May is as good a time as any to earn that raise you have been eyeing for months. But tread carefully because you do not want to rustle the waters at work. The best way to be considered for a raise is after a job performance review. Some company’s schedule these automatically every six to twelve months. Some company’s do not do this at all. If you are fortunate to work for a boss that issues performance reviews please make sure you prepare ahead of time.

Consider a Figure

How much you deserve is dependent on your wage from the previous year. Consider the performance of the company since last year to determine how much you deserve. If the company did not increase sales or layoffs were common, you better keep quiet. You probably will not be getting much and I do not see anything you can do about it either. That Is…short of finding a new job.

Company Profits Are Up?

But if the company has been doing quite well you also deserve to be fairly compensated. That is where an updated resume will come in hand. Cough cough, it only costs $15 to update your resume with my help. The updated resume will need to list your most recent achievements since you began the job. Do not bring the actual resume to the interview. Simply copy the job description and accomplishments from your updated resume onto a new document. When your boss offers a raise that is lower than you expected, you should be able to explain your accomplishments orally and in writing.
Your boss will probably tell you, “This is the raise every other employee is getting across the board.” Don’t buy into tactic until you have explained your position that you are a great worker because of all of your recent achievements. There is always room for a special case like yours, you, who went above and beyond the call of duty.

Take a Look at This Free Raise Request Template

I started the process for you. Once you create that updated resume feel free to paste the new job description directly into this handy template that you may download at http://resumetointerviews.com/RaiseRequestTemplate.doc  

Let me leave you with one of my favorite most recent reviews of Resume to Interviews:

“I can finally post in this thread with feedback. I ordered the new college grad one with an add-on cover letter. I’ve scored interviews with every single one of the big three miners and a few up and comers here in Australia. These places get around 10,000 applicants a year and hire around 50. I am in talks with securing my dream job out of university, and this is with only a GPA of around 2.8. I wholeheartedly endorse these services.”

For those of you who have purchased resumes or CV’s from us recently, we like to thank you for your business.  It’s a great time to be a resume writer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, and we like to thank all of you for that. Now that you have your professionally created CV or Resume, it’s important to think about how you are going to use it. As easy as it is to think of a Resume to Interviews Resume as a Golden Ticket to a fulfilling and well-paying job, it’s not quite that simple. You have to get your Resume in front of eyeballs, and those eyeballs should be connected to brains that make hiring decisions. That’s how Resumes get interviews. After all, if a Resume clearly and confidently asserts the accomplishments of a job seeker in the woods, and nobody hears it, does it make a noise? I don’t know, but I do know it doesn’t get interviews.

The most important thing to remember when applying for jobs is this:

Getting a job is a numbers game. It always surprises me how few people seem to understand that. We get a good amount of customers who use our services to target one specific job opening. That’s fine if you have a job you are content with and you see a particular opportunity you like, but if you’re unemployed, unhappy with your job, or a graduating senior, it’s a terrible strategy.

After you use our resume writing service, get your resume out there. It’s almost graduation time you slacking seniors! Apply to everything that you think is even remotely related to your skills and interests. Don’t waste time wondering if it’s a perfect fit. You can figure that out once they get back to you. Go on all the job listing websites, and fire off as many resumes and cover letters as you can.

Also, while it is a good idea to post your resume on job sites, don’t expect that strategy to generate to much in way of responses.  You need to find openings and send your Resume off. Always send a cover letter with it, as well. You should tailor the cover letter for each job. You should edit the Resume for each industry, but not for each job.

Because getting a job is a numbers game, you shouldn’t stop sending out your Resume once you get a few interviews. They might lead to jobs, they might not. Either way, you need to keep sending out your Resume to as many companies as possible until you secure a job. Until then, there is no reason to assume anything.

Here are some people who did secure new jobs with Resume to Interview Resumes and CVs. Congrats guys!

• Katie is now a Talent Acquisition Recruiter at a Global Fortune 500 company.
• Zhixia is now a Nurse at a Community Health Clinic.
• John is now an Engineer at a Manufacturing Firm.
• Sharese is now  a Graphic Designer at a Women’s Magazine.
• Doug is now a Project Manager at a Video Game Development company.

Alright, now everybody else get out there and get a job! Good luck! Not done with us yet? Check out what Resume to Interviews has been up to at the start of 2012.

Hello again from Resume to Interviews,

This has been another record setting month for RTI, and again we wanted to thank everyone who was a part of that. Check out the first resume article too.

We like to see how people are doing, and we take a lot of pride in seeing clients get new jobs on LinkedIn. Here are a few recent ones. Congrats!

Jillian is now a Client Marketing Manager at a marketing firm

Emil is now Chairman of the Board at sustainable energy teaching foundation

John is now a Senior Analyst at a major aerospace and defense manufacturer

Will is now an Animator at children’s animation studio

Jordon is now a System Administration Senior Advisor at a major computer manufacturer

It’s also time for college seniors to start thinking about what they are going to do after school. For those of you who aren’t planning on joining a commune, here is some advice for college grads constructing their first post-college resume.

