturing companies. We have lots of Cost Accounting and manufacturing stuff in our background, so we understand inventory turns, costed products, etc. Why do we like manufacturing so much? Here's why: Dad had a manufacturing company, and we worked there during summers through high school and college. Let's try that Summary again:

=====================================================

Since I helped out in the Accounting department of my dad's manufacturing business during high school, I've been drawn to manufacturing Accounting roles and the points of leverage that smart and nimble analysis can uncover. With six years of manufacturing Accounting for Caterpillar and a bent for spotting and exploiting cost-saving and revenue-boosting opportunities, I'm eager to help Eagle Manufacturing accelerate its growth in the Controller spot.

==================================

Notice that our job-seeker (we'll call him Jack) names the company and the job right in his Summary. Why not? He can tweak his resume every time he applies for a job. He's using a human voice in this Summary (the E-book "Put a Human Voice in Your Resume" is for sale on my site, www.asklizryan.com, if you're interested in that) and talking very specifically about what he's good at, without getting all abstract and lofty a la "I'm a strategic thinker and problem-solver yada yada yada." He's just saying, "Here's me, and this is what gets me up in the morning." Thanks Dan! Liz

On a cover letter, declare intention to solve the pain?

I read your article and think one of your lines, would make a great first sentence to a cover letter. Your thoughts?

“I see what you’re up against in your business, and I understand what you’re looking for. In this letter, I’ll briefly share with
you now how my background relates to the issues you’re facing.”
By Kent on 2009 09 23

Hi Kent! I like your thinking; the only hitch is that we don’t get much if any “lead time” as the recipient of our letter reads what we’ve written. Rather than start with a set-up, a la “I’ll start by telling you what I’m going to tell you” could we jump right into the heart of the argument? Our job is to illustrate for the hiring manager that we understand his or her business pain and have relevant advice to share. That’s something we want to demonstrate rather than to assert. It’s strictly the manager’s (reader’s) job to determine whether we know his pain, or not - we don’t want to make that claim outright, as doing so could very likely elicit the response “Not so fast, Bucko” - I’ll make that call.“ If we simply describe what we believe the pain to be, and then share a relevant dragon-slaying episode of our own, we’ve allowed the reader to do what he or she wants to do, namely, to evaluate our fitness for the job.

You raise a very good point Kent, and that is the distinction between showing and telling in a resume. We can yak yak yak about our strategic vision and our superior communication skills and our experience leading complex multi-functional pan-continental yada yada ‘til we’re blue in the face, and somehow the whole things reads like lifeless dreck. That’s because we’re standing back and characterizing ourselves - never an appealing habit, in a cover letter or in a Personals ad (“I’m smart and cool and sexy, and chicks dig me.“) In every way - credibility-wise, readability-wise and likeability-wise - we’re better off saying “I have a feeling you have a Welsh green dragon flying around your castle, and I bagged one of those last year in the Hebrides.“ Cheers—Liz

Ask Liz: following up with a networking contact?

Dear Liz,

I am an avid networker like you, and I meet with about two new people a month. I
send an email message as a followup, thanking them for their time, but unless
they're something immediate to follow up on, it is easy to fall out of touch
with the people I'm meeting. I want to be helpful and available to the new
people I meet, but I don't want to spam them. I don't add them to my newsletter
mailing list unless they specifically ask me to. Any suggestions for keeping
"new contacts" alive?

Thanks,

Reggie

=================

Dear Reggie,

I am glad you're networking as enthusiastically as you are. Since business
networking doesn't always pay off in the short run, too many people give up on
it and don't grow (or cultivate) their networks at all. Here are a few
suggestions for thanking and acknowledging new contacts (as well as folks you've
met over the years and don't see as often as you'd like to):

1) For starters, you're doing an important thing right - so, hats off to you!
I'm referring to the thank-you email message that you send to new acquaintances
after each coffee or lunch meeting. I recommend to networkers that they get very
specific in that message, thanking the new friend for a particular bit of advice
[a rundown of the best small-business events in town, e.g.] to let the recipient
know that you really 'got' and appreciate your coffee- or lunch-mate's
recommendations. If there were any take-away items from the networking coffee or
lunch, be sure to mention those a la "I've left a message for my friend at XYZ
Graphics, as I mentioned I'd do, and I'll let you know when he responds."

