12.14.2003

It's never too early to get ready

Living in close proximity to the Fairies can be interesting, to say the least. Flannel, for instance, is absolutely insane about being on time. If the event begins at 8:00 PM, she's there by 7:30. Bills? She's pays them at least a week early. Preparing for a trip means packing starts as much as a month before the event. Even her Thanksgiving meal is completely cooked 1 - 2 days in advance, only needing reheating the morning of the celebration itself. Now, the other Fairies aren't nearly as hardcore, but once of the things we all have in common is that we like to be prepared. Maybe not as far ahead as a certain Fairy though...

The point I'm trying to make is that at the end of the year, (or in some companies at the very beginning of the year) your manager will conduct annual reviews. What does this have to do with preparedness? This is because this is the perfect time to update your resume just before the spring hiring rush. How are these two events related? Under the best of circumstances, the accomplishments of your work this year that will be part of your annual review document can translate easily into the bullet points under your current company's listing on your resume. You should update your resume every three months; most people don't do this. But you can make up for it and even get ahead of the game by taking the little extra bit of time to use one event to leverage a greater return out of the other.

When you are preparing for your annual review, approach it the way you'd prepare for a sales presentation. List all of your responsibilities, then all of your accomplishments. You may or may not have an opportunity to include the responsibilities; some job reviews have your official job description already attached. You put the accomplishments down on your review document. How should you phrase them? Remember, you're trying to convince the company, in a respectful and non-threatening way, that they should pay you more in order to do the same job. What makes you increasingly valuable to them? Why should they make the extra effort to retain you? Have you saved the company any significant amounts of money? Provide total dollar amounts. Have you been to salary survey sites recently? Do you know what your market value is worth? What skills do you have that are worth so much money? Emphasize them. Your responsibilities don't usually become bullet points on your resume the way the accomplishments will, but they do help jog your memory and also provide a good source of keywords that can go to the skills summary section at the top of your resume and also in the comprehensive skills list at the bottom.

In a worst-case scenario, your company isn't treating you so well. You weren't getting paid market rate to begin with; raises and bonuses are a distant memory. You can actually feel your skills stagnating. You are going to have an annual review; you wonder why you're even bothering, since there's no money for raises and no chance of getting a promotion. Well, this is your chance to take this opportunity and make something of it. Do a thorough review of your skills, responsibilities, and accomplishments. Make bullet points out of your accomplishments and put them both in your resume and in your review document. Once you're done with your HR paperwork, turn your attention to revamping your resume.

If you start now, you can allot two weeks for every section. You don't have to do them in order, either - I'd start with the skills section at the very end of the resume, since that's the easiest to fill in. It's a little time-consuming, but worth it. Take all the unique words from your resume, such as applications, operating systems, hardware, etc. and put them in a list. Go through your list of programs on your computer and write them all down too. You use them, get credit for it. When you finish with what will be your Internet-ready resume, remember that recruiters and hiring managers will be searching for people by certain keywords. If you have those words in your resume, yours will come up. Make sure you have all those words in there. Next I'd revamp the training and education section, since you may have to fill in a section on your review document about what classes or trainings you did this year. Those are two relatively easy hits; those, plus your address section at the top comprise three sections. (You can definitely finish all three of these in a week.) Since the Job Fairy resume has six sections, you'd be halfway there! Three more sections, times two weeks each - that takes you to about Valentine's Day- the very earliest start of the spring hiring frenzy.

If you write your review document well and use that information to populate your resume, then you're in a great position. If your company is inclined to hand out raises this year, you've done the work of pitching them on why they should increase your pay. If they aren't so inclined, then you've got your resume in the best shape it's ever been, ready to post available on the over 500 job boards listed here at jobfairy.com. You don't threaten to walk out, you don't have a tantrum if they don't increase your pay - you simply decide to do something about the situation. You're focused on your goal, which is either a better job or better compensation. Moreover, if your current company can't do for you what you need it to, feel free to find another one that can. You deserve to be appreciated, treated fairly, and compensated at no less than fair market rate for your skills. If you treat yourself and your dreams with respect and loyalty, you'll always make the right career choices. Change may be scary, but staying put in a position that's going nowhere fast is even worse.