Writing outstanding job applications - Part 2

Last week, we started a series of 3 articles on how to write outstanding job applications.

If you remember, the first article covered what to do if your applications are still far away and how to prep ahead of time.

This article covers how to create a job application system that will help you be more efficient and write better applications.

The 3rd and last article, which is coming up next week, will help you tie all this together and write amazing resumes.

So, let me first explain why I think having an application system will make your life much easier in the long term. I have two arguments for that:

1) First, it is going to save you time.

You are probably applying for multiple jobs or to multiple companies and, unfortunately, writing one application for all won't cut it because recruiters will quickly realise it is generic and question your interest in the job. That's why you need to tailor each application to the specific job, and since there will likely be overlap, creating a baseline resume that you tweak to each application will save you time in the long run.

2) Second, it will help you write better applications.

When writing job applications, I think people often try to do multiple things simultaneously. It likely goes like this: you try to recall what you have done previously and with what result. As you do that, you critically discard some of your experiences, select relevant ones, tailor them to the job posting and formulate them into well-sounding sentences that will resonate with the recruiter.

The problem with this approach is not only that it is a highly inefficient use of your attention requiring you to rapidly switch between divergent and convergent thinking. It is also that you will not be able to recall all relevant experiences on the spot and select ones that are the best possible representation of your factual capabilities.

That's why the process can benefit from separating these activities into discrete time blocks. If you give yourself time to recall, select, formulate and make the resume recruiter-friendly in separate intervals, you can focus on each step fully and improve the quality of their outputs.

As you go through each step, you create a selection of things that you can choose from further down the line. Writing a resume becomes a buffet: you have all the ingredients handy and it becomes a matter of choosing the best ones to convey your message well.

Now that you're on board, we can get into step 1.

1)    Gather experiences

You first need to gather all the experiences in one place to have a clear and complete overview of what you have done. 

To do that, create a document listing all courses, projects, degrees, competitions, internships, workshops, etc., you have participated in. For each of them, note down your day-to-day activities and the outcomes of those activities.

Now is not the time to be critical and choose which experiences and activities you will select for your application. It is a time to get everything on paper and once you have a critical mass in front of you, you can choose the most valuable ones.

I suggest taking at least a few days to create this list, as you likely won’t be able to recall everything in one sitting. As things randomly come to mind in a span of a few days, don’t rely on your ability to remember it later and capture your thoughts immediately.

2) Define the spin

Now that we have a comprehensive list of experiences, we will define the spin. What I mean by that is that each experience can have a different flavour depending on how you spin it. It can, for example, represent good communication skills, organisational skills, leadership skills or whatever else, depending on what angle you want to take.

Because of that, even if you don’t have much experience, you can still create great applications by highlighting the relevant elements of your experiences. 

To define the spin, think about which skills were needed or acquired as a result of each activity.

For example, let’s say you were the lead organiser of a yearly student festival at your university. As part of this, you coordinated a team of 5 peers, led a fundraising campaign among students and took care of communications and promoting the event.

So, what can we get out of this? Let’s look at coordinating a team of 5, which could be positioned as follows:

• ability to build trust because you didn’t know your team members and needed to develop good relationships quickly
• being an effective leader because you had to understand the strengths of each team member, oversee the project and delegate some activities
• having good communication and interpersonal skills because you had to find a way of working together and getting to a successful outcome
• ability to work in a diverse team because each of you had different backgrounds

The Harvard Competency Dictionary is a great resource to help you with this step. They use it as a performance evaluation document, but it can also be helpful when writing applications. It is a list of 31 transferable skills (which means you can use it for applications in any field) that are broken down into their subcomponents and described in detail. It can help you frame your experiences and may spark some inspiration.

With this, you will have created a bank of experiences, activities and spins that we will use to choose relevant and impactful elements for your application (coming up in the 3rd article). Depending on the jobs you are applying for, you will select different experiences, activities and spins and we will use them when putting a resume together in the next article.

3) Create a resume template

The final step of creating an application system is making a resume template to reuse whenever you write a new application.

There are a couple of standard things to take into account:

• Format: unless you are applying for creative jobs, keep your resume simple. The opinions here vary; some prefer an all-black-and-white resume, others do something in Canva, etc. I like to write in a simple format because it is the best use of space and you can fit more onto one page.
• Structure: resume structure is pretty standard and here are some common elements:
  • Personal details: Obviously, you need to include your name, email, phone number, spoken languages, etc. Some decide to include a photo, but that depends on your location. For example, when studying in the UK, I've been told I shouldn't include a photo, while in Switzerland, it is common practice to include it, so check the customs in your location.
  • Summary: Only some people include it, but it gives the reader an idea of your experience, skills and the kind of person you are without reading your entire resume.
  • Three largest sections - your education, experience and other activities: For now, add placeholders - we will fill them out in the following article.

If you need some inspo, I have included my resume template below. It's geared towards consulting, so it is one page and very plain - black and white, no fancy formatting, no photo. Feel free to use it to write your resume or use it as an inspiration when creating your format/structure.

Conclusion

So far, we created a bank of experiences from which you can choose the best depending on the job. We also defined the potential spins for each experience, so it is a matter of picking and choosing the most relevant ones for the job you're applying to. We also created a CV template to reuse and plug things in to make writing resumes as easy and fast as possible.

In the final article of this series, we will look at how it all fits together and how to bring all the work we've done so far into one hell of a convincing resume.

Speak next week.