The Hospitality industry is one which has grown in leaps and bounds with the advent of the last century and the advancements in transportation and communication. This growth has been phenomenal to the extent that today, a little over a hundred years on, hospitality is the main revenue maker for many countries across the globe. For these tourist destinations, the revenue gathered from vacationing consumers is critical to the GDP and social growth. Interlink this with the travel industry, which is considered part and parcel of hospitality and you can see an economic turnout toughing not billions but trillions of dollars worldwide annually, with millions earning their livelihood and massive numbers of jobs being created every year as many nations now begin to explore into this vast, only partially tapped market.

Especially today, when information is readily available on the internet and large numbers of vacationers are looking to escape to cheaper destinations, hospitality has become one of the major pillars for the rebuilding process.

What does online hospitality consist of?

Hospitality is a broad term encompassing many aspects of travel, tourism and entertainment. These and their many subcategories belong to, but are not limited to tourism and are found in every corner of the globe.

The main factor to remember about this industry is that Hospitality is now big business, in fact, one of the biggest around and nearly every other industry is affected by it. This means that hospitality consists of areas relating to any field of expertise from any and every aspect of business or profession. Another factor to remember is that hospitality and online hospitality have become one, i.e., while in the days of web1.0, hospitality on the internet was limited to information only, In this web2.0 era, it is now hosted on the web as a consolidated business, and it stands to reason that hospitality education is also consolidated on the internet as a viable area of education and training.

Some of the areas associated with hospitality on the internet are as below;

- Online Travel bookings by air, sea or land

- Online Accommodation and bookings for hotels, resorts and guest houses

- Online destination finders and packaged deals involving popular vacations and destinations

- Online booking ticketing for entertainment shows, casinos and even adventure sports

Online Hospitality education; major programs

Hospitality education is available over the internet from many famous colleges and universities in Europe and the Americas. Many of these courses are available in blended/online format and are conducted over the internet so that professionals and students all over the world can benefit from the learning while not having to travel, relocate or quit their jobs in order to do so.

There are many programs online that can help you learn or train for a career in core hospitality management, for instance hotel management, or for any of the niche supporting areas in hospitality, namely accommodation management, entertainment, travel and tours, cooking and catering and sports (golf, tennis, fishing, adventure etc); you can even learn to be a jet ski instructor or a crabbing or snorkeling specialist.

Here are some of the well known programs and courses on offer over the internet. These are all part of the online hospitality management education category and are available to almost anyone from any industry or field of education. Each of the following courses has an emphasis on hospitality management and its support functions;

- Online Full MBA (Concentrated study in Hosp & Tourism)

- Master of Science in Recreation, Sport and Tourism

- MA in Tourism Planning and Development

- Bachelors in Business / Management

- Bachelor of Science in Business Administration / Hosp & Tourism

- BS – Interdisciplinary Studies in Hosp Management

- BS in Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Management

- Associate of Arts in Hospitality, Travel, and Tourism

- Associate degree in Global Travel and Hosp Management

- Certificate in Organizational Management- Hotels & Accommodations

- MA/MS, BA/BS, Certificate/ASS in Cooking, catering and presentation (various types/cuisines)

Swindon Job Centre for Jobs and Vacancies – Field Recruitment helps candidates in finding all kinds of full and part time office jobs and vacancies in various industries and sectors in Swindon, surrounding areas in Wiltshire UK.

When you want to do a job resume, the first thing you should consider is what it is for. A resume is a summary of your skills and qualifications that you submit to a prospective employer so she or he can evaluate you for the position you are applying for. It is the first step in getting a job, one that is supposed to land you an interview for the job you want. That is why in preparing resumes, you should take great care in including all the necessary information as well as presenting them in the most effective way.

In order to do a job resume, you must know how it is supposed to look like. First of all, the standard resume is set on white, A4-sized bond paper. It should be typed and printed using black ink. The font type and size you should use must be easy and pleasant to read. Proper use of margins and indents must be observed, and the general appearance of the document must not look too crowded or sparse. Including your photo in your resume is optional, and it is best to check whether your prospective employer requires it or not.

