[ATTW-L] Teaching the resume

[Derek Ross]

Hi All:

Great thread. I’ve got a piece in Godwin Agboka and Natalia Matveeva’s book on resume design that might be of interest:

Ross, D. G. (2018). Résumé design and career advocacy in a Goodwill Career Center. In G. Agboka and N. Matveeva (Eds.), Citizenship and Advocacy in Technical Communication: Scholarly and Pedagogical Perspectives. New York, NY: Routledge. https://www.routledge.com/Citizenship-and-Advocacy-in-Technical-Communication-Scholarly-and-Pedagogical/Agboka-Matveeva/p/book/9781138560802

I overview what most of the textbooks say to do, and discuss a series of interviews, surveys, etc. from both the HR and job seeker side of things. Lots of fun charts, and some interesting stuff putting it all together with Social Network Analysis. Here’s an overview paragraph from my methods:

My intent in conducting research on perceptions of résumés was to determine where potential job seeker and potential employer expectations might differ, and to establish how technical communication professionals volunteering in career services organizations might best serve our communities. To answer my research questions, I conducted semi-structured interviews with two key personnel at a Goodwill Career Center, conducted surveys with visitors to the Career Center seeking help with résumé design, worked with Goodwill’s own research into what employers look for in effective job applications and résumés, and considered my own observations and experiences as a volunteer with Goodwill. This multi-part approach allowed me to gain a more robust picture of perceptions of resumes than if I had used only one approach with one demographic. It also allowed me to make connections between perceptions and descriptions offered by potential employers, employees, and professional communicators. (pp. 178 – 79)

Take care,

Derek

Derek G. Ross
Editor, Communication Design Quarterly<https://sigdoc.acm.org/publication/>
Department of English, 9030 Haley Center
Auburn University, AL 36849-5203
334-844-9073
http://www.derekross.com<http://www.derekross.com/>
Pronouns: he/him/his


From: ATTW-L <attw-l-bounces at attw.org> on behalf of "Susan Rauch, PhD" <susan.rauchttu at gmail.com>
Date: Wednesday, November 7, 2018 at 1:09 PM
To: "geoffrey.clegg at gmail.com" <geoffrey.clegg at gmail.com>
Cc: "attw-l at attw.org" <attw-l at attw.org>
Subject: Re: [ATTW-L] Teaching the resume

Hi All,

Great topic of discussion!!!
I was also going to reference Chalice's work, and Richard also made a good point about the scannable resume - something that is useful to have on hand with those nasty electronic app systems that don't want to read a nicely "designed" resume.
When I teach the resume and job letter, the resume is taught in three parts. Students start with a somewhat clean RTF document for organization of content that is converted into and crosschecked with a  plain-text document. This is their first draft before creating a more visually appealing resume using tables (although that can get a bit wonky especially in scannable systems, or if alt text is not used for accessibility) e.g. infographic for some of my mass comm/viz comm students. I then teach a visual resume using some of Duarte's principles of Slidedoc that is viewable in SlideShare that represents and expands on the personality traits of the letter and resume. This is inclusive of "only" 5-6 sections so it should not be more than 7-10 pages with a cover slide and closing remarks. They share this link in their letterhead which is very useful at job fairs. This is not meant to replace the traditional resume, but some students have received second looks, interviews, and hires after attending job fairs where employers may receive and have to sift through 50-100 resumes.

But I again agree with most that the traditional resume is still very important. What I found interesting and frustrating is that other departments across disciplines and even career center advisors teach the resume and its organizational parts differently, as Chalice's research will indicate. While I understand some industries require certain components, that is not what I am referring to i.e. are still teaching the generic "blanket" Objective statement which many industry professionals will say they don't want to see rathermost say to include a more personalized career profile or statement that is tailored to the job (preface: some industries will want to see the Objective, but on the norm it is not necessary nor is the blaket References upon request at the bottom). What is frustrating is students feel a bit overwhelmed with the different variations that different departments are teaching across disciplines. I don't have an answer specifically for how to overcome the inconsistency of how style is taught or advised across discipline and among career advisors, but as someone else mentioned Chalice has done some good and relevant research on the topic, and I helped her transcribe some of her interviews from her research a while back which was eye opening.

I do tell students to follow their industry's preferences and we do research on that in class. I also suggest if they need a digital portfolio such as my Viz Comm students, to add a Portfolio Available statment at the bottom of the resume. References are a given and takes up line space,and most employers will either ask for it in the app system or after an interview (unless indicated otherwise in the job post) and should be available either in another document to add into the online app.

