In today’s economy, the job market is fierce with competition for a limited number of positions. Due to the trying circumstances, college graduates are now being stacked against baby boomers with decades of experience. But no matter what your skill set, how do you showcase the goods in the 10 seconds it takes a recruiter to skim your resume?
Cue Resunate, a free product of Careerimp, Inc., that creates smarter resumes in seconds. Pittsburgh-based Ayan Kishore, CEO and Founder of Careerimp, Inc., and Mona Abdel-Halim, Director of Sales and Marketing for Careerimp, Inc. and Co-Founder of Resunate, realized there was a need for a SEO resume builder that utilizes the same technology hiring companies use to filter job applicant resumes. After conducting labor issue research during their graduate degree studies at Carnegie Mellon University, they came across a common grievance that needed to be addressed.
“We asked people what they were struggling with the most and what was holding them back as a job seeker,” Abdel-Halim explained. “They said the time spent on creating applications and resumes was frustrating them, along with not having the feedback to tell them what they were doing wrong or right.”
This prompted Kishore, who has experience in international development recruiting firms, to combine his understanding of new technology and labor issues to help develop this resource for job seekers at career service centers on and off campus.
“We started by tackling resumes knowing they are often the most influential first impression one can make. But, sadly, this importance is often overlooked by job seekers. As a result, due to a series of resume myths, some of the most qualified candidates jeopardize their chances of getting called for an interview,” Abdel-Halim said.
Myth #1: The more experience the better
Contrary to popular belief, listing many experiences that are irrelevant to the job opportunity can work against you. Why? Time! Employers have so little of it and are looking for the “easy hire” — someone who unquestionably has the skills they are looking for and genuinely interested in holding the position. Otherwise, a dissatisfied employee is likely to not be an employee for long.
Resunate Solution: Automatic resume focusing.
Myth #2: Make your resume beautiful to stand out
While this is usually the case if you are in a creative field, styling your resume can place you at a disadvantage. Employers are looking to clearly spot your relevant skills – don’t have them searching through images or squinting through curvy font to find it. Resumes with unique headers and formatting also fail to scan properly for the majority of employers using applicant tracking systems (ATS). Meaning, if your information is not scanned, you will never even be considered.
Resunate Solution: Clear resume templates.
Myth #3: Use a functional resume to hide gaps in your work history
Employer consensus indicates that it is better to explain gaps in your work history than attempt to hide them. Otherwise, employers searching for dates may tire and throw your resume in the shredder pile.
Resunate Solution: One-click chronological resume
Resunate uses an extensive reference database of word associations to contextually determine meaning from the contents of your profile and from specific job descriptions. The service ranks all of the concepts, not just keywords, in your profile against concepts from the job description. Selecting the highest ranked, thus the most relevant experiences, Resunate then creates a resume focused for the job.
By showcasing your most relevant skills, you are not only more likely to be remembered, but also more likely to rank higher in automated screening systems called applicant tracking systems (ATS) used by the majority of employers.
Employers use ATSs to extract candidate information into a searchable database. Once the information is extracted, employers either search for the most qualified candidates by inputting keywords and phrases, or rely on the ATS to recommend candidates for their job requisitions using a semantic match. Employers then see candidates much like the results in a search engine, in ranked order. By having your most relevant experiences in an easy-to-search format, employer ATSs are more likely to rank you higher in candidate searches.
With eight features, ranging from WYSIWYG Editing to Automatic Resume Focusing, the people at Resunate are focusing on the evolution of their product. A unique mobile app could be in the works for next year and their newest feature to be released in three weeks, Employer Impression, will allow you to see what the employer views on their end.
The Meyers & Briggs Foundation even wants in on Resunate’s technology. An exclusive deal enables Resunate to provide Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator assessments through their product in order to help users visualize how their personality will fit with the jobs they are applying for. “This is the first time they have allowed another organization to offer this test online,” Abdel-Halim said. “As we worked together, we have discovered how knowing your type can help you figure out how satisfied you may be at the job you are applying for.”
When asked why someone else has not created this technology yet, Abdel-Halim said the technology was complicated and constantly evolving on the employer’s side. “We face the challenge of constantly adapting to the type of technology that occurs in the career space, but it has also been demonstrated for the first time by the LinkedIn IPO that job seekers are willing to pay a subscription for career advancement tools,” Abdel-Halim explains. “In fact there is a huge segment of people who are passive job seekers, they are not unemployed, just potentially looking to make a career.”