To do a job resume, you must keep in mind what information you should include. First, prepare your contact details and personal profile. Then you should prepare your educational background, considering inclusive dates you attended which schools and what degrees and awards you have achieved. Then you should list your work experiences, including the job titles, functions you assumed, inclusive dates, and awards you achieved if there is any. You should also draw lists of all your technical skills and personal traits which you believe is necessary for the position you are applying for. If all these are set, you are ready to do a job resume.
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Everyone should have an updated resume on file. But when you’re applying for a specific job, you want to make sure your resume stands out. How do you do this? First of all, you need to understand your audience when writing your content. Second, you need to apply some basic document design principles.

Who is your audience? Regardless of who you’ll be submitting your resume to, it must be professional and follow some basic formatting standards. But the specific content and tone you should create depends entirely upon who will be reading it and what information you need to communicate to them.

Tailor your resume to the specific position you’re applying for. How do you do this? State your objective at the top of the resume in a way that shows you can meet the specific qualifications necessary for the specific job you want. Also, make sure the information you provide throughout the resume is applicable to your prospective employer. Pack a punch with descriptive words that succinctly describe how aspects of your previous positions have prepared you for your next job. Highlight your achievements using specific examples and quantifiable data, rather than simply bragging or making obvious statements such as “I am a hard worker and a dedicated employee.” Show, don’t tell, why you are good for the job. Your resume will reflect who you are and what you are capable of. Make it shine!

But even if you are obviously qualified for the job, a shoddy design or excessive grammatical errors can land your resume in the trash. The appearance, not just the content, of your resume sends a powerful message to potential employers that can greatly influence their hiring decisions. Consider applying these design principles before you send out your resume:

Typography: Choose a font style and size that can be easily read. Script or novelty fonts should be avoided. Serif fonts (such as Garamond or Times New Roman) are good for long sentences because the letters are connected to each other, helping the reader’s eye glide along and read faster. Sans serif fonts (such as Arial or Verdana) are great for headings because they can have a more powerful presence, but reading a lot of text can fatigue the eye.

Hierarchy of Information: Simply put, make sure the most important information comes first. Readers enter documents from the top left corner of the page. This makes it a great location for your name and contact information. The higher up you list something on your resume, the more important the reader assumes it is, and the more likely it is that it will be read. Hiring managers typically only look at resumes for 60 seconds, and won’t read every word. Start sentences with the most important words, in case they don’t read the whole sentence. Make it easy for them to read by creating bolded headings and indentations and lists for various levels of information. This will guide the reader’s eye and break up the information into more manageable chunks. If it takes effort to read and understand your resume, people simply won’t read it.

Templates: Beware of using resume templates provided by your software or downloaded from the internet. While they can be helpful if you don’t know where to start or how to come up with your own design, they have some drawbacks. First, not all templates are created by people who understand good design principles. They may work well for certain people or positions, but may not help you highlight your specific information very well. Second, they are frequently used, so there’s a good chance that your resume will look exactly like dozens of others in a stack. Creating your own design, or at least customizing a template to fit your purposes, will set your resume apart.

It probably goes without saying, but make sure you are qualified for the job you apply for, and that you are 100% truthful in the content you supply on your resume. After those conditions are met, set yourself apart by remembering who your reader is and how people read documents. Good luck, and happy designing!

There are many things you should consider when you want to write a job resume. First, what information you are supposed to include; second, how you should organize and phrase these information; and third, what job or jobs you intend to apply for using that resume. It is important that you have all the information you need before you begin writing, not only because it will save you time but also because it will allow you to focus on managing them in creating your resume.

When you need to write a job resume, it is important to begin with a career objective. This does not only prove to your intended reader that you have a good reason for applying the job other than simply getting a job, but helps you write a well-developed resume. From here, you should provide your contact details, a personal profile, your educational background, your work experiences, a set of skills and qualifications, and if necessary or helpful, a list of character references. It is best to gather all the relevant details for each category before you begin writing.

