Helping Career Professional Succeed in the Job Interview

June 19, 2013December 12, 2020

How to Write a Personal Profile on a Job Application Form

Personal profiles are generally one to two A4 pages long, they take on average over an hour to complete and need to match the criteria from the job specification.

This article will teach you some value techniques to boost the amount of job interview you receive from your job application forms.

These days most companies allow you to complete the application online, the advantage here is you can start and save your application, only submitting the form when you feel it is ready.

The Personal Statement

Throughout the job application form, you will add your contact details, past employment history and your qualifications, so they do not need to be added (and repeated) on the personal statement.

Most job specifications that accompany the job application form tell you in detail, what requirements the employer is looking to be evidenced on the job application form and the importance the employer places on each criteria.

Example Job Specification:

Factor	Essential	Desirable	Measured
Experience	Experience of leading a team Understanding every child matters regulations	Experience of writing management reports	Application Form/Interview
Qualification	NVQ level 3 or equivalent in Child Care	NVQ Level 4 or equivalent in Management	Application Form

As you can see some job requirements are essential and MUST BE EVIDENCED in your personal statement while other job requirements are desirable if you possess them add them to the application form.

With most job specifications the employer will tell you when they will assess each criteria; Interview/Application Form

The Profile Layout

The whole of the application should be easy to read, if you need to add additional pages to the application form, add them and make a note (and give a reference number to each individual page) in the application form so an employer does not miss this vital information.

Always complete a spell and grammar check, if possible ask someone else to check your application form for you.

You can use headings to split up your text; the essential criteria requirements make the best headings. If you do not like to use headings follow a format so information is not missed or duplicated throughout the job application form.

How to Sell Yourself in a Job Application Form

Start with an opening paragraph; a mini summary that can highlight your best strengths and skills in 4-5 lines. For ideas ask yourself these 3 questions:

What is your key message you want to convey to the employer?
What are your 3 main strengths relevant to the job role?
How would the company benefit from hiring you?

The opening paragraph must intrigue the employer, encouraging them to read your statement in more detail.

Avoid writing general information such as “I’m a good team player” write how your experience has made you a good team player, stories work well in personal statements.

Ensure every paragraph you write is relevant to at least one of the essential criteria from the job specification.

Remember you have to prove to the employer that you understand the job role, duties and industry. The best way to prove you possess this knowledge is to record that you have completed the essential criteria in a past role.

Feeling tired, take a break and grab a bite to eat, don’t make mistakes due to tiredness; in most cases, you will have several weeks to complete the application form.

Make your statement interesting; if you were reading the statement would you want to carry on?

Keep the statement positive – use stories
Use enthusiastic language
Highlight your strengths and key skills

At the end of the personal statement, write a brief summary of why you have applied for this role, what has made you pick this particular role and/or organisation?

Complete your Application Forms.

Re-write your application 2 more times, each time edit your statement, deleting negative language and adding more positive stories; you want this statement to be the best it can be, ensuring you get a guaranteed interview.

Imagine you’re the interviewer, really visualise yourself as the person who is going to read your job application form, get into their mind and even sit how you think the interviewer would sit. Read the application form, from the interviewer’s eyes, remember the interviewer has never met you and only knows what you have recorded about yourself.

As the interviewer, did the “you” on the application form come across well? Do you feel the application form has mentioned all your strengths’? Will the interviewer want to interview you, now they have read the application form?

Ask Yourself:

What have you missed from the application form, which needs to be added?
Double-check the job specification, have you highlighted all the essential criteria in your personal statement?
Is there anything else you can do to improve the application form?

Now you have a completed application form, an application form that really highlights your strengths and skills, you are probably really proud of this application form, especially after all the hard work you have put into it.

Keep a copy of this completed application form as you can use this draft copy as a basis for all your future job application forms.

When writing a new application form, copy and paste the statement from your original application into your new one, edit each new application/profile to make it relevant to this new position and company, this will save you a large amount of time.

June 18, 2013November 24, 2020

Five Failsafe Ways to be Prepared for your Job Interview

Be Prepared for your Job Interview

This Months Guest post comes from Simply Marketing Jobs

The golden rule of being interviewed is BE PREPARED! It sounds obvious but so many well-qualified job seekers make the mistake of arriving for interviews without planning properly in advance, hoping their experience and personality will carry them through. So what can you do before the big day to ensure you impress the interview panel and land that job?

