A Tough 2009, But Great Opportunities Awaits

What an exciting year of 2008! It was truly a roller coaster ride where most of us exprienced the HIGHS in the early part of the year follow by the LOWS since the mid till end of the year. Well, the truth is most economists is also looking at 2009 a bad year where the impact of recession will be felt by most countries, especially in the Asia countries. More retrenchments may take place as corporates are seeking ways to cut down expenses.

But for jobseekers, this can be a good opportunity for you to switch to a job that can either help you gain extra experiences, or leverage on your current experiences.

In fact, some companies are seeking to recruit top talents, people who can help drive their companies through this tough turbulent times. (See this post from Business Times dtd 25th Dec 08 "We Will Hire Top talents & Avoid Mass Firing")

So for jobseekers, this is the right time for your to re-strategize your cover letters and resumes, get ready your best suits for interviews and get yourself a big bang for the start of 2009!

I wish you every success, and a great Happy New Year! We're going to have a great year ahead!

To Your Success,

Allan Heng

Read more about Writing a Good Resume, and How To Ace In Interviews.

How To Increase Your Cover Letter Response By 2-3 Times!

Frustrated over the low response of your cover letters? So what if you've tons of great experiences and your resume generally lands into the paper baskets, or being thrown away by a mere click of a button if you're sedning it through emails.

This is what I've learnt today, and can increase your response by 2-3 times! And it's very simple. This technique is known as the "Mr. P.S.".

Most of the times, post scripts, or simply P.S. is the first thing that people will read when they open a letter. It's that powerful!

What you need to do is simply to add a P.S. in front of your signing off, just after you finished the last paragragph of your cover letter.

This P.S. is generally not more than 3 sentences, the main objective is to grab the readers attention and call for a action, either through your promised following up, or them calling you. Below are just a few examples:

P.S. The attached resume explains my relevant experience in detail. I look forward to an interview where we can chat in person to get better acquainted!

P.S. I'm sure you review several resumes each day. I hope mine will allow me to quickly show you how my experiences and qualifications can greatly enhance this role I'm applying.

P.S. I would like the opportunity to present a few additional ideas to you in person. Let's get together soon. How about next week?

Use this little trick and see how it works for you!

To Your Success,
Allan Heng

P.S. By the way, if you want to learn how to write an irresistible cover letter, you can check out this fantastic Cover Letter Creator that I've just discover. Click HERE to find out more!

How To Increase Your Chances Of Getting Headhunted

In this information age, being headhunted is getting easier as the opportunities and chances of your skills being exposed to others are much more. Getting headhunted is not about merely showing your resumes and your accomplishments. It's about getting yourself known to relevant people that makes the difference. Below are just a few areas where you can get others to know you more professionally:

1. Participate in relevant trade exhibitions
This is probably one of the most effective and easy way for exposing yourself to people within your trade or industry. Don't just go to trade exhibitions with the sole objective of understanding the latest technology or products. Talk to as many people as you can. The focus is to let more relevant trade companies know who you are. And remember to exchange your business cards for future correspondance.

2. Join the School Alumni
School Alumnis are as good as trade exhibitions because you can get to know people of the same specialised trade/area. You can even get yourself more exposure by being one of the alumni committee member. That'll give you more reasons to contact the members.

3. Join social networking sites like LinkedIn, MySpace & Facebook
It has becoming not a trend, but a way of life for people to engage into cyber social networking. Some headhunters even screen through their candidates through their social networking sites profiles to ascertain whether is he/she the right person. Just make sure your profile is casual and reflects your true personality.

Another thing about such sites is that you can widen your social network easily, and should you need job recommendations, it spreads extremely fast. And such referrals will land yourself much more easier into your desired job.

4. Join relevant forums
Make sure you put a decent profile and state your interests. Read through the topics that are relevant to your desired job, and make comments on it. This will allow people to get to know you more, and start to look at you as a professional in your trade.

5. Writing & submitting articles
Writing articles to your local press, magazines will greatly enhance your image as a professional. However, you'll need to know what articles the press and/or magazines will be interested in. So make sure you do some research on what type of articles do they generally publish. Alternatively, you can also submit shorter articles to Ezines like Ezine Articles. They're a huge e-articles directory that have millions of visitors visiting them and searching for relevant articles.

One tip for you: If you can't think of any topics to write to your desired press or magazines, go to Ezine Articles to do your research on the type of topics that generated the most visitors.

6. Create Your Own Blog
Creating your own blog builts credibility, reputation and allows people to "locate" and understand you easier. All you have to do is to get a free blog provider like Blogger or Wordpress, and just follow their instructions. And make sure you update your blog regularly so that your blog can be easily searched by the search engines.

If you're really interested in creating your blog, you should learn some internet marketing techniques to increase your exposure.