In order to write a job resume, you should keep in mind the job you plan to get into. From this, you can work out how to organize facts about yourself in a way that would emphasize your qualifications for the job. Do not simply lump ideas or details together. Each part is supposed to build your credibility for the job, so you should present only the relevant details. Even entry-level positions require a specific set of qualifications. You should strive to prove that you have these, whether they are focused on technical experience, academic excellence or personal traits, and which ones. Ultimately, knowing how to write a job resume is knowing how to work with what you have to get where you want to be.

Your resume must always attract an employer’s attention at first sight. Hence make a best resume using some resume tips to land you your dream job

• Always use attractive titles and heading that match the job profile you want and a great way to do this would be to mention the job titles and skill headings clearly. Maintain the flow and the length of the resume and like a myth, you don’t have to follow the strict rule of writing a resume in one page. You can highlight the headings to make it more presentable

• Employers generally make snap judgments while reading your resume – and if they see an unrelated job profiles or titles or skills then they immediately assume that you are not qualified for the position. Don’t waste your time elaborating on your skills or the headings, as employers don’t have time to waste on each resume and determine whether you have the appropriate skill or experience which they are looking for. The design of your resume must showcase your skills, experience and education at the first glance. At first glance, employers must form an image about your skills and abilities.

• Your resume should be designed to attract the employer’s attention, but it should not be jazzy and should have the complete content and should include all your skills and abilities. These things may land you an interview, as well as determine your salary package that you may receive.

• Always use powerful words and statements to demonstrate or describe your achievements as well as your responsibilities. These points can grab an employer’s attention and elevate your image in front of him or her. The more you specify your positive points, the better. Use powerful words and phrases to control the images that the employers develop about you while reading your resume. Powerful words should match the job profile you are seeking.

• Learn and analyze the key words that employers provide in the advertisements or job descriptions, as this should be the key element in creating powerful and impact oriented resumes.

• Always try and understand and project the employers hidden needs through your resume like for example if an employer needs someone who can handle departments, accounting more efficiently then you should identify it and anticipate the full range of need and show that you can resolve it through your resume.

• Resumes should always provide a list of duties of each applicant without explaining the benefits of the skills to the employers like for example a secretary’s resume should state her typing speed and should also state how it could benefit the new employer. The real benefit of the employee should produce more work and also save the employer money.

• Your resume should create an image of you in front of the employer. When writing your resume, keep in mind the level of the job you are seeking and the salary you are expecting. Always use language according to the position you are seeking.

• Try and prioritize the content of your resume, as this is the most important mistake that is made by many job seekers. Always compile statements according to importance, relevance of the job you want.

• Always try and tweak your resume and cover letter as they can generate many more interviews for you. Try and place the heading to the left hand column for retail management positions.

Try and improve your resume as much as possible – after all, it’s the one that can get you an interview call.

When you lie on your resume, cover letter, job application, or at an interview – there’s a high probability you’ll get caught. That’s why honesty is the best policy.

Why it’s important to always tell the truth

Lying on your resume these days can be a deal killer. When jobs became tight after 9/11, thousands of job hunters, including candidates for CEO positions, were caught lying on a resume and being untruthful during interviews. Bottom line: don’t lie on your resume

This is why employers have been very careful about who they hire. While prospective employers will not always monitor the facts on your resume, they often perform, or hire outside organizations to perform employment background checks.

When prospective employers call places where you worked to ask for information about you, most companies will cooperate by giving your dates of employment and salary range. You can lose your job by exaggerating salary. That’s what happened to a friend of one of my career-counseling clients in New York.

My client set up an interview with his boss for his friend and former colleague who had been out of work for well over a year. The friend, who lied on his application, was hired for an administrative position. After a month on the new job, he was called into the boss’s office and fired.

The now ex-employee had exaggerated his previous salary by four thousand dollars. The policy of the bank that hired him was to provide a salary that commensurate to the one he previously earned. The moral of this story is to always tell the truth to prospective employers.

Sure, it’s okay to make yourself look better than you actually are. But to exaggerate or to lie about titles, salaries, or achievements is big no no. You can get caught and not hired. Or get caught and fired like the person we’ve just discussed.

Spanish novelist, poet, and playwright Miguel De Cervantes made the point almost 400 years ago when he wrote –

“Honesty is the best policy”

Cervantes’ complete quote is, “I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy.”

When it comes to your career management, you jeopardize your future when you lie about your past.

