Keys To A Winning Public Profile, Online and Offline

With the reality of LinkedIn, Facebook, and dozens of other websites profiling you, the old-fashioned written resume is an artifact of a hiring practice that is now superfluous. The real “resume” that you have to live with is everything that you or anyone else has posted about you on any site on the Internet. You can’t hide, since no Internet presence is now assumed to be a negative.

Today, most personnel organizations readily admit that they already use the Internet to validate what they see in your written resume. You can bet that if the stories don’t match, they will more likely believe the online version. That’s why I emphasized in an old article, “Google Yourself to See How Other People See You,” how important it is to keep your online image clean.

In reality, it doesn’t matter whether you are preparing an online profile for your favorite social network, or a written resume (Curriculum Vitae) in the old-fashioned sense, you need to make certain that it helps your case rather than hurts it. Here are some tips on how to make yours stand out above the crowd, online and off:

1. Focus on publishing results. By focusing on results produced and on the needs of the employer, you’ll stand clearly apart from 90 percent of other applicants. Their profiles say, in effect: “I worked these jobs.” Your profile should say: “Here are results you can expect.” That’s much more refreshing and enticing.

2. Make it look professional. You only get one chance for a good first impression. Choose a couple of readable font styles and sizes, and no bright colors or highlighting. Spell check and proofread many times – a single typo or incorrect word can get you rejected. Online, avoid slang and other bad language, and keep your comments positive.

3. Include a current picture. Every professional needs to look professional. You can’t hide, so be proactive and look your best (online or on paper), with a small headshot, rather than force the recruiter to find some not-so-attractive shots on Facebook or Twitter outside your profile. A cartoon picture or pet photograph won’t impress anyone.

4. Don’t leave time gaps. Big time gaps in your professional life are a red flag. Did you skip those years because you were raising a family, unemployed, or in jail? A short entry for the period, stated as positively as possible, will leave a better impression, and avoid embarrassing questions later. Complaining about terrible jobs won’t get you sympathy.

5. References on request. Mention that references are available, but including them in the profile can leave the impression that these are very generic. Personal references should be customized to support specific requests from a potential employer, and confirmed by you prior to employer contact.

Executives tell me that they are continually frustrated that most of the resumes they see still sound like “job descriptions?” We need to know what you did, not what you were supposed to do. Words like “assisted” and “supported” are not results. Fuzzy words will hurt you.

Offline, it’s a good strategy to customize your resume to match each opportunity. For example, if you are looking at an entrepreneurial position, show a background in leadership. Mention entrepreneurial groups, and highlight groups you started all the way back to college. If it’s an executive position, highlight your results in that context.

I suspect the day is near when Wikipedia will make even social network profiles obsolete, meaning that every professional will have a public profile entry, maintained by a vast number of “online volunteers” (see Bill Gates, for example). The “open source” cross-check process seems to keep these fairly accurate, and the constraints on who is a “public person” go down every day.

Based on what I see today on Facebook, a lot of people have a long way to go in building that professional resume to show the world. Now is the time to check yours and make sure it highlights your strengths, rather than your shortcomings, before it shows up on Wikipedia and your employer’s desk.

Marty Zwilling

Martin Zwilling is the Founder and CEO of Startup Professionals, a company that provides services to startup founders around the world. See more details at www.startupprofessionals.com