Have You Spent Your Entire Career At One Employer? If So, You Need to Read This Post.
I have recently written resumes for several individuals who have spent long careers (20 – 40 years) with a single employer. None of these people had a functional resume before we started working together and most of them had not kept detailed notes about past jobs and accomplishments.
When I graduated from college in 1989 most large companies had college graduate training programs and if you joined one, the company expected that you would stay with them for many years, or perhaps, your entire career. Companies invested in a multitude of training programs and development opportunities designed to groom junior employees into senior level roles. Employee loyalty was valued and was rewarded by company loyalty – if you weren’t particularly good at one job, the company would move you to a department in which your strengths could be utilized. Good employees were valued and were treated accordingly.
Jobs and workplaces certainly have changed since 1989. Generation Y employees view themselves as short-term employees wherever they go and they have a plan for navigating different employers/industries over the course of their career. There is no shame in moving from employer to employer anymore – in fact “job hopping” is a reality that stems from the fact that employers are no longer loyal to employees. Today every employee has to look out for his own best interests and always keep an eye out for great new opportunities no matter how nicely his employer is treating him today.
If you are employed by one of the few remaining companies that have employed “lifers” whether it’s a government job, not-for-profit, or private sector you need to start keeping track of your accomplishments. When the time comes for you to retire or you are laid off you need to be able to create a resume which clearly explains the unique skills and accomplishments that you bring to a potential employer.
I spent many years at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago which is an employer that invests in its employees and expects long tenure. I can remember being given very high profile special projects by the COO, successfully completing them, getting a pat on the back and then, as a reward, being assigned another high profile project. It was great. Some of the projects were unrelated to my “real” job and others were only important internally and wouldn’t necessarily seem significant to anyone outside the Fed. I have recently worked with several clients who had the same types of experiences – you are tagged as a high potential employee and given lots of cool assignments that are industry/company specific but that may be unimportant to a potential employer. How do you get that kind of information on paper? Or do you?
What I try to do is to figure out which projects might be relatable to another employer and relevant to the job my client plans to seek. Some projects or experiences just don’t make sense to include on a resume even if they were very important to your career at one point in time. The other thing I try to do is to make sure to “translate” the terminology unique to your long-term employer into terms that are universally meaningful.
If you are one of the fortunate few who have spent your entire career with one or two large employers, do yourself a favor and start keeping notes on every job you have had. Maybe you will keep your job until you retire and can live off your pension. But, should something unexpected happen, you need to have organized information that can be used to craft a resume that will help you get a job in an increasingly competitive job market.
Article by Liz Handlin and courtesy of Ultimate Resumes
