If you are searching for a new position, the #1 most dangerous thing you can do is ask yourself questions about your job search.

“What do you mean?” you may ask.  “Are you crazy?  All the job search guides tell me to answer questions like what my goals are and what my ideal job is.  If I don’t ask myself questions, how will I get answers?”

The problem with asking yourself questions is that it is really difficult to have a conversation with yourself.  Asking yourself questions will get you only the answers that you can generate yourself.  Those answers are necessarily limited. 

Your conversation might sound something like this:  “What do I want to do next?  Oh, I don’t really want to think about that.  I’m confused.  The economy sucks.  Maybe I’ll never get a job again.  I think I have to do the laundry.  Wait, what was that question?”

Thankfully, there’s an alternative to this mind chatter:  Have someone ELSE – someone you trust – ask you the important job search questions.  You might be surprised at the clarity you achieve when you bounce ideas off another human being.  That person might be a job search coach or a relative or a friend.  It MUST be someone who listens extremely well and asks good questions.

Here are the Top 10 questions to have someone ELSE ask you.  Give this list to someone you trust and have him or her read it to you, one question at a time:

1. What do you love about your current position (or last position)?
2. What don’t you like about your current position (or last position)?
3. What would be your ideal work schedule?
4. Do you work best with people or alone?  With a lot of supervision or little supervision?
5. What size organization and corporate culture are the best matches for you?
6. How much money do you want/need to make?
7. Is there a job at your current company that you would want to do?  And/or is there a way your current job could become your dream job?
8. What’s your dream job?
9. Who in your life can you talk to about what it’s like to do X job?
10. What will you do to find out more about the day to day realities of X job?

It doesn’t hurt to begin by answering these questions on your own.  You might have some success in generating useful answers.  But whatever you do, don’t stop there.  I guarantee you that some new thought or clarity will come from having a conversation about these questions with someone other than yourself.

If you have a conversation and have success, please report the results in the comments.  I’d love to hear about your experiences!

It has become automatic for me that the end of summer means I’m heading to dance camp.  In fact, I almost didn’t go to camp this year because I had so much work to do, engagements on my calendar, etc.  But this ritual of camp is so ingrained that a week ago I cancelled all my appointments and bought a plane ticket.  The end of summer just isn’t the same without dance camp.

The end of summer also means fall colors coming, and crispness in the air.  Apples flooding the farmers market where berries used to be.  Thoughts of snow shovels encroaching.

Most important, however (yes even more important than dance camp), the end of summer means admissions season is approaching, and life is about to get even busier for The Essay Expert.  For the past nine months I have been a resume writer and business owner, as well as a career advisor at the University of Wisconsin Law School.  In a few short weeks, “College Admissions Essay Advisor” will move to the top of the list along with “Law School Admissions Consultant” for Kaplan.

I look forward to this upcoming time of year.  College and law school applicants all have unique stories to tell, and I love learning and exploring them.  I love working with students, helping them gain insights into their lives that they might not have had otherwise.  I love watching people’s stories reveal themselves onto the page in a way that captures the interest of admissions officers because no one else could have told those stories in that particular way.

And of course I love helping clients get into the colleges and law schools of their choice.

I associate apples and fall crispness, even Thanksgiving, with the process of shepherding students into their next phase of life.  It’s a rewarding venture and the results will flower with the spring.  In the meantime, I’m heading to dance camp.  I’ll have more bloggery for you when I get back.

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I’m curious…  what does the approach of the end of summer mean to you?  Are you a job seeker getting ready to buckle down in your search?  Are you the parent of a high school senior getting ready to increase your encouragement for your child to write an essay draft?  Are you a teacher writing letters of recommendation?  Please share in the comments below.

If you want to make your cover letter stand out, make sure to avoid these words completely.  You might be surprised at the result.

1.  HOPE

e.g. I hope to hear from you soon.

OR

e.g. I hope to be able to contribute my skills to ABC company.

Why not?

Hope springs eternal.  The company doesn’t care about your hopes and dreams.  They care about what you can do for them.

Alternatives:

I look forward to speaking with you further regarding my qualifications.

OR

My ability to take clear, decisive action will allow me to make an impact at ABC company from day one.

OK, now we’re talking!

2.  HONE

e.g. This summer, I honed my research and writing skills through a position at XX law firm.

Why not?

You and every other person honed something.  It’s an outdated and overused expression.  Tell them what you did and they will figure out that you honed your skills.  If you absolutely must, use “strengthened,” “developed,” or even “sharpened.”