How to Prepare for a Job Interview.

Carry out extensive research on the organisation

It’s vital to do all the research on the company that you can.

Spend time going through the company website and if the post you’re applying for is senior, get a copy of their latest published accounts (normally these are available to download from a company’s corporate website).

Google is of course a fantastic tool for finding out some interesting facts about the organisation you’re hoping to work for.

“What do you know about our company?” is one of the most commonly asked interview questions, so having to scrape around for something to say instantly looks bad. If the information is on their website, there is no excuse for not knowing about it, and having pre-prepared opinions about recent business activities and marketing campaigns will demonstrate your interest. It’s best to keep any negative opinions to yourself of course.

Areas of the business you must research:

· What does the company do?

· What’s the company culture?

· Which products and services does it sell?

· Growth plans for the future

· Main competitors

· Financial performance

· Recent published trade news

· Who will be interviewing you and what is their role?

Presentation

First impressions really do count so don’t risk everything by looking scruffy or inappropriately dressed.

Always overdress rather than risk being under-dressed. Studies show that often the average length of time between a candidate entering the interview room and a decision being made is less than four minutes.

After this time, recruiters are often looking for evidence to support the decision that – perhaps subconsciously – they have already made.

If you are at all unsure about the dress code ask the recruiter well in advance. Remember to think about your body language too – smiling often, sitting upright rather than slouching, and making plenty of eye contact will all show you in a good light.

Punctuality

As a professional, you don’t need to be told to arrive on time, but if you have interviewed extensively yourself you’ll know just how many job seekers still arrive late.

Make sure you find out where you are going and plan how you are going to get there. If you are unsure of the exact location of the interview print out a map.

Allow plenty of extra time in case of travel delays, particularly if you are heading into central London, or any other major city for the job interview. If you arrive very early find a nearby café and collect your thoughts and make any final preparations e.g. ensuring you have your mobile phone turned off before you go into the interview.

Prepare for the likely questions

Many people fall down here, simply because they haven’t spent sufficient time thinking through answers to fairly straightforward questions. Here are a few classics that will remind you of what to expect at an interview and what kinds of answers to give.

Why do you want to work for us?

The interviewers want to know you are genuinely interested in the company and the opportunities this job provides.

So you must demonstrate that you understand what makes this company different from its competitors, and what you think will be the interesting/challenging/rewarding things about working there.

Think carefully about what really appeals to you about this job and company and how you can stand out from the other people who are applying for this job, and come up with at least three points – e.g. the brands are powerful and widely admired in the marketplace; it’s an award-winning company; you’ve read fantastic client testimonials on the company website.

How would you describe yourself?

Whatever you say it’s important to be honest and genuine.

You want the interviewer to feel confident that they are seeing your true personality rather than telling them what you think they want to hear.

Remember to give plenty of evidence to back up statements or claims about yourself. Rather than telling the interviewer you are ‘target driven’, give live examples of when you have hit or exceeded targets and describe the steps you took to ensure targets were never missed.

What are your strengths?

The interviewer wants to know what your key strengths are in relation to this particular job. Make sure you choose examples that are relevant to this role but also examples that set you apart from other applicants.

Try to have four or five strengths available in case the interviewer asks for some further examples. Remember that for most jobs you will want to include an example of working well as part of a team, and fitting in well with others.

What is your greatest weakness?

Of course, be careful not to say anything too negative about yourself – such as you struggle to concentrate, or are badly organised.

Prepare an example of a weakness that you have overcome – for instance, your time management skills have improved in recent years because you now use a certain system. “I used to accept too much work in an effort to please everybody, but soon discovered that I was diluting my focus and not performing as I should…. Today I try not to be superwoman, but explain carefully to colleagues why I must prioritise my workload.”

Where do you see yourself three years from now?

Don’t overstate your ambitions here. The company really just wants reassurance that you’ll stick with the company and stay motivated over time. So it’s best to say something like: “I envisage myself enjoying my work in a progressive company like this one, and being valued as an asset to the organisation. I hope I would have performed well enough to have earned a promotion, having proved I am worthy of such a position.”

