The Importance of Adaptation and Survival in the Job Search Jungle

by Thomas Madrecki
A caveat: I am a fourth-year student at the University of Virginia with a good grade point average (3.79/4.0) and a solid background in journalism and communications, and I have yet to secure full-time employment. That being said, I still believe in the following recommendations…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/icelight/ / CC BY 2.0

There’s no question that we live in an ever-changing digital and Internet-driven environment, an environment that affects every aspect of our lives, including the job search process. And with so many mediums and so many options out there, it’s more important than ever that we learn how to stand out from the crowd and how to efficiently and effectively communicate our professional proficiencies across a wide media stratum – not only because it will make us stand out, but because it showcases skills that companies are looking for in the hiring process. In an odd – if convoluted – way, selling yourself successfully means selling to recruiters the idea that you can sell … anything.

The first step? There are several very easy and readily available ways to boost your resume and its appearance. A little bit of effort will go a long way toward impressing future employers and making your application stand out amid a sea of less marketable candidates.

The first of these suggested technical skills is a familiarity with the Adobe creative suite. And I’m not suggesting this just as a skill set for someone looking to enter the communications/design arena. I see no reason why any job-seeker wouldn’t stand to profit from even the slightest InDesign and Photoshop experience.

For starters, any product crafted in Adobe software looks and feels light years ahead of anything composed in Microsoft Office. Every employer receives hundreds of applications that originated as 8.5 x 11 documents in standardized, size-12, Times New Roman font. Maybe, if they’re lucky, some bold soul is creative or design-oriented enough to fashion his resume in Helvetica instead. Far better, though, to use InDesign in composing your resume and sample materials, as the number of advantages vastly exceeds any initial drawbacks in terms of a learning curve. If you’ve got an eye for print design – just an understanding of what works and what doesn’t – you’ll be able to reap numerous benefits:

1. A “cleaner,” more sophisticated look.
2. A quicker and easier ability to convert documents into secure .pdf format.
3. Generally speaking, more space to include outstanding achievements and career experiences as a result of straightforward, customizable line kerning/leading and font selection/sizing.
4. Another great technical skill on the bottom of your application.

As a final note, be careful not to “go crazy” with your resume. I shouldn’t have to say this, but tailor the look of your resume to the impression you wish to convey to employers. Maybe a serif font with dozens of bold, dramatic flourishes speaks to your inner poet, but it’s probably unwise if one is seeking employment as a financial adviser (though I’d have to inquire why any poet would stoop to such mundane, middle-class work). Similarly, though, I personally love groundbreaking graphic design and all things “modern” and “clean.” Precisely because I’m not seeking employment as a graphic artist, my own resume reflects a more traditional, perhaps refined, taste. After careful consideration, I attempted to utilize a standard layout with relatively easy-to-read boxes and a few eye-catching design tweaks (the Trajan font header, for example, as cliché and overdone as Trajan tends to be). The result is something that is slightly more text heavy than I would ideally like, but provides an adequate representation of who I am.

Providing that link brings me to the second technical skill recommendation – WordPress web site design as a way to showcase your work portfolio online. Initially a blogging platform, WordPress has been molded into a viable content management system with the help of an open-source (and mostly free) design community. An entire instruction manual could be devoted to conveying how to best utilize WordPress, but the bare bones are these:

1. You have two options – WordPress.com and WordPress.org. The first is a free-to-host service with more limited design and URL options, while the latter is a fully customizable option used in conjunction with a paid hosting service and URL. The best option is up to you, but my personal route of choice was first to explore the system using WordPress.com and then transfer over to my own domain.
2. WordPress uses customizable “themes.” There are dozens of blogs and sites devoted to the latest WordPress designs, so common sense would dictate that you research as much as possible before starting your new site.
3. Get your hands dirty. WordPress is easy to use, but one has to experiment, naturally, before one can get the most out of the system. Looking into the coding framework and going beyond the initial capabilities of various templates is the only way to separate oneself even to a greater degree, so it can’t hurt to tinker.

I apologize upfront for the scarce introduction, but all that really needs to be mentioned is the “wow-factor” possibility. To be perfectly frank, I didn’t know a lick of coding and still barely know my way around PHP and CSS. But with a bit of determination and outside-the-box thinking, I put together a creative portfolio that most college students charting a career in my field of choice (i.e., not web/print design) can’t match. As a side bonus, my experience using WordPress later provided me with several freelance opportunities, the most important of which was the chance to redesign an internationally distributed magazine’s web site.

So, what’s the takeaway? There are plenty of ways to distinguish your application during the hiring process. I haven’t found the right job yet, but I can’t imagine being in today’s job market and not being armed with the technological survival and adaptation mechanisms highlighted above. After all, it’s a jungle out there.

Thomas Madrecki is a fourth-year Echols Scholar at the University of Virginia and the former managing editor of The Cavalier Daily newspaper. A true media chameleon, he hopes his extensive writing background and knowledge of various print/web design options makes him the perfect candidate for a career in brand management, communications, journalism, and/or public affairs. On the side, he’s also a former Dexter USBC High School All-American bowler (averaging about 225) and a budding, Nietzsche-adoring philosopher with a keen interest in existentialism and the pursuit of happiness.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 9th, 2010 at 9:45 am and is filed under Job Search, Thomas Madrecki, WhatsNextGenY. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.


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