You knew that first impressions were important in your interview, and you obviously aced that, because now you’ve got the job. However, did you know that first impressions are equally as important when starting a new job?

During your first hours, days, and even weeks on the new job, your new boss and coworkers are going to form their opinions of you, and these will likely color the rest of your time with this employer. For instance, if you earn a reputation as a slacker early on, it will be difficult to shake that label for long enough to earn a promotion, even if you deserve it. Conversely, if you work hard during your first few weeks on the job, your boss and coworkers will be much more likely to overlook rough periods in your performance later on.

Here are ten tips for creating stellar first impressions when starting a new job.

Take Time Off Between Jobs

At a wine tasting, guests are served bland foods to cleanse their palates between wines. Likewise, taking time off between jobs helps you to shake off the old routine and prepare for the new.

Humans are creatures of habit. Any job, but especially one at which you have spent a considerable length of time, establishes a sense of routine in your life that you may unknowingly be reluctant to change. Even a few days off between jobs can help you to prepare for a new routine and a new work environment.

Do Your Homework

You probably did a certain amount of research on your new employer during the application and interview stages. Now is the time to finish your research and round out your understanding of your new employer. If you are taking time off between jobs, you can use that time for this purpose.

To research or brush up on your new employer, read any materials about the company you can get your hands on, including the employee handbook. Your goal is two-fold: to understand what the company does and how you fit in, and to know what to expect in the workplace. If you or someone in your professional network knows someone at the company, plan to meet them for lunch or coffee before your first day – a little inside information can go a long way toward a smooth transition.

Dress Professionally

Presenting a neat appearance reflects positively on your work ethic and habits. Therefore, when beginning a new job you should always dress a notch or two above what is expected. Once those critical early days or weeks are over, you can relax a little without worrying about being perceived as slovenly or a poor worker.

If you have done your homework as suggest above, you should have a feel for your new employer’s dress code. However, if you are unsure it is always better to err on the side of too professional rather than not professional enough.

Arrive Early, Leave Late

Always being the last one in the door and the first one out will make it seem like you don’t actually want to be there – a dangerous impression to make, particularly during your first few weeks on the job.

Instead, always plan to be a little early, and don’t be in a rush to leave at the end of the day. Besides giving the impression that you are enthusiastic and ambitious about your work, you will also gain a reputation of never being late unless there is a real emergency – a valuable reputation to hold.

Get to Know Your Coworkers

Part of settling into a new job is integrating yourself into the workplace’s social network. Like it or not, you spend more waking hours with your coworkers than with almost any other people in your life. Moreover, these people’s opinions of you can directly impact your success with the company, not to mention your day-to-day happiness with your job.

Whatever you, don’t distance yourself from your new coworkers. While it may be tempting to frequently have lunch with your old coworkers, you may be inadvertently signaling to the new group that you are not “one of them.” Instead, socialize with your new coworkers over lunch and coffee as much as possible. Lunch dates with old coworkers can help you to maintain a strong network, but should not be overdone.

Ask for Help

Asking for help is an important part of settling into a new job, yet many people worry about seeming incompetent. In actuality, the opposite is true. By not asking for or accepting help from your coworkers, you risk ostracizing yourself from them, not to mention wasting time and energy on avoidable mistakes.

However, you also don’t want to ask the same questions over and over. If you know you may have a hard time remembering a complicated procedure, or that you have a bad memory in general, take notes whenever you get help. By only asking each question once, you will come across as a quick learner to your boss and coworkers.

Take Initiative

The first few weeks on the job, your new employer will most likely give you a more relaxed workload than your coworkers are expected to carry. Although the expectation is that you won’t be up to speed right off the bat, your employer also expects that you will let them know when you are ready for more work.

Use your light workload to focus on mastering and completing the work you have been assigned, and let your supervisor know if you will need another assignment soon. The sooner you can handle a full workload, the better the impression you will make. You may also opt to volunteer for special projects in order to really get noticed – but only do this if you are sure you can handle the extra work.