Anyhow, the supplemental digital visual resume seems to work well for my students if designed well. This is not meant to serve in the same way as a portfolio of documents (although students may add a portfolio section at the end ) nor is it like LinkedIn.
The only glitch I see is that students have a hard time getting past the PPT as a drafting tool with the Slidedoc template, which is not meant to be used as a oral presentation tool with larger fonts. I get this with the digital reflective portfolio too when students use the Slidedoc in this same way. It is a great option though if used correctly in conjunction with SlideShare and a private share link as a branding tool to supplement the job search materials. Note: There are some really wonky Slideshare resumes out there that are poorly designed and exceedingly lengthy, which have been the basis for a good classroom discussion/workshop and possibly online discussion forum analysis topic.

Kind regards,
Susan Rauch, PhD
Lecturer, Professional Writing (science and technology)
Course Coordinator, Communicating in the Sciences
Massey University
Palmerston North, New Zealand
s.rauch at massey.ac.nz<mailto:s.rauch at massey.ac.nz>


On Thu, Nov 8, 2018 at 4:59 AM Geoff Clegg <geoffrey.clegg at gmail.com<mailto:geoffrey.clegg at gmail.com>> wrote:
I'm mostly business communication these days so my focus is a bit skewed. One of the issues around the resume that I cover concerns design. Far too many of my students use templates that get rejected by ATS (applicant tracking systems) software. We focus on the importance of information, not using graphical templates, and using key terms of from the job ads. We do, however, talk about the needs of international job applications, how a career fair resume can use different designs than one submitted electronically, and the importance of the rhetorical value of a resume in combination with a cover letter and interview.

Geoff


On Wed, Nov 7, 2018 at 9:52 AM Blackburne, Brian <bdb026 at shsu.edu<mailto:bdb026 at shsu.edu>> wrote:
Hi, Mark,

In addition to the useful resources posted by Rebecca and Lisa, I’ve observed, anecdotally, that CVs and résumés are still as important as they once were. In industry-related contexts, I find that potential clients/employers still like to see a traditional résumé, and in academic contexts, the CV is invariably required for applications; what’s more, many hiring committees are expressly forbidden from using LinkedIn or other social platforms to research/evaluate candidates. Such sources often hold information that shouldn’t be considered in job searches (e.g., sex, race, political affiliations, gender identity, attractiveness, etc.) and could potentially bias those conducting the search. I do think that we must help students create effective job materials across all genres/media, but I tend to focus on the résumé as the go-to document while helping students consider how their online personas may affect their searches when potential employers do google them or even ask for social-media handles as an explicit part of the search process.

The topic is a fun one to teach. Enjoy!

BB

Brian D. Blackburne, Ph.D.
(Pronouns: he, him, & his)

Sam Houston State University
Director | Technical Communication
Associate Professor | Department of English
Treasurer | Association of Teachers of Technical Writing
BrianBlackburne at shsu.edu<mailto:BrianBlackburne at shsu.edu>
936-294-3359


From: ATTW-L <attw-l-bounces at attw.org<mailto:attw-l-bounces at attw.org>> on behalf of Mark Crane <craniac at gmail.com<mailto:craniac at gmail.com>>
Date: Wednesday, November 7, 2018 at 8:43 AM
To: "attw-l at attw.org<mailto:attw-l at attw.org>" <attw-l at attw.org<mailto:attw-l at attw.org>>
Subject: [ATTW-L] Teaching the resume

Hi,
I was wondering if you teach resume creation (and by extension, branding one's self and tools like LinkedIn) in your introductory courses, and if so, if you have any suggestions for doing this in a way that is supported by existing research.  My own sense is that resumes, although important, seem to be less important than they once were.

We'll be collecting research about resume writing and the semantics of electronic resume filtering processes in class today, but I thought I would "drink above the horses" as it were and ask the experts as well.
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--
Geoffrey Clegg, PhD | Assistant Professor of English
English Department
Midwestern State University
Wichita Falls, TX 76308
geoffrey.clegg at mwsu.edu<mailto:geoffrey.clegg at mwsu.edu>
geoffrey.clegg at gmail.com<mailto:geoffrey.clegg at gmail.com>


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Kind Regards,

Susan Rauch, Ph.D.
Massey University, NZ
susan.rauchttu at gmail.com<mailto:susan.rauchttu at gmail.com>
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