Have questions prepared too

‘Do you have any questions?’ is actually a very important part of the interview process, so don’t say ‘no’, whatever you do.

Asking insightful, pre-prepared questions when given the opportunity is as important as any of the answers you will have already given during the interview, this is well worth remembering.

Not having relevant questions or squirming uncomfortably as you try to think up an intelligent question on the spot will make you look badly prepared and disorganised.

Have 10 questions prepared before you go into the sales job interview. As the interview progresses several of these will no doubt be answered as part of the general interview dialogue. However, when it is your turn to ask questions, pick the 3 to 5 questions that seem most relevant at the time.

Good questions to ask might include:

• What is the company’s approach to training and development?

• How would you describe the company culture?

• What is the biggest challenge facing your company currently?

• How will my success in this role be measured over the next 12 months?

• What kind of person does really well in this division?

Being fully prepared in these ways should set you off on the right track. The more prepared you are, the more confident you will appear on the day, which should also help reduce nervousness. So put in the time, and the rewards really are within reach!

This article was provided by Simply Marketing Jobs, a leading marketing recruitment board.

June 13, 2013February 12, 2021

An Introduction to Career Guidance Theory

An Introduction to the theory and models used in IAG sessions

Career Guidance Theory

Careers’ guidance theory is based often on research and provides practitioners a framework from which they can work from. Careers guidance theory is developed through best practice and allows practitioners to measure the impact of their intervention.

Without career guidance theories and research, practitioners may use dated models of IAG (information, advice and guidance) which were often relevant to their time but have now become dated.

Career guidance theory is developed and improved to be more relevant to the changes in the government policy, economy and advances in new technology. Without a framework or theory, career advisors may find it a difficult task to evaluate their practice and a lack of evaluation can lead to a lack of identification for areas of improvement, impact or good practice.

Career Guidance Research

Good theory is always based on research. But guidance practitioners have to be aware of how the researcher’s voice that the practitioner is well-read on will dominate the career guidance session, even though there is a general commonality in all career guidance models of ‘moving the client forward.’

An advisor using one model or theory, as an example “Differentialist theory” will identify the client’s interests and needs, and match these to opportunities,. A second advisor using “developmental theory” will take into account how the client will develop and change over time, and how the client will learn new knowledge and skills.

These two theories, designed to support the advisor to move the client forward, may have different outcomes. A practitioner using Egans model will presume the practitioner has a rapport with the client, whereas the later developed Hambly model, which was built on Egan, doesn’t assume anything.

Without evidence-based research, practitioners will not know, apart from through their own experiences, what the best framework for providing IAG (information, advice and guidance) is.

In addition, as we have addressed, models and theories need to develop to meet the needs of the current time.

Practitioners of IAG, as part of their personal development, will keep up to date with new theories and models through a number of ways, one being a shift in agenda by government policies.

Theories of career choice and decision making

Theories of career choice and decision making have developed over the years building on good practice and research, starting from:

1950’s – Differentialism

1960’s – Developmentalism

1970’s – Stucturalism

1990’s – Social learning

1990-2000’s – Constructivism, planned happenstance and community interaction theory.

The Constructivist Approach

The constructivist approach (Savikas Young and Collin (1992), works on the client’s level, allowing individuals to make their own choices in the context of their own interpretation of the world, which has been referred to as the ‘narrative approach.’

The constructive approach takes into account that we all perceive the world differently through our own personal filters which generally include the client’s past experiences, their generalisations, deletions and distortions and the state the client is in.

As an example, two people thinking about a parachute jump will have two completely different internal representations, one person may feel excited while the other may become highly nervous. This is the same for when a client thinks of a certain career choice, the client may ‘excited,’ ‘bored,’ ‘fearful,’ or any number of emotional reactions.

In this way, the advisor has to be aware that they and the client will be representing the session differently and will need to ask ‘clean language’ questions to continue to build rapport and to help the client move forward.

To understand the client’s world in more detail, the advisor can ask the client what they know about a certain topic, while at the same time not imposing their own constructs onto the client.