2) As an alternative to an email thank-you, you could send a physical card.

I use Send Out Cards like crazy, because it's ridiculously easy to use the site
to send thank-you cards to people you meet. You need a membership to use the
site, but once you sign up as a member, you just type the recipient's name and
address into the Send Out Cards database, pick a card, write your sentiment for
the inside of the card, hit Send, and you're done. You pick whichever card you
like (Send Out Cards has zillions of card designs) or create your own - you
could use your coffee-partner's logo or even his or her photo on the card, for
instance - and say something fun and clever inside.

If you want, you can send brownies or another treat with the card, and you
manage the whole shebang from your desktop in a few seconds (it's really
inexpensive, too - sixty-two cents per card, brownies extra).

If you want to try Send Out Cards for free, click on this link now and I will
have someone contact you to set up your free gift account.


3) For folks you haven't seen in a while, a great way to touch base is to send a
relevant article, podcast or blog post link with a note that says "I thought
you'd appreciate this, because..." The "because" is critical - I hate getting
"This article made me think of you" email messages that have been sent en masse
to a networker's entire database. (Crass!)

By the same token, you're smart not to add new contacts to your newsletter
distribution list without permission. It is easy enough to ask a person in a
p.s. at the bottom of your email thank-you or your physical card, "Let me know
if you'd like me to send you this month's edition of my online newsletter,
featuring [an interview with Robert Plant, e.g.]."

Best,

Liz

outdated job-search methods?

Dear friends,

Last night in our virtual job-search coaching group, we were talking about
sending letters and resumes to employers via U.S. mail. As you know, I think snail mail can be a great way to reach a hiring manager, especially given the way that the Black Hole swallows resumes.

In the meeting I mentioned in passing, "Use the same type and weight of paper for the resume and the cover letter, and the same font in the same size." I threw in "That's good-quality white bond
paper, not old-fashioned resume paper" and the thought made me wonder whether
many job-seekers are still using that beige, white, grey or blue nubbly paper
that we used to get our resumes printed on when "Thriller" ruled the charts.

That 'resume paper' would date us now. We don't want to use it. What other
job-search tools of yore should we be wary of? I have already written about the
outdated accents aigu in the word 'resume' and of course, the phrase Dear Sir or
Madam. Are there other very-last-millennium job-search techniques and tools
job-seekers should avoid?

Thanks!

Liz

JANE REPLIES:

Liz,


Well this post really threw me. I'm currently in career transition and have my
resume on the "resume" quality cream-colored paper. In fact when I got some
freebies printed at Kinko's Fedex they said the color I chose was the most
popular.


With all the networking meetings I've attended this is something I've never
heard before.


The premise is if yours is standard white it will just be one in the pile with
all the others. This doesn't mean to go the route of neon pink, pastels,etc. And
these days we need to stand out (in a good way) any way we can, in addition to
our qualifications, character, personality, etc.


Am interested in getting your feedback regarding reasoning, and plan to share
this topic at a networking event I'm attending Friday.


Thanks again.


Jane

Liz replies to Jane:

Dear Jane,

Thanks for writing! The job search arena is changing fast. Branding is becoming
a bigger and bigger piece of the equation all the time. These things that I
mentioned in the "fading" post aren't evil, they're just not especially
up-to-date, and the danger of employing these methods is that we'll date our
job-seeker brand.

Dedicated 'resume paper' is a perfect example. That stuff was super-popular when
the most common way to get a resume in front of a reader was to send it by mail,
and when we ordered resumes in boxes of 100 copies. I subscribe to the idea of
using snail mail in job-hunting once again, because the Black Hole has proved to
be such a graveyard for resumes. But these days, we don't need (and I'd go a
step further to say we don't want) fancy resume paper, a branding choice that
suggests that we print and send a lot of resumes. After all, what other types of
business correspondence do we ever send anyone on special paper?

Resume paper is dated - that's why I don't like it. I don't doubt at all that
it's still popular. Fax-blast resume services are sadly popular, too!

Unfortunately, the not-especially-current job-search and career advice that is
out there gets spread far and wide in serious, authoritative tones every day. In
a reply to a LinkedIn query I had posted on this very topic, a lady wrote to
tell me 'In the resume-writing community, objectives in resumes are extremely
outdated.' Glad to know the RWC thinks so! I think that advice is bunk, and
random bunk at that.