Alternative:

My research regarding constitutional rights violations culminated in a report and recommendations that guided the ACLU in future actions.

It’s obvious this person is using some powerful research and writing skills.

3.  DRAWN

e.g. I am drawn to ABC company because of its outstanding reputation and high quality service.

Why not?

You get drawn to a person across a crowded room.  Companies don’t care to hear that you are drawn to them.  And a bonus tip:  companies with outstanding reputations don’t need to be told that you want to work there because of their outstanding reputations.

Alternative:

The relationship management skills I built while working in a state office are a match for ABC company’s commitment to outstanding customer relationships.

That’s so much better, isn’t it?

4.  FEEL

e.g. I feel the relationship management skills I built while working in a state office are a match for ABC company’s commitment to outstanding customer relationships.

Why not?

Can you see how adding “I feel” at the beginning of this sentence killed it completely?  Tell a psychologist how you feel.  Tell a company what you can do for them.  If you must, use the word “believe” instead of “feel.”  But see if you can avoid this type of language altogether.

Alternative:

The relationship management skills I built while working in a state office are a match for ABC company’s commitment to outstanding customer relationships.

Delete these four words from your cover letters and I promise you more creative and powerful language will show up.

Did you try it?  Share examples in the comments please!

I’ve always thought that typos, so long as they are few and far between, are less egregious errors than misspellings and other errors that stem from lack of knowledge.  Apparently a U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals judge agrees that people — and multi-billion dollar companies — who make typos should be given a second chance:  Verizon $1.67 bln typo can be fixed: court  I imagine my own typos and yours won’t have such monumental consequences.  Our readers are our judges, and we can only hope they have the same understanding as our nation’s highest courts. 

That said, if you are applying for jobs, your resume and cover letter are not the most ideal places to err.  Make sure to read, re-read, and re-read again.  There’s no need to risk judgment from a hiring manager that costs you a job.

Guess what?  The importance of the essay has moved up in the list  – from #7 to #6 — since the last survey!  Part of the reason for this is that many colleges have begun to make the SAT and ACT optional with “test optional” policies.  The essay continues to be more important to private liberal arts colleges than it is at large state universities, so if you are targeting Ivy League and other top private schools, put some focused attention on the essay part of your application.

It’s hard to write a good essay without good material.  Not surprisingly, factors #4 and #7-10, are all essay-related as well.  “Passionate involvement in a few activities, demonstrating leadership and initiative,” which ranks #4, gives you great essay material.  “Special talents or experiences” comes in at #7 and is also fodder for an outstanding essay, as is “demonstrated leadership in activities” (#8), a factor that showed up for the first time on the list this year. 

It is crystal clear from this list that schools are not looking for well-rounded students – they are looking for leaders.  It is much more important to get deeply involved in a few activities than to do a little of everything.  And you’ll have a lot more to write about in your essay if you take on leadership positions that require you to manage people, organize big projects and events, and grow as a person.

Note that succeeding in these areas requires some planning ahead.  If you are not a harp player already by the time you are entering your senior year of high school, it is unlikely that you will become one.  If you haven’t been deeply involved in a student organization, it might be difficult to take on leadership suddenly.  It’s more important than ever to find your passion early and follow it.

Finally, “demonstrated enthusiasm to attend” ranked #10 in the survey.  Take this factor under advisement as you write your essay.  You would do well to write something about why you want to attend a particular school, especially if it’s your first or second choice.  Just make sure to send the correct essay to each school, mentioning the school you’re applying to and not another school!  Mixing this one up is a great way to get yourself into the “no” pile (and it happens all the time).

Thankfully, you have a lot of guidance about how to get into the “yes” pile.  Determine where you will most stand out as an interesting candidate with leadership abilities, and write a great essay about it.

For help on your essay from The Essay Expert, contact us at info@TheEssayExpert.com or by phone at 608-467-0067 OR 717-390-6696.

Your senior year will be busy.  You will probably be visiting college campuses, formulating your list of schools and taking the SAT subject tests, in addition to balancing your regular plate of schoolwork and activities.  So it’s important to do anything you can do for your applications now.

If you want to avoid last minute panic, follow these suggestions and get a jump start on your college applications:

1.    If you are having essay-worthy experiences this summer, don’t trust that your memory will recall all the details of those experiences.  **Write them down!!**  Trust me, it will make the essay writing process SO much easier than it would be with just your memory to rely on.

2.    If you’re not engaged in some interesting activities and adventures this summer, do some self reflection and find something to jump into.  It doesn’t have to be glamorous – you could get a job in a bakery or video store and make an essay out of it.  A great essay is more about who you are and how you experience your life than about the actual things you do.