Constructivism highlights that the teacher, which may be an IAG advisor, will need to provide sensory input so the client will construct meaning from it.

With each experience, the client will learn and their view of the world may be re-enforced or changed. By suggesting situations without adding your own perspective the client will make their own construct from this, which adds to their learning.

This learning is then internally and most likely subconsciously rather than consciously remembered, affecting future perspectives as this situation may be generalised, deleted or part deleted and distorted.

This theory is highly client-led, but can take time as the advisor cannot suggest ways forward and can only offer situations for the client to digest and then perceive in their own way, learning which each new perceived situation.

Clients can easily build up limiting beliefs that may need challenging in a constructive way, by asking clients questions on their situations and past experiences while the advisor asking situation questions do not add their own interpretation onto the client which may break rapport.

Planned Happenstance

Planned Happenstance (Mitchell 1999, Krumboltz and Lewin 2004) theory allows clients to make career choices by keeping an open mind, taking hold of new opportunities and engaging in networking.

Planned Happenstance affects all people in all areas of their lives and affects people’s interpretation of their world (constructivism.) when planning a career, clients and advisors cannot predict how politics, new advances in technology and world economics will affect their planned future career opportunities.

These unplanned events can create opportunities for people, which when grasped can open new exciting opportunities that were never predicted. Pathways are often unfolded, rather than planned, if clients keep an open mind rather than sticking to a well thought out plan, that can in some instances become a barrier rather than a support mechanism, the client may receive “once in a lifetime opportunities.”

Planned happenstance is highly effective as clients cannot know all the possibilities available to them. The advisor, to give the client the best opportunity should endeavor to build up the client’s networking skills to increase new planned happenstance opportunities.

Advisors should use opportunities to help them client reframe situations which is the opposite of the constructivism theory where advisors recognize the client’s perceived view of the world.

By increasing the client’s activities, networking opportunities and opportunities they are more likely to naturally find planned happenstance situations.

In some cases, a client may choose planned happenstance rather than sticking to a planned career path, believing that this new opportunity will suit them well or that they may miss out on a good opportunity while waiting for their ideal career.

Once in this ‘good opportunity’, clients may fall into the routine of this new position and miss out on the ideal position they could have held out for.

This means clients should way up each opportunity against their criteria making a more informed discussion rather than taking any opportunity, in this way planned happenstance is a conscious, purposeful, and on-going process that will help the client to build a more satisfying and fulfilling career.

Community Interaction Theory

Community interaction theory (Law 1981) suggests that some of the most influential factors in career choice relate to events that occur in the context of ‘community interaction’ between the individual and their social groups.

Law identified 5 components that affect people and their career choices;

Expectations – this can be pressure from family members to follow a certain career.
Feedback — ongoing positive and negative feedback and re-enforced messages from peers, family and professionals.
Support — reinforcement of aspirations and assistance in developing appropriate skills and strategies.
Modeling — can be conscious and unconscious and can be positive or negative, clients may model peers, family and professionals and can also feed into the expectations criteria.
Information — opportunities to find out about options that can feed into the planned happenstance theory.

The amount of information a person receives around career opportunities, LMI (labor market information) and career advice and the quality of this advice affects how the client will perceive the world (constructivism)

These 5 components can come from many sources including family, professionals, peers and friends and by exploring these 5 components the advisor can understand how external factors affect the client and can work with the client to overcome these difficulties and to help them deal with any barriers to moving the client forward.

If needed advisors can support the clients to gain more positive community interactions in all 5 components.

For an advisor working with ethnic groups, advisors need to be aware of cultural differences and cultural history and how these affect the clients. Without this knowledge, advisors may break rapport or at the worst build up new barriers.

Egans Model

Egans model of career guidance is a well known and used career guidance model. This is a 3 stage model used to help people solve problems and to develop opportunities.

The Egan model addresses 3 main questions:

“What is going on?”

“What do I want instead?”

“How might I get what I want?”

These questions can be asked and answered in one session, but will often be discussed over several sessions.

The 3 steps make it easy for both the advisor and client to know where they are what stage they will be moving onto next. Egan is easy to use and is client-focused while continuing to develop the client throughout the 3 stages.