Make a Plan

Having a plan can help you monitor and achieve your goals during your first few weeks on the job. Your plan should include all of the things you are expected to learn, as well as a few goals you set for yourself to keep you motivated. Prioritize your goals to help you remember which skills are more important to master. Remember, the point is to keep yourself challenged so that you stay motivated, but not so challenged that you get discouraged.

A nice touch is to share your goals – and your progress – with your boss. To you, this may seem awkward and anal-retentive. To your boss, it will make you appear organized and ambitious.

Communicate with Your Boss

Just as sharing your goals with your boss can help promote a positive impression, communicating other aspects of your settling-in can encourage trust and confidence in your abilities. Your boss has hired you because you seemed like the best person for the job; in other words, he or she has taken a chance on you, and will appreciate updates on your progress.

Maintain a Positive Outlook

Optimists almost always make better first impressions than more negative people. Those who maintain a positive attitude in the face of a new or challenging situation tend to be looked on more favorably. Smile when you meet people for the first time or pass coworkers in the hall. Avoid complaining about anything, and stay out of the workplace gossip during these critical early weeks.

The Importance of Good Impressions

Because Americans only stay in each job for an average of about four years, it is safe to say that this job probably won’t be your last. So why put so much effort into making a good first impression?

While it’s true that this job is most likely a short-term solution, it still has the power to impact your career. Making a good impression might benefit you at this job by helping you to get promotions and special projects that look good on your resume and supercharge your career. In addition, starting a new job off on the right foot improves your chances of creating long-term networking contacts.

By following these ten tips and starting every job on the right foot, you can create solid stepping-stones from which to eventually reach even your loftiest career goals.

Your resume must always attract an employer’s attention at first sight. Hence make a best resume using some resume tips to land you your dream job

• Always use attractive titles and heading that match the job profile you want and a great way to do this would be to mention the job titles and skill headings clearly. Maintain the flow and the length of the resume and like a myth, you don’t have to follow the strict rule of writing a resume in one page. You can highlight the headings to make it more presentable

• Employers generally make snap judgments while reading your resume – and if they see an unrelated job profiles or titles or skills then they immediately assume that you are not qualified for the position. Don’t waste your time elaborating on your skills or the headings, as employers don’t have time to waste on each resume and determine whether you have the appropriate skill or experience which they are looking for. The design of your resume must showcase your skills, experience and education at the first glance. At first glance, employers must form an image about your skills and abilities.

• Your resume should be designed to attract the employer’s attention, but it should not be jazzy and should have the complete content and should include all your skills and abilities. These things may land you an interview, as well as determine your salary package that you may receive.

• Always use powerful words and statements to demonstrate or describe your achievements as well as your responsibilities. These points can grab an employer’s attention and elevate your image in front of him or her. The more you specify your positive points, the better. Use powerful words and phrases to control the images that the employers develop about you while reading your resume. Powerful words should match the job profile you are seeking.

• Learn and analyze the key words that employers provide in the advertisements or job descriptions, as this should be the key element in creating powerful and impact oriented resumes.

• Always try and understand and project the employers hidden needs through your resume like for example if an employer needs someone who can handle departments, accounting more efficiently then you should identify it and anticipate the full range of need and show that you can resolve it through your resume.

• Resumes should always provide a list of duties of each applicant without explaining the benefits of the skills to the employers like for example a secretary’s resume should state her typing speed and should also state how it could benefit the new employer. The real benefit of the employee should produce more work and also save the employer money.

• Your resume should create an image of you in front of the employer. When writing your resume, keep in mind the level of the job you are seeking and the salary you are expecting. Always use language according to the position you are seeking.

• Try and prioritize the content of your resume, as this is the most important mistake that is made by many job seekers. Always compile statements according to importance, relevance of the job you want.

• Always try and tweak your resume and cover letter as they can generate many more interviews for you. Try and place the heading to the left hand column for retail management positions.

Try and improve your resume as much as possible – after all, it’s the one that can get you an interview call.

It’s much the same for Stephanie Calhoun and Seth Feit. Like Longino, they’re familiar with the ways students describe their skills and themselves. They know how to quickly scan paper and electronic documents, to pull out the ones they’d like to examine more closely, and to toss the others aside.

Longino, a college recruiter for GTE Corp. in Irving, Texas, says he looks at the education portion of a resume first.