3.    If you haven’t already, ask your teachers NOW for letters of recommendation.  They will appreciate having the extra time to think and write.  See my article, http://theessayexpert.com/blog/2010/05/29/before-you-graduate-start-now-on-your-letters-of-recommendation-lors/

4.    Write an essay draft.  It doesn’t have to be perfect.  Just get something down on paper.  It will get your ideas flowing and take off some of the pressure you might otherwise experience in the fall. 

5.    Talk to your parents and friends about your ideas.  And if you do write a draft of your essay, share it with others.  They might have insights into your experiences and growth that you don’t have.  After all, you only have one brain and it can only recognize so much about itself!  

6.    On August 1, download the Common Application Form and fill out all the generic information you can (name, address, etc.)  Get those details out of the way so they don’t clutter your brain and you can focus on writing your essays.

Follow these six suggestions and you will have much more peace and brain space so you can focus on your other senior year activities — and you’ll have more FUN too!!

While this image is hilarious, if the interview were for a mechanic  or an assembler of chairs at IKEA, the scene would not be so farfetched.  And in fact, it is not unusual for an interviewer to test an interviewee with a task to perform on the spot.  A good interviewer might test your practical skills in an interview, or your ability to respond to criticism, by asking you to perform a task or adjust your demeanor mid-interview.

I once interviewed a young man for a social worker position at the non-profit where I worked in Brooklyn, NY.  There were two of us interviewing him, and I really liked him.  He answered questions well and I was considering hiring him.  My frustration was that he never made eye contact with me.  It seemed as if he were gazing off into space and not fully connecting with me.  And I knew there was no way I would actually hire him if he couldn’t make eye contact.

I did something perhaps unconventional.  I stopped the interview, told him what I was experiencing, and asked him why he wasn’t making eye contact.  He gave a reasonable response that he was struggling with having two interviewers and didn’t want either of us to get all his focus.  From that moment in the interview, he made full eye contact with either me or my associate.

I hired him.

Why?  Because I knew beyond doubt from that interview that this man took criticism and coaching well, and could implement a suggestion quickly and effectively.  He also had all the other qualifications we were looking for.

He is still working at the organization today, and is appreciated for his work ethic and great attitude, as well as for the results he produces.

So this IKEA cartoon, while humorous, might not be that far off the mark for something you might be called upon to perform on the spot in an interview.  Luckily, all the tools you need are already in your possession.  You just need to be good at following directions.

The fact is, we all love a good story.  Admissions committees love good stories.  Hiring managers love good stories.  Customers and clients love good stories.  Always remember:  the person you’re writing for is a human being!  How do you get another human being to read your document?  Spin a good yarn!

If you’re applying to college, tell a story with a beginning, middle and end.  I had a client who wrote about teaching his sister to ride a bike.  His first draft was all rosy about how great the experience was, and it did not have a compelling beginning, middle and end.  He felt lost in the writing, and the essay was boring. 

What ultimately made the story great was that he started at the beginning, when he was annoyed at his sister for being small and clumsy, then moved through the process of a breakthrough in becoming a teacher, and a better teacher — and finally to where he released the seat and the sister took off on her own on the bike.  Victory!  A great story.

In college applications, many times what makes a great story is to admit to a struggle or fault, and show how you broke through it.  In a cover letter, believe it or not, you can do the same thing. 

All kinds of people are saying “No one reads cover letters anymore.”  Well, of course no one is reading them – because they are stilted and boring and no one can get through them!  Have you ever considered that if you write a good enough story in your cover letter that it really *will* get read!

Do you have an example of a time when a project was failing, and you stepped in to fix it?  That makes a great story!  Is there an example of something you achieved that relates to the job you’re applying for?  Don’t be afraid to tell these stories in your cover letters!

On your resume, too, tell as much of a story as you can in a bulleted line. 

What not to write:  “Assisted scientists with their research.” 

What to write: “Conducted genetic, epidemiology, and behavior research on sport fish in Illinois, Canada, and the Bahamas.”

Ah, now that sounds kind of interesting!

For an example of a bio that tells a great story or two, see Senior Investment Analyst Bio on The Essay Expert’s website.   This client reported to me that she loved her bio story so much that she kept reading it to herself after it was done!

Whatever the reason, we all love a good story.  Tell one in your college and job applications.  Tell one in your bio.  If you do it well, your intended audience will keep reading…  and reading…  and reading.