An Objective that addresses the employer's pain a la "My Objective is to triple
inventory turns and reduce WIP costs as the Inventory Manager for Acme Plastics"
is spot on. I get nervous when I hear that The Resume-Writing Community (as a
body? Do they vote on this stuff?) makes pronouncements like this and,
presumably, teaches them to job-seekers in the same rote fashion by which we
learned our times tables in elementary school. Scary.

I heard a lady a booth behind me at Panera Bread the other day tell a hapless
job-seeking gentleman seated across from her that the phrase "Hands-on manager
with a bottom-line orientation" would make a snappy addition to his resume. This
is the prevailing view. That's why our Ask Liz Ryan members have a job-search
advantage over other candidates, if our worldview and methods suit their brands
and their job-search goals.

Nubbly beige paper would be the absolutely last way we'd want to differentiate
ourselves from other job-seekers. Assuming that the masses of candidates whose
resumes might end up in piles alongside ours are not writing to decision-makers
directly with pithy, pain-based letters and human-voiced resumes, I'd say we can
proceed with the bond paper and let the words on the page do the heavy lifting
for us.

Cheers,

Liz

Using LinkedIn In Your Job Search: free E-book

Dear friends, my new E-book Using LinkedIn In Your Job Search is available as a free download here for the next 48 hours. (If you missed it, don't worry - I'm writing new E-books all the time, and they always go on my site for free for 48 hours before they go on sale).

Cheers!Liz

Five Waste-of-Time Job Search Activities

Deceptive Targets in the Job Hunt
5 Methods That Waste Your Time
by Caroline M.L. Potter, Yahoo! HotJobs

Time is money -- whether you've got a job or not. While it may be tempting to chase down every possibility when you're searching for work, don't. Many can lead you down a blind alley -- where you may lose the contents of your wallet.

A focused search using tried and true methods, especially networking, will lead to your next job, not tactics that smack of desperation.

Avoid these five job-hunting "don'ts" that will yield the poorest of results, according to leading workplace advisor Liz Ryan.

1. Spray and pray.

Don't blindly send your resume unsolicited, electronically or otherwise, to any company without first making verbal contact. Says Ryan, founder of AskLizRyan.com, "Tossing out un-customized cover letters and undifferentiated resumes in huge volumes and crossing your fingers is a job-search non-starter. That doesn't work, and it hasn't worked in 10 years, or more." Establish a connection before sending a customized cover letter and, adds Ryan, "You can even customize your resume if a job opening calls for it."

2. Stand in line for a job fair.

Admits Ryan, "Sad to say, but most job fairs are a waste of time. Avoid the huge cattle call-type job fairs where zillions of employers have booths, yet no one is taking resumes." There are some job fairs that have value. Ryan, a former human resources executive, points to company-specific open hours and college placement job fairs. Tap your network to learn if anyone can recommend worthwhile fairs. "Ask around before you head off to a job fair or risk having your time wasted and your ego dashed."

3. Earn certifications nobody wants.

It's common to feel less-than-confident in your skills if you're having a hard time finding work, but don't rush out to spend money on any additional training unless you're certain it will yield improved results. Ryan reveals, "Before you sign up for a certification training program, check the job boards to make sure that employers are asking for it. There's no sense investing time and money in a certification no one wants."

If you're getting the hard-sell from an educational institution, Ryan says, "Ask the people at the school that's doing the certifying, 'Which local employers have hired your graduates in the past year?' If they can't tell you, run away."

4. Pay a headhunter.

Don't dole out money to any kind of recruiter or sign a contract agreeing to do so. "Real headhunters, also known as search consultants or third-party recruiters, won't take your money. They get paid by employers to fill open jobs." She warns, "If a recruiter calls or emails you to say s/he's got jobs open, and then invites you to his or her office for a counseling session and presents you with a range of career-coaching services, bolt for the exit. Real search professionals won't take a dime from their candidates."

5. Sign up with a resume fax-blast service.

This old-school -- and desperate -- tactic is a total turn-off to potential employers and smacks of spam. Ryan says, "Services that send out hundreds or thousands of your resumes might have been worthwhile 20 years ago. Today, they're worse than pointless, because it irks employers to get unsolicited resumes. Forget the fax-blast services and do your own careful research to reach decision-makers with messages they actually want to hear."