Groundhog Day

In North America February 2nd is known as Groundhog Day, when, according to the Pennsylvania Dutch superstition the groundhog is said to come out of its hole at the end of hibernation. If the weather is sunny and it sees its shadow it goes back into its hole, which foretells six weeks more of winter weather.

​The alternative dictionary definition of Groundhog Day is “a situation in which a series of unwelcome or tedious events appear to be recurring in exactly the same way.” And for anyone who has seen the eponymous film with Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell, Groundhog Day specifically symbolises getting stuck in a relentless repetition of the same day until such time as you make the right decisions and find your purpose.  

---

For the past 10+ months every day has felt like Groundhog Day for many of us: wake, eat, exercise, teach (if you have kids), work (if you have a job), eat, teach, work, walk, eat, work, sleep, repeat…..or a variation on that theme. On February 2nd 2020, who knew?
And the things that have brought changes to this monotony have not always been positive: illness, loss, redundancy amongst them. Being kind to yourself is the most important piece of advice I have heard for dealing with all these situations.
 
In the film, Phil (Bill Murray) has many unsuccessful attempts at escaping Groundhog Day until he makes the right changes and wakes up to find snow, love and a new life.
When dealing with redundancy, after the rawness of shock, grief and anger have receded there is the mission of finding a new job.  If you read around the subject, and I have, you can find a lot of advice about preparing yourself for the task, identifying your goal, doing your homework and being disciplined and resilient about executing your plan. 
 
To help with one of the key areas of preparation, your CV and LinkedIn profile, here are 5 tips for getting them to work as hard as possible for you:

1. A lot of recruiters use ATS (applicant tracking systems) to help them sort through the volume of applications they receive for each role, so you need to know and feature the keywords for your role and industry in your CV so that your skills are recognisable to AI-based readers.
2. Your CV needs to focus on your achievements and not your past job descriptions. Think about what your standout moments have been in your past roles and highlight them to show how you made a difference.
3. Keep your formatting simple, neat and business-like; don’t be tempted to use borders, fancy fonts, multiple columns and boxes to make the CV stand out.  Whilst these may appeal to some human readers (but not all) they often render the CV unreadable when ingested into an AI recruitment programme.  If you don’t know who is going to be reading your CV, then err on the safe side.
4. Keep it short and to the point.  If your CV is being read by time poor human recruiters they will want to be able to see what they need to see within a VERY short amount of time. With this in mind, use a Profile and a Key Skills section at the top of your CV to showcase why they will WANT and NEED to meet you, as this can encourage them to read on and allow you to get your message across. 
5. Use LinkedIn. Make sure your profile is up to date; that you are using all the sections you can, your headshot is professional, your banner is striking, your About section is compelling, your Experience is complete and you have spent time utilising Skills and Endorsements. This will make you a 5-star LinkedIn user and ensure your visibility on the platform, and to recruiters.

 
If you want to make your next 10 months into anything other than Groundhog Day then plan, research and prepare so you make the right decisions, find your purpose and your next job.
Good luck!