Hi, there lovely readers. Ever applied for a job that had your name all over it, sent your application then kicked back to wait for the call to interview? Instead, nothing. Nada. Crickets. Confidence starts to slide and soon the motivation to continue your job search morphs into couch slouching, watching dodgy mid-day movies while dust-busting biscuit crumbs off your chest.

Well now! That just won’t do will it? Let’s throw that discouragement to the curb, review the most common reasons recruiters might not be calling you back and take a course correction for better results ok?

First up, the Resume

Your resume is the first critical step to getting you through the door, that’s after the document has managed to make it through the scan bots (more on that later) into the 6-second read pile. So what annoys the recruiter the most?

Format: unusual fonts, tiny font size, colour, pictures, tables, former company symbols, excessive white space, misaligned paragraphs all serve to annoy the recruiter. Keep your resume crisp, clean and no more than two pages.

Grammar: Given 58% of recruiters will dismiss your resume thanks to a spelling error or two this is a critical element. I can’t tell you how many resumes I’ve seen as a personal branding specialist where the owner has listed ‘Attention to detail’ as a strength, yet poor syntax, punctuation, inconsistent tense and spelling errors all negate the statement. Print a copy and have a friend review. Moreover, if you’re concerned about your grammar, you may find ‘Grammarly’ helpful. A great little site that picks up errors provides important alternative words and checks for ease of readability.

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