The model is forward moving which has a positive motivation behind it, but with some clients, you may need to return to an earlier stage especially after large breaks between appointments and the Egan model does not allow this.

Unlike Hambly’s integrative model, Egan presumes the advisor already has rapport where in many cases advisors may need to build rapport up over several sessions to deal with any deep issues the client has to face.

Egans model is highly solution focus, asking in part 2 futuristic questions and also covers blind spots, feelings and potential barriers while keeping a focus on moving forward.

The Egan model uses leverage, commitment and action planning to keep the client on track and motivated with what had been agreed in the session, the action plan also allows the client to see the distance traveled.

The action plan stage often uses SMART actions and allows the client to time-bound actions asking “what will you do first?” Egan is found to be client-focused with emphasis on future action and client involvement designed to empower.

Once the endpoint has been reached, the experience of trying out can be the starting point for mentoring sessions allowing the Egan model to start again.

The Integrative Model

The Integrative model was built on Egan with a focus on career advice and unlike Egan who assumes rapport and contracting, Hambly uses stage one of three stages to address and establish these foundations.

Hamblys model, unlike Egan, allows a flow through the model allowing if needed for advisors to return to any stage throughout the model. Like Egan, Hamblys model is client-led – looking at the client’s story, has a focus on moving forward, looks for blind spots and agrees on commitment and actions for the client to move forward.

June 11, 2013September 2, 2021

10 Facts about Care Sector Jobs

1. Due to medical and technological advancements, we have an aging population – we are all living longer. For the care sector, this means they need to train and recruit more staff then ever before to meet the demands of this sector.

2. The recent baby boom has predicted that this sector is set to grow. Currently there aren’t enough trained carers to meet this potential demand.

3. Care jobs vary depending on the support required by your clients. Support required for some elderly clients is low; you may be tasked with befriending a large number of old age pensioners who lack of support network. In this role you may take the OAP on trips, shopping, to doctor appointments or just to have a cup of tea and a chat. The middle includes the same duties, but you may offer additional support, such as making tea, checking they have took their medication and even some small DIY task. The final stage may include offering specialist support or even delivering personal care to the elderly.

4. Many people get into caring roles due to their caring nature. You also have to remember that your patients may deteriorate and at some stage will pass away. As a carer you may be the person who discovers the decease or witnesses as an example hart attack. You to ensure that you are capable (after training) to handle these situations, and to be able not to take grief situations home with you. For care roles you need to ensure your personality traits, work ethic and values to match the right care role.

5. Entry route to these roles generally start at level 3 (college level). For specialist roles such as therapist and nurses you will be required to gain a degree. Course entry routes and duration can be found on university prospectuses.

6. For applicants wanting to work in specialist fields including Physical Therapy, Alzheimer’s, Mental Health or Nurse you first have to qualify at university in this particular specialism.

7. Surprisingly recent statistics have shown an increase in crimes committed by the elderly, which may see an increase in prison guards specifically trained to work with OAPs.

8. With many carer roles, you will work shift work. Some care positions include “stay over’s” which may include sleeping at a patients house or care home. As part of the application process you need to ensure you highlight your willingness to do this.

9. Entry level jobs are mainly as care assistants; supporting care workers in care homes. Care homes and hospitals also recruit cleaners, cooks and orderlies to help support their patients.

10. New regulations are predicted to come into practice to ensure the safety and care of OAPs in all sectors of this industry from care homes to specialist support. These regulations will include an increase in unplanned visits by the regulating authorities.

Check out care sector jobs here: Care sector jobs

June 5, 2013December 12, 2020

Need a New Career?

“Find Out What You Love To Do and Get Paid For Doing It”

man in a creative search

The best career advice you will ever receive is to fully understand what you love to do, and then get paid for doing it.

One quick way to complete this task is by creating a list of all your career likes and dislikes

Career Likes (example)

• Creativity

• Working on my own initiative

• Working on multiple projects

• Giving and sharing ideas

• Seeing the end result to my work

• Receiving regular feedback

• Short distance to travel to work

Career Dislikes (example)

• Working on one long project

• Analytical work

• Working 9-5

• Being a small part of a big team

• Not being able to travel to work on my bike

• Targets

Next take your Career Likes and put them in order of preference, which is the most important like With your dislikes, ask yourself if I had all/most of my likes would I be still work in a role where I had to (add a dislike) do this for all your dislikes.

