How to sell yourself on your resume when you are young and without experience?
28 August 2014
Read by 3973 persons
When you are still a student and with few jobs behind you, it's hard to write a strong resume. How to highlight yourself despite everything? Our expert gives you his recommendations...
Like every week, Gilles Payet, employment coach on Questions d'emploi and Mon coaching emploi, answers the questions of 20 Minutes' Internet users.
Dimension: How to make a more or less credible resume when you are a young person still at school and you want to find a job for the summer, for example, or for internships?
Hello,
Principle of reality: since you have no professional experience to support your approach, support it on your natural skills, your qualities but also and especially on a project. What can you do concretely for the person you are addressing?
Your approach:
- Do this triple work of identifying your qualities, knowledge and skills
- Identify internships, jobs, sectors that you like a priori and for which your skills are adapted
- Build a personalized speech (do not copy-paste) on what you could concretely bring to your contact
Noelle: The resume, what do you think? My 16-year-old daughter is leaving school to look for an apprenticeship, she is presenting herself to a potential employer who asks her for her resume. My daughter replied that she did not have one. This person asked her to come back with a resume. In her place I would have taken the opportunity to ask her why she was applying for this job, if the hours didn't scare her, etc. A person who has charisma will sell you a castle in Spain. A person who has golden hands will make you a house with four pieces of wood.
Hello,
You are obviously right about the active questioning that this employer should have conducted in the presence of your daughter. It's common sense. As it is common sense to leave aside a justified criticism to concentrate on what I call the rules of the game (here to provide a resume).
I invite you on this subject, for the sake of personal efficiency, to always respect the initial conditions - and only afterwards (or in parallel with this "constrained" action) to propose a different (or complementary) solution.
For example, and to take up the specific situation of your daughter, what it is/was possible to do or say:
Response time n° 1: "Noted, thank you very much for this important information. I will therefore send you this resume this afternoon."
Response time n° 2: "Would you have just 30 seconds for me to explain why my application would be very interesting for you?"
Or
"Would you be kind enough to give me 30 seconds - no more - to explain to you everything I could accomplish as an apprentice at xxx (company name)?"
Or even
"I applied in particular at xxx because I had noted that in the products you market there was xxx and it turns out that I know xxx that I know particularly well how to do xxx"
And even if the person replies "No, I really don't have time", you have still scored points because you have given relief to your application. A first contact during which you were able to offer a first level of involvement, relevance, intelligence in relation to your approach. The receipt of the resume in the afternoon will be looked at with more attention than if you had simply remained at a level of response without exchange.
Explaining this to your daughter will allow her to be (even if the exercise is difficult of course) perhaps more comfortable next time?
I wish her good luck in her efforts. Do not hesitate to contact me if you need anything.
Gilles Payet.
20minutes.fr
Posted online on August 28, 2014.
Like every week, Gilles Payet, employment coach on Questions d'emploi and Mon coaching emploi, answers the questions of 20 Minutes' Internet users.
Dimension: How to make a more or less credible resume when you are a young person still at school and you want to find a job for the summer, for example, or for internships?
Hello,
Principle of reality: since you have no professional experience to support your approach, support it on your natural skills, your qualities but also and especially on a project. What can you do concretely for the person you are addressing?
Your approach:
- Do this triple work of identifying your qualities, knowledge and skills
- Identify internships, jobs, sectors that you like a priori and for which your skills are adapted
- Build a personalized speech (do not copy-paste) on what you could concretely bring to your contact
Noelle: The resume, what do you think? My 16-year-old daughter is leaving school to look for an apprenticeship, she is presenting herself to a potential employer who asks her for her resume. My daughter replied that she did not have one. This person asked her to come back with a resume. In her place I would have taken the opportunity to ask her why she was applying for this job, if the hours didn't scare her, etc. A person who has charisma will sell you a castle in Spain. A person who has golden hands will make you a house with four pieces of wood.
Hello,
You are obviously right about the active questioning that this employer should have conducted in the presence of your daughter. It's common sense. As it is common sense to leave aside a justified criticism to concentrate on what I call the rules of the game (here to provide a resume).
I invite you on this subject, for the sake of personal efficiency, to always respect the initial conditions - and only afterwards (or in parallel with this "constrained" action) to propose a different (or complementary) solution.
For example, and to take up the specific situation of your daughter, what it is/was possible to do or say:
Response time n° 1: "Noted, thank you very much for this important information. I will therefore send you this resume this afternoon."
Response time n° 2: "Would you have just 30 seconds for me to explain why my application would be very interesting for you?"
Or
"Would you be kind enough to give me 30 seconds - no more - to explain to you everything I could accomplish as an apprentice at xxx (company name)?"
Or even
"I applied in particular at xxx because I had noted that in the products you market there was xxx and it turns out that I know xxx that I know particularly well how to do xxx"
And even if the person replies "No, I really don't have time", you have still scored points because you have given relief to your application. A first contact during which you were able to offer a first level of involvement, relevance, intelligence in relation to your approach. The receipt of the resume in the afternoon will be looked at with more attention than if you had simply remained at a level of response without exchange.
Explaining this to your daughter will allow her to be (even if the exercise is difficult of course) perhaps more comfortable next time?
I wish her good luck in her efforts. Do not hesitate to contact me if you need anything.
Gilles Payet.
20minutes.fr
Posted online on August 28, 2014.