“I look for the degree, the major, and the graduation date,” he says. “And, of course, the GPA. It’s kind of a lump sum of things that I look for.”

Calhoun, college relations manager at JC Penney Co. Inc. in Dallas, Texas, says she looks at the experience section first.

“I look to see if the student has retail experience,” she says, adding that she then checks out the graduation date and the GPA.

Feit, corporate staffing manager at America Online in Fairfax, Virginia, says he looks first for skills and experience.

All three recruiters agree that aside from containing the education, skills, and experience they seek, a resume needs to communicate those elements clearly and be free of glaring grammatical and spelling errors.

Getting started

If you’re just beginning the process of building your resume, you’ll need to construct a framework first.

“A resume is like a final term paper,” says Jeff Nardo, career services coordinator at Coastal Carolina Community College in Jacksonville, North Carolina. “You have to put in the same energy, attention to detail, and focus.”

Your resume should begin with a heading that includes your name, address, telephone number, and, in most cases, e-mail address. If you’ll be leaving campus soon, be sure to provide a way for employers to reach you after you’ve moved from your dorm room or apartment. If you’re not sure where you’ll be living, it’s best to include both your campus contact information and contact information for your parents or a friend who isn’t planning to move and who won’t mind taking and forwarding messages.

“I often tell students to sign up for a free e-mail account that can travel with them,” says Marcia Merrill, career adviser at Loyola College in Baltimore, Maryland, pointing out that most campus e-mail accounts end within a certain time after a student graduates.

When you’re choosing that e-mail address, make sure it appears professional.

“I don’t feel comfortable responding to ‘sexylegs,’ ” Calhoun says. “Keep it simple.”

If you have your own web site, you may also want to include its URL on your resume. But both recruiters and career counselors stress that you must make sure your site contains only professional information and images.

Objectively speaking

After you’ve assembled your heading information, you’ll need to find a focus for your resume. One good way of doing that is to write an objective that clearly tells the employer the sort of work you’re hoping to do.

Merrill advises students to avoid writing grandiose “philosophy-of-life” objectives.

“Some students look at the objective as a statement of what you want to do with your life,” she says. “Employers get a lot of ‘To continue learning and growing in a nurturing environment.’ You can probably say it in a different way.”

“We like to see some kind of objective or summary statement,” Feit says. “The more specific it is, the better. Then we’re able to route the resume to the appropriate people.”

Nardo tells students to tailor their objectives to each employer they’re targeting—and to each job they’re seeking.

“The objective is like the thesis statement for a term paper,” he says. “In it, you’re trying to prove your knowledge of a particular area.”

Education, of course

After you’ve found a focus, you’ll likely want to tell employers what you’ve learned. That means you’ll need a section for your education. You may also want to include related course work in that category or in a separate section directly beneath it.

At minimum, the education section should include your degree, when it was earned or is expected, and what college or university you attended or are attending. Many job seekers also include their GPA.

“Usually a 3.0 or better should go on the resume,” Merrill says, adding that if employers don’t see a GPA listed on your resume, they’ll assume it’s less than 3.0.

Feit and Calhoun both say they won’t immediately toss aside a resume listing a lower GPA, but they won’t keep it much longer unless it shows strong experience.

“We don’t cut you off if you don’t have a 3.0,” Calhoun says.

Merrill adds that the education category is a good place to mention if you’re on the dean’s list or have received other academic honors.

“Some students have a separate category for honors,” she says. “Others just list honors with their education. If you’ve made dean’s list but that’s your only honor, put it under education.”

After the education section, many student job seekers include a section listing courses that are related to the job they’re seeking.

“It’s kind of annoying if you list every class you’ve ever taken,” Feit says. “If you’re looking for a position as a software developer, then list software development courses.”

Feit says that he doesn’t think a course work section is always necessary, but it can be helpful, “especially for people who don’t have much meat on their resume.”

For most students, the education section should precede the experience section.

“For me, it’s easier if education is placed near the top of the page,” Longino says.

But not all employers agree.

Calhoun says she likes to see the section listing a student’s work experience placed above the education category.

