Joe Ditched the Resume Writer and Made ‘Unicorn Resumes’ Using Jobscan

Written By : 06-09-2024  05:18:37 PM

After being steadily employed for about 20 years, Joe found himself in a common position: facing a layoff. 

Joe was working as a Director of Quality for a ceramics company focusing on semiconductors. His company began to feel the strain of the market. The notoriously cyclical industry experienced a recent downturn that caused layoffs at Joe’s company. 

While he survived the first round, the second round left him without a job. 

“And it was the first time in 20 years that I’ve been unemployed and I discovered everything changed since I was employed last time.

The entry-level vs. senior-level job search

Being out of the job market for 20 years, Joe was at a different phase of his career.

“When I was employed 20 years ago, I was at an entry-level. I don’t have any secondary education, I graduated from high school, and that was basically it. And then walked into an entry-level role 20 years ago and then worked my way up to a director role.”

He was now looking for a mid- or senior-level role, which demands a new resume to target those opportunities. 

Resume writer or job search tools?

Joe noticed the changes he needed to make and sought professional advice after his layoff. 

He went to the Oregon Employment Department for guidance. “I was thinking of hiring a resume writer to go through and look at my resume because my resume was old and it wasn’t particularly good.”

The Oregon Employment Department recommended he use Jobscan instead. 

“I ended up getting a resume writer,” Joe shared. “But then I realized they were using Jobscan.” 

Cutting out the go-between

“One of the services that they offered was, not only to help update the resume and improve your resume, but then also they said to send job descriptions and they’d let me know how well you’re matching on your resume,” Joe stated. 

At the same time, Joe started checking out Jobscan and discovered, “Yeah, it was very similar. They look like they’re using this tool.”

So that’s when Joe started to generate his own match reports and optimizing his resumes. 

Creating ‘unicorn resumes’

After a months-long, 6-interview process with a company that ended without a job offer, Joe felt defeated: “It was a real kick to the stomach.”

“I put a hundred percent of my effort into that. And I realized, okay, I can’t do that. I have to start blasting resumes to everyone where I’m a good fit.”

To do that, he needed to start tailoring his resume, making ‘unicorn resumes,’ as Joe calls them. 

Using Power Edit to help tailor his resume, he managed to secure interviews at large companies like Boeing.

Power Edit provides suggestions for adding in keywords, shows you what skills you’re missing, and gives you a match score to track your improvements.

By tailoring his resume to target roles in warehousing and quality assurance, he secured the right role after 8 months without work. 

He was hired by a logistics company looking for someone to build out and implement standard operating procedures and warehousing processes.

“It’s like my last job and warehousing jobs had a baby and this is the result.”

Using his resume to be the solution

After being laid off, Joe’s job was looking for a job. Over time, he discovered that on top of tailoring your resume to the job, you have to tailor your resume to be the solution that job posting is looking to solve.

“Even though you’re making a resume tailored to the individual job that you’re applying to, make it specific to the problems,” Joe shared. 

By sharing how you can solve the problem, using quantifiable examples, you make it easier for the hiring team to imagine you in the role and the impact you can have.

 

https://www.jobscan.co/blog/unemployed-for-8-months-before-using-jobscan/  Click Here