Getting headhunted is not an overnight thing. You'll need to build your credentials bit by bit. And if you apply what I've mentioned above, you'll definitely increase your chances of being headhunted by leaps and bounds.

To Your Success,
Allan Heng

The Cover Letter Is The Sales Teaser

Why is a cover letter the most important element in your resume? just imagine that you're the HR Recruiter in a large MNC, and you're required to review & filter hundreds of resumes in a day. Can you afford the time to screen through all resumes in details? Absoultely no efficient at all!

Most recruiters will screen the potential candidates first thing is through the cover letter before they decide whether to go indepths into your resumes. So writing a good resume is not only about the details, but more importantly your cover letter.

Think of your resume as the sales copy of a product or service. The more benefits and specifications the better it is to see how good tjhis product / service is. And your cover letter is the teaser. The teaser does nothing but to attract potential buyer to read more into the sales copy.

I hope I've made it pretty simple on the role of the cover letter. Writing a good resume is not going to help you increase your job search interview chance if nobody wants to read it.

To Your Success,
Allan Heng

5 Pitfalls of Writing a Good Resume

The followings are some of the pitfalls that you should avoid when writing a good resume:

1. Too Lengthy
The reviewer (usually a recruiter or the HR practitioner) will most probably be screening through hundreds of resumes within a day, and will not have a lot of time reading the details. If your resume is too lengthy (more than 5 pages) and/or your cover letter is more than a page, chances are your resume will be deleted away.

2. All About Yourself Only
Writing a good resume is not about who you are, and what you do. Instead add it more pointers on how your experiences can be of value to the company, especially on your transferable skills and accomplishments. Focus on what you can do for the company through your experiences and accomplishments than just merely stating it. You maybe were managing a project of different nature. So you can simply stated that your project management skills will allow you to take on ah-hoc related projects, etc.

3. Spelling & Grammatical Errors
Some companies may have little tolerance on such mistakes. So make sure your proofread it again and again, and get a third party to do another round of proofread. This is the worse pitfall, and also the easiest mistake to make.

4. The Wrong Type Of Font (Resume Formatting)
Do not use fanciful fonts. A safe bet will be using Times New Roman or Arial. It is easy to read. And make sure your paragraphs are sufficient spaced apart. If it is too cramped, the reviewer will be discouraged to read on. Remember, you are writing a good resume, not a fanciful resume.

5. Contact Information Wrongly Placed
Putting the contact information on the front page will allow the reviewer to have access to your contact number easier. That is the most important aspect. Your sole purpose of writing a good resume is to attract them to contact you. Putting your contact information at the wrong place will discourage them to contact you.
Only put your picture if you think that will enhance your chances, especially if your job requires meeting up with customers. A pleasant appearance will definitely be an advantage. However, if you do not have a proper picture, it will also be fine.

Writing a good resume is not difficult. If you avoid the above mentioned pitfalls, it will surely increase the chances of getting interviews.

To Your Success,
Allan Heng

7 Powerful Tips on Writing Good Resumes

The following are tips on writing a good resumes that all employers and recruiters will love to see:

1. Resume Format
If you are a fresh graduate with limited working experiences, put your academic accomplishments first, especially if you have good grades. If you have sufficient working experiences (2 years or more), you should put your working experiences before your academic accomplishments.

2. Contact Information
It is important to put your contact information, preferably on top of your resume to allow the recruiter and/or HR personnel to contact you. If you have a decent picture, put it up. This will give you a slight edge. Otherwise do not put any picture.

3. Highlight Key Points
After reading the job descriptions of your desired job, highlight key points that either matches or enhance the job description using a different font colour. This will allow the recruiter / HR personnel to spot it faster and easier.

4. Job Responsibilities vs Accomplishment
Writing a good resume through mere detailed job responsibilities is not sufficient. It merely tells others what you have been doing, and not how good you are. Putting some accomplishment after your job responsibilities details like the extra projects that you have undertaken and how that contribute to the company, will allow the reviewer to estimate your capabilities.

5. Know Your Audience
Your resume is written for 2 types of reviewer : The HR practitioner, and the hiring manager. Both types of reviewer are usually looking for different things in a resume. Writing a good resume means that you will need to cater in these 2 types of reviewers.

6. Limit To Not More Than 5 Pages
Do not write your resumes more than 5 pages as the reviewer will find it too lengthy, and be discouraged by it. Instead a good resume will be around 3 pages. So write the essential points. You can elaborate it more during the interview.

7. Cover Letter
The cover letter is the most important aspect of a good resume. Make sure the cover letter is within 1 page, with the main paragraph occupying not more than 2/3 of the page. The cover letter is a teaser, to attract the reviewer to read more in the resume, so no details.

Writing a good resume is critical as it is the first impression that the reviewer gets. I wish you all the best in your job hunting and hope you will get your desired job as soon as possible!

To Your Success,
Allan Heng