“I would prefer experience to appear on top,” she says. “I already know you’re in school.”

Wherever the section appears on the resume, employers will be looking at it closely.

“I’ve seen a lot of resumes that really don’t have anything on them,” Longino says. “The students don’t describe their accomplishments. They might just say, ‘rang up sales and talked to customers.’ Instead of saying ‘rang up sales,’ say ‘responsible for generating 50,000 sales transactions in three months’ or something like that.”

“You have to quantify and qualify,” adds Nardo. “You can’t just say you handled money, for instance. Say ‘handled in excess of $5,000 per day.’ Then qualify it. If you sold clothes, how well did you do it? Did you get an award? A bonus? A raise? Measure how much you did and explain how well you did it.”

Longino adds that students shouldn’t hesitate to include summer and part-time work experience that doesn’t initially seem to be related to the position they’re seeking.

“Students are way too negative about their fast-food experience,” he says. “It’s how you position it that matters. Customer service is a wonderful training ground. Try to identify how what you did fits into the corporate world and play up that experience.”

Calhoun, who hires specifically for retail positions, agrees that customer service is key.

“Even if you were a telemarketer, you still have experience in customer service,” she says.

If you haven’t completed an internship or worked in a job in or out of your field, Feit recommends including a project completed for an upper-level class.

“Describe it like a work experience,” he says. “But be honest about what it is. You don’t want to snow someone into thinking it was a full-time job for two years.”

Nardo, who often counsels students who are transitioning from other careers or returning to the workplace after raising their children, says that sometimes volunteer and home-management activities can be used as experience.

“The challenge is to identify what’s relevant,” he says.

“You could be punctual and pay your bills,” he says. “You could refinish your bathroom in your home and follow well-defined instructions.”

Other categories

Recruiters and career counselors agree that not every resume needs to look exactly the same. Different people need to emphasize things in different ways.

Nardo says he sometimes recommends a key skills or special competencies section, to be placed high on the resume, usually just below the objective.

“It’s like a table of contents or an outline,” he says. “You’re saying, ‘I’m going to tell you more in the experience section.”

Special skills, such as fluency in a foreign language or proficiency in specific computer programs, can be placed beneath the experience category as well, as can a listing of honors and awards.

All three recruiters say they don’t mind seeing a list of activities—as long as the student can relate them to the job.

“A lot of people get carried away with awards,” Calhoun says. “If you were homecoming queen, I don’t really need to know that.”

Feit says he likes to see leadership experience, even if it doesn’t seem related to the job.

“Having an office in a fraternity or a volunteer organization is good,” he says. “It shows an ability to balance. Sports are nice, too.”

Adds Longino, “There’s nothing that says ‘I can organize my time’ better than the resume of a student who is a collegiate athlete and also has a good GPA.”

Putting it on paper…or online

Once you’ve organized your information into categories, you’ll need to make sure it can be read easily and can withstand the scrutiny of an electronic scanning system and, in some cases, a trip through cyberspace.

If you’re planning to send your resume by “snail mail” or hand it to a recruiter at a job fair, make sure it appears clean and pleasing to the eye. In most cases, it should be confined to one page of white or off-white paper, although some employers in some fields, such as education and counseling psychology, expect longer resumes.

“I’ve seen some hot pinks,” says Calhoun, who still receives about 80 percent of the resumes she reads on paper. “That will not get your resume read faster.”

“I’ve had resumes coming in that were blue and purple,” adds Longino, who receives about 75 percent of the resumes he reads on paper. “It’s hard on the eyes.”

A brightly colored resume can also make it hard for electronic scanning systems to pick out the correct words, and could put you out of the running for a job you want and are qualified for.

Calhoun says the quality of paper doesn’t matter to her a great deal, as long as the information is clearly presented and shows the experience she’s seeking.

If you’re planning to fax your resume, the same advice holds true. If you’re e-mailing your resume, or directly entering it into an employer’s web site, remember to keep it as simple as possible.

“In the technical age, content is king,” says Feit, explaining that AOL receives 90 percent of its resumes through its web site. “Formatting doesn’t matter as much.”

No matter how you plan to submit your resume, make sure that you’ve proofread it carefully and asked several other people to do the same.

