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In Tough Job Market, Applicants Try Résumé Gimmicks
Wall Street Journal ^ | jan 23, 2014 | Lauren Weber

Posted on 01/25/2014 8:06:07 AM PST by Innovative

Vitae Delivered With a Pillow or by Stuffed Carrier Pigeon Bring Attention but Not Always Gigs.

The box was delivered to the Los Angeles office of One Fine Stay, a business that arranges short-term accommodations in luxury homes. Stuffed inside was a queen-size pillow in a cheap cotton pillowcase.

The intriguing gimmick didn't ultimately work for Pillow Guy, who was rejected after one phone conversation and a face-to-face interview. Also rebuffed by One Fine Stay: an applicant who "delivered" a résumé via a stuffed carrier pigeon and another who included a link to his unpublished erotica.

Companies like the online craft marketplace Etsy have seen it all. Senior recruiting manager Bobby Gormsen says recent entries include an embroidered cover letter, a potholder résumé, a paper-garland résumé that looked as if it could be strung on a Christmas tree and an application that bobbed up in a corked bottle.

(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Society; Weird Stuff
KEYWORDS: careers; jobapplications; jobs; jobseekers; unemployment
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There is a difference between "creative" and "stupid"...
1 posted on 01/25/2014 8:06:07 AM PST by Innovative
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To: Innovative

The “Wendy Davis” method of resume enhancement.


2 posted on 01/25/2014 8:07:10 AM PST by SkyDancer (Live your life in such a way that the Westboro church will want to picket your funeral)
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To: Innovative

These are desperate times.


3 posted on 01/25/2014 8:07:55 AM PST by Silentgypsy (Flying polyps)
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To: Innovative

In a shaky economy, companies tend to be especially risk-averse. The creative guy who behaves unpredictably? Not so much demand for that.


4 posted on 01/25/2014 8:08:48 AM PST by ClearCase_guy (Anti-Complacency League! Baby!)
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To: ClearCase_guy
Buwt wait! We're in a recovery aren't we?
Will this summer be Recovery Summer VI or VII?
I can no longer keep track.
5 posted on 01/25/2014 8:22:41 AM PST by YankeeReb
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To: YankeeReb

In the meantime the massive layoffs continue.

WalMart is just announced they are laying off some 2300 workers from their Sam’s Club operation.


6 posted on 01/25/2014 8:30:31 AM PST by Innovative ("Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing." -- Vince Lombardi)
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To: Innovative

Evil Republicans shafting the proletariat, right?

http://www.foxbusiness.com/industries/2014/01/24/report-wal-mart-plots-2300-job-cuts-at-sam-club/


7 posted on 01/25/2014 8:32:38 AM PST by nascarnation (I'm hiring Jack Palladino to investigate Baraq's golf scores.)
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To: Innovative

This stuff is creative, but I wouldn’t give a borderline candidate an interview because of it.


8 posted on 01/25/2014 8:34:52 AM PST by Ted Grant
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To: Innovative

He should try “gay” erotica, betcha that would work!


9 posted on 01/25/2014 8:35:32 AM PST by bigbob (The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly. Abraham Lincoln)
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To: Innovative

It was difficult enough to get a resume read during ‘the old normal’ times. In these current times, the competition in many locales is massively greater.

20,000 lined up to get applications for the new Walmarts opening in the DC area, for example.

I recall at several companies during the 80s and 90s the personnel department could collect applications and resumes, toss them into a box, and have the janitorial person toss the box into the trash at the end of the day. When companies get inundated with applications and resumes, they don’t take the time to read them. They might pull a half-dozen or so out of the stack eventually, but most end up in File 13.

In the 1980s I noticed a trend of companies using personnel from temp agencies. In some cases, they only needed the person short term. In other cases, they might offer the ‘temp’ a full time job after a while. The companies used the temp agencies as screeners. That made it easier for the company to ‘return’ an incompetent ‘temp’ without the potential threat of a lawsuit.


10 posted on 01/25/2014 8:37:22 AM PST by TomGuy
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To: Ted Grant

About 25 years ago I tried to apply at a company I really wanted to work for but had no luck. I then placed a resume under the wiper of every expensive looking car in the parking lot. No hit hits and probably confused a lot of people.

I took my resume to a professional resume service. They reworked my resume. I sent that version off to 3 companies and got 2 job offers. I guess creative didn’t work in my case.


11 posted on 01/25/2014 8:47:37 AM PST by Dutch Boy
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To: TomGuy

Now the recruiters are collecting resumes to try & sell their services to clients- for jobs that are a year old or never even existed in the first place. Watch it with the ones who seem to want some obscure “experience” or what the client “is looking for” keeps “evolving”.

I read somewhere that a lot of these jobs are posted for the benefit of shareholders/ investors to make the company look like it has more business than it does. I don’t doubt it. The ads keep running & running- or wait a few months & run them again. Nobody has turnover like that.
It’s a damn mess.


12 posted on 01/25/2014 9:12:22 AM PST by KGeorge (Till we're together again, Gypsy girl. May 28, 1998- June 3, 2013)
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To: Innovative

Here is the one sentence on a resume that has proven to be 100% effective in getting an applicant the job they always wanted!

“My Dad owns the company.”

For government jobs it’s

“My Dad is the Director of this department.”


13 posted on 01/25/2014 9:24:47 AM PST by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer")
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To: Dutch Boy

Most resumes stink, and just throwing resumes around doesn’t work. You need a professional network and then do your homework and get in touch with the hiring manager at each company.


14 posted on 01/25/2014 9:26:12 AM PST by gura (If Allah is so great, why does he need fat sexually confused fanboys to do his dirty work? -iowahawk)
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To: gura

That has been the best way I have found to get hired. It’s tough to get a decent job right off the street with a cold contact.


15 posted on 01/25/2014 10:07:16 AM PST by Dutch Boy
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To: TomGuy

More frequently, you have to apply online and then the application is scanned for key words. Only if your resume has enough of the key words they are looking for does a human look further into your application. I think this is especially true in the tech fields.


16 posted on 01/25/2014 10:14:21 AM PST by OrangeHoof (2001-2008: "Dissent Is Patriotism!" 2009-2016: "Dissent Is Racism!")
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To: YankeeReb

The Recovery was in 2009 and 2010.
“Recoveries” are short term and don’t last very long.
Since 2011 we have been in the obama economic boom.


17 posted on 01/25/2014 11:08:27 AM PST by phyllisleeholman
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To: phyllisleeholman

Welcome to Free Republic. I see that you signed up on Aug 7, 2007 yet your first comment was today, Jan. 25, 2014 to talk up Obama’s “recovery”.
Nice try troll.


18 posted on 01/25/2014 11:28:24 AM PST by Jean S
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To: phyllisleeholman

No sarcasm tag....zot


19 posted on 01/25/2014 2:22:36 PM PST by xone
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To: phyllisleeholman

...another example of the tragedy of the 19th Amendment...


20 posted on 01/25/2014 2:29:43 PM PST by who knows what evil? (G-d saved more animals than people on the ark...www.siameserescue.org.)
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