Now you have a better understanding of what is important to you, in your career. You can take this knowledge and match it against job specifications. To find job roles or new careers, re-read your list and if your key like is around “creativity” Google “creative job roles” or as an example you may love finances, so Google “financial job roles”

Research which career sector and then specific role would best suit you. The final stage is preparing your application or in some cases re-training to ensure you meet the employers essential criteria.

May 31, 2013December 12, 2020

Top 7 Reasons To Become a Life Coach

Reason 1

You get paid for helping other people be successful. This is a really rewarding career as you see your clients journey from the initial session all the way through to the last, where the client will often have changed in terms of confidence, self esteem and motivation.

Reason 2

A life coach can charge what hourly rate suits them (often between £50-£300 per hour) you choose your own hours to create your own life/work balance, you are your own boss and you can even work from home. Many coaches deliver face to face, telephone, Skype and e-mail sessions.

Reason 3

You will learn many skills as a coach from rapport building, influencing skills, communication, motivation…the list is endless. A good starting point is to learn coaching techniques, at the end of this article you will have a chance to download 101 coaching techniques

Reason 4

You don’t even require a qualification. There are no regulations in the coaching sector, if you have the personal skills required, know the coaching techniques and are able manage your own time and business then a coaching business is easy to set up.

Reason 5

Coaches can make a lot of money. Many coaches as well as coaching people make money by selling e-products, becoming an affiliate, delivering workshops and publishing books.

Reason 6

As a coach you wall meet some intersting peopel, including clients and through networking. If you are interested in people then coaching is an excellent career choice.

Reason 7

A coaching business can be established within 24 hrs, that’s right, with the right tools and advice you can be up and running by this time tomorrow. And if you know the secrets to internet marketing, which I will share with you below your website can me on Google page One within 60 minutes.

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May 28, 2013

5 Reasons Not to Start a Life Coaching Business

Becoming a self employed life coach is highly rewarding, as you get paid for helping others. But there are reasons why some people shouldn’t become a life coach.

influence the interview

Get Rich Quick; as with all self employed businesses, becoming a life coach won’t make you a millionaire over night. The more you put in the more you will get out of the business in terms of job satisfaction and financial reward. Most coaches charge between £50-£300 per session. As you can see, money can be made but first you need to know the secrets of securing clients and this comes with time.

I’m a Good Talker; Life coaching isn’t just about talking, in fact great life coaches listen more then they talk. Newbie life coaches might be tempted to give people their advice, where in reality life coaches aren’t advisors their coaches, which means you need to learn how to word your questions so the clients can find their own answers to their own problems

I Don’t Like Manual Work; as a life coach you will generally work form an office or your home. There is no manual work involved in life coaching but life coaching is mentally straining. Some people believe that being a life coach is an easy job; as with all careers once you become an expert the pressure is off, but all coaches will agree helping others can be mentally tiring, which means you need to ensure that the stress from supporting others doesn’t affect you

No Overhead Cost; setting up a life coaching business is very cheap. You don’t even need to attend any of the hundreds of life coaching training seminars that are available as long as you know and understanding the techniques life coaches use. Most coaches work from home, so again no cost. But their are hidden cost, one you will need to pay for insurance, two internet marketing is a key part to a coaching business, which means you need to learn how to dominate Google and finally, good coaches will continue to develop their skills, which means paying for additional training and workshops.

5. I Want To Give My Job Up; many people choose life coaching as a career, because they don’t like their current job. First I would advice getting some careers advice before changing careers, but what you also need to remember is that setting up a life coaching business that earns you a salary you can live on can take awhile. I always advise coaches to start their coaching business part time, this way you can still have a part time salaried job with a steady income.

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May 10, 2013December 12, 2020

Why You Should Choose Volunteering Over A Summer Holiday: Tips For Graduates

Each year the number of university applicants and starts is increasing.

Even more important, students securing high level qualifications is also on the increase, what this means for any academic is that competition is for any high level academic position is strong.