“It’s really important to remember that spellcheck does not work for grammar,” Merrill says, adding that the same applies for homonyms. “If you have ‘their’ instead of ‘there,’ it won’t come up on spellcheck.”

Merrill tells students to have a career services staff member review their resume before they send it off.

“Make sure you’ve spelled everything right, especially the company’s name,” advises Calhoun. “And keep in mind what a resume is: a summary of your job qualifications.”

Many career counselors advise students and new graduates to take a portfolio of work with them to job interviews. Your portfolio holds evidence of your experience—examples and copies—of anything you’ve worked on and/or accomplished in school, at a job, or in volunteer work. For many students, a portfolio offers a comfortable way of demonstrating ability with “real life” examples.

Artists and news reporters, for example, traditionally use portfolios to showcase their work. A graphic artist working as a web designer, for example, might bring printouts of the development of a web site from initial drawings through completion. An artist going into advertising might bring samples of ad campaigns. Reporters bring “clips” of stories they have had published. A reporter’s portfolio might include several articles as they were submitted to an editor plus the finished, published product in order to demonstrate that they’ve had experience writing stories and that the stories were publishable.

You can ask a number of people what to include in your portfolio—e.g., a career counselor, a faculty mentor, an adviser or mentor from your field. Many will be happy to look through your portfolio and critique your selections. However, having the right ingredients in your portfolio isn’t enough. The key to success is presenting the contents at the right time during your interview.

Heidi Perman advises students at the University of Minnesota-St. Paul on how to get the maximum value from their portfolios. She offers these guidelines:

One size doesn’t fit all

One portfolio won’t work for all interviews (although you’ll probably use many of the same pieces for your interviews). And, there is no “right” number of items to include in your portfolio. Remember—you don’t have to show everything you’ve brought, but you also don’t want your portfolio to be so thick and full that it looks as if you’ve brought everything you have ever accomplished.

To prepare your portfolio for an interview, review the job description and choose examples of your work that relate to the skills the job requires. Then, review the pieces you’ve selected to include in the portfolio for this specific interview and order them within your portfolio according to topic. You want to be as organized as possible so that you can avoid shuffling through your papers to find examples.

If you can, practice answering questions while pulling out examples from your portfolio. Contact your career services office to see if you can participate in mock interviews to practice your presentation skills.

It’s show-and-tell time

Using your portfolio during the interview is like a grownup version of show-and-tell. Remember, there’s a right time and a wrong time to present your portfolio or its contents to an interviewer.

Don’t hand over your portfolio at the beginning of the interview—the employer will be tempted to look through it while talking to you and may not give you his or her full attention. Or, the employer will listen to you and not see the great examples of work you’ve included.

Don’t save your portfolio until the end of the interview. The employer may have a very limited amount of time to spend with each job candidate, so he or she may not have time to skim through your portfolio before the next interview. Your portfolio will go in a briefcase to be examined later (if at all), at which time your work will not make a good connection to your interview.

Also, don’t put original documents into your portfolio—sometimes employers ask to take your portfolio with them. Make copies of everything that you include and be prepared to leave this copy of your portfolio upon request.

Here’s how your presentation should work:

The interviewer will ask you a question.

Take a moment to think about your answer—and to pinpoint (in your mind) something in your portfolio that relates specifically to your answer.

Answer the question. Then say, “I have an example of this in my portfolio.”

Next, open your portfolio and find the document as quickly and smoothly as possible.

Introduce the document to the interviewer. You might say something like, “During my internship at XYZ Company, I designed a widget supply chain that streamlined the process for my department. I have a drawing of the process that I believe demonstrates the skills we have been talking about.”

Whip out your document. Then, be quiet. Wait for the employer to look up (this is a signal that the employer has finished examining your document) or until the employer asks a question about your work.

Or, if the silence is too uncomfortable, you can point out specifics of the example you are showing.

The interview will then naturally flow to another questions—and another example from you.

At the end of the interview, when the employer asks “Is there anything else you want to share with us?” you can show a project that you feel especially proud of from your portfolio. Or, you can ask the interviewer, “Can I share with you any other items from my portfolio?”