1. You don’t have a lot of experience. That’s fine, you wouldn’t be expected to. So put your education first.
2. Don’t include your GPA if it’s under a 3.0.
3. If you put a lot of work into a club or association, don’t be afraid to make that the focus of your resume, as long as it’s at least a little relevant to the kind of jobs you are applying to.
4. If you volunteer, make sure you put the amount of hours you volunteered. It will separate you from the many people who volunteer somewhere for an afternoon and then put it on their resumes.
5. Don’t put classes on your resumes. Do put academic projects on your resume. That way you’re not showing what you learned, your showing how you used what you learned, which is much more important.

That’s all for now. Happy hunting everybody, and congratulations to all you soon to be college graduates. Now go get a haircut and read about how getting a job is a numbers game.

Welcome to the first installment of the Resume to Interviews blog. Since writing this you can read other articles about Resume to Interviews and also the belief that finding a job is a numbers game. This was a banner year for us at RTI, and we wanted to thank our customers for helping us grow our business and provide more quality Resumes and CV’s in 2011than ever before. Due to RTI’s growth, we will have the opportunity to continually add and update products and services in the coming year, and we wanted to make sure our clients, and potential clients, are kept up to date on everything new happening at RTI. Hence, this newsletter, which will be coming in regular installments to an inbox near you.

For those of you who have used RTI in the past, we’d like to take the time to remind you that all RTI clients can buy a resume update for only $15. Or you can buy two resume updates, targeted to two different positions, for only $20. And don’t forget about our cover letter package, which is only $20, and comes with a cover letter template that you can use to create an infinite amount of cover letters in the future. (Of course, hopefully you won’t need that many.)

A Few Words on Our Resume Creation Philosophy

Here at RTI, we get a lot of emails wondering if we have ever done resumes for the (blank) industry. While we certainly understand that many customers want to make sure the person writing their resume knows what the industry the resume is being written for requires, we also want to make it clear that our philosophy and process is designed to be universal. (And also that we have done Resumes and CV’s for countless industries and countries all over the globe.)
There are differences in resume and CV requirements across industries, and we know what they are. But they are mostly cosmetic in nature. What makes a great engineering resume also makes a great legal, programming, graphic design, and academic resume.
Here are things you have to do to create a great, eye-catching resume that employers are looking for:

Avoid all the things that people who read resumes HATE.

We hate to start out all negative, but this is actually really important. You’d be amazed how often Resumes are tossed in the trash not because they are badly constructed, or have bad information, but because they push the buttons of a HR person who reads hundreds of resumes a day and develops an irrationally strong hatred of the following things:

-          Seeing an applicant claim to pay attention to detail on a resume with grammatical errors.
-          Reading anything about energy levels on a resume. Unless you are applying to be a cheerleader, you should never call yourself “energetic.”
-          Self-described “go-getters.” What does that even mean?
-          Reading words that don’t mean anything. “Helped” is one of those. When you say you “helped” the team accomplish a goal, it’s not clear at all what YOU did. The hot dog guy at Busch Stadium could say he “helped” the Cardinals win the World Series. And he wouldn’t be lying.
-          Seeing someone claim to “communicate” with someone, but not identifying what it is that is being communicated. You could be “communicating” gossip. Also, never use “interfaced.” You sound like Spock.

Clearly and accurately Say EXACTLY what you did at a job.

Many people think being somewhat ambiguous on a resume makes a task done once or twice look like something that was done regularly. It doesn’t. When hiring people are reading resumes and they come across something ambiguous or unclear, they assume the applicant is being sneaky on purpose to cover something. Hiring people are cynical about resumes, they have to be. They assume ambiguity is exaggeration or a sign of dishonesty. The only way to make sure you aren’t trying to misrepresent your experience is to say exactly what you did, and how many times you did it.

Be economical with words.

While it’s very important to say exactly what you did at a position, it’s also very important to say it in the fewest possible words. The more words you have, the more likely you are to confuse meaning. Also, the more work it is for the person reading. The more you cut down each individual bullet point, the more bullet points you can have (provided they are all relevant to the position you are applying to.) You’d be amazed how many words are needless, and contribute nothing to a sentence’s meaning. For example, there is no reason to ever use the world “proactively” in a resume.

Use active sentences with strong verbs.

This is a rule for all types of writing. Say what you DID in a resume. Not what you were, or who you helped, or who you worked with. Say what you DID and what it accomplished.
Those are just some general ideas and principles that we stick too here. We hope that gives an idea of how we work. There are others of course, like never use colors or stickers, and don’t use your mom as a reference. (Unless your mom is the CEO.) But those are pretty obvious.
Until next time, good luck with the job hunt! And remember, no matter how charming, confident, and professional you are in person, you can’t get interviews without a good resume.