A job seeker posted a comment on my Sept. 2007 "Industry Reputation" thread today. It's the third one from a job seeker who found the post by Googling either "Resume Pro Writers" or "Stanford Writing Institute."
He wrote:
Wow. Thanks for posting this. I was just about to contact Resume Pro Writers when a little voice told me to Google the Stanford Writing Institute. You just saved me $125 and two weeks of aggravation. Thanks again, and good luck in your job search.
I guess I should be writing a couple of posts each month about how to choose a resume writer and other positive attributes of working with the professional resume writing community. Plus, all of you who are interested in getting more exposure should be contacting me to get profiled... a topic I'll get into more when I finally get around to writing up my impressions of the great teleseminar with branding expert Rob Frankel. (As I imagined, he had some great insights about branding both yourself as a resume writer and your clients...)
Ideas, information, and resources for professional resume writers.
I have been writing resumes for more than 20 years. Does the business have a "reputation problem?" I know I'll take a LOT of heat for this -- but the problem I find is the drum beat encouraging the nonsensical need for letters behind a resume writer's name.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there are some phenomenal "certified" resume writers out there. Overall, however, I think certification is a way for the certifying body to make money -- and for the resume writer to jack up prices.
I get a much larger fee to write an article (I've been published over 200 times including national mags) than I am paid to write a resume. And I SHOULD be! There is far more skill involved in creating a 2,000 word feature than a 2-page resume -- not that I don't invest the same commitment and skill into both. But I only charge $50 for a resume/cover letter package -- and no one that I've ever seen writes a better resume than I do.
So, if the industry feels antsy for a face-lift -- its first step should be to stop pretending that clients need to invest three, four, even eight hundred dollars for a great personal marketing tool, just because the resume writer has a few Cs and Ws after his/her name.
Just my opinion.
Stephanie Hoover
1KillerResume.com