When recruiting graduates, employers do consider job hunters qualifications and positions such as finance, law and medical sectors all have specific entry requirements, which means all applicants will have the same qualification.

To secure your first paid job, you need to stand out at the job interview and one way to do this is through your experience. and a lack of experience is the number one reason why new graduates don’t secure employment within the first 6 months of graduating. During the summer holidays it is very tempting to gain any paid job to give yourself that all important income.

Students study hard and party hard, all this partying cost money. Students these days also have a passion for fashion. the fashion and partying is all part of the student life style and this life style needs funding. You need to look long term, not short term. you cna get a paid job in a fast food chain or retail outlet giving you a disposable income, but what if you didn’t?

Instead you could spend your summer holidays volunteering in a range of sector specific placements. what you lack in funds, you will make up in experience.

And once graduated, this experience will come in to it’s own, because the employer can only be impressed by your commitment to your career. The employer will be blown away by the vast experiences you, as a graduate have already undertook and the skills you have learnt can add value to their team.

Who would you employ if you had the choice of two graduate, the one with the qualifications and a lack of experience, or the second applicant with both experience and qualifications?

May 10, 2013December 12, 2020

Can You Use White Lies on a CV?

First a WARNING, white lies are fine, but be careful as employers have a legal right to dismiss employees who lie on their applications/resumes. But we all make white lies, and a tweak here and there on your resume can be the difference between you receiving that all important interview offer or not.

The Job Title Killer?

Companies are very creative with their job titles; the problem here is that one business may use a term (or job title) that another doesn’t.

When applying for a new position, you may record the job title used in your current job that might be misunderstood by the new employer.

Remember many employers will initial skim through your resume, checking if you have the relevant experience, if they wrongly believe that your creative job title is a different job to the one you are applying for, you may be quickly dismiss from the interview list. Examples of this are “Planner” or “Landscape Architect” “janitor” or “Sanitation Engineer”

Close the Gap.

Delete the months and only leave the years in your employment history section as this deletes any short periods of unemployment. Employers will just presume you haven’t been unemployed.

Words Have Power.

The words you hear have different representations, even though the word itself has the same meaning. In the Resume you need to use power words, as power words will create the overall stronger impression, from the employer perspective.

Which sentence sounds the best? “A good team player” or “an excellent team player” both sentences have the same meaning, but the second sentence sounds stronger by replacing one word. Go through your resume and edit the words, until you create the best overall impression.

May 10, 2013December 12, 2020

14 Jobs You Wouldn’t Expect in the Healthcare Sector

There are hundreds of various jobs available in the healthcare industry from entry positions through to consultant. Some of the less known careers include:

Ambulance Care Assistant

– taking patients to and from hospital in the ambulance. Entry requirements; clean driving licence and a good general education.

Anatomical Pathology Technologist

– examining patient who have died to identify the cause of death. Entry Requirements, none for the assistant role, degree level for specialist doctor

Music/Art Therapist

– using art/music to help patients express emotional difficulties. Entry requirements; Degree/post grad degree

Biomedical Scientist

– investigates body fluids/tissue to enable doctors to diagnose illnesses. Entry requirements; biomedical degree

Caterers

– to prepare patients meals following nutritional regulations. Entry requirements; varies on level of chef

Management team (admin, catering, etc)

– to run/manage various departments. Relevant degree in Management

Clinical Cytogeneticist

– studying chromosomes from sample of human blood/tissues. Entry Requirements; Honours Degree

Clinical Photographer

– taking photos/videos of patients conditions to be used in the consultant progress. Entry requirements; clinical photographer degree

Dietician

– giving advice to patients on the nutrition of food. Entry requirements; BSC in Nutrition

Emergency Medical Dispatcher

– sending vehicles to incidents as quickly as possible. Entry requirements; good education (on the job training)

Finance Team

– deal with parole, pensions, and financial reports. Entry requirements; degree in finance

ICT Support Technician

– supporting all healthcare professionals with IT issues. Entry Requirements; degree in ITC

Maintenance Staff

– responsible for building, grounds, cleaning. Entry Requirements; Various on level of role

Occupational Therapist

– help children to overcome physical and psychological problems. Entry Requirements; BSC in occupational therapy