Tips For Speed Reading Resumes

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As a busy business owner, manager, supervisor, or entrepreneur, you probably feel like there is never enough time in the day to get it all done. Your day is full of tasks and responsibilities that are crucial to your professional success. And if you are like many employers, you are always looking for ways to manage your time more effectively. Reading resumes can be an extremely time-consuming process, but it is not one that you can rush through.

If your goal is to hire highly qualified and motivated employees, reduce turnover, and foster growth in your business, it's important to pay close attention to the resumes that come across your desk. While it is essential to take your time during this vital process, there are a few ways you can get through the resume reading process faster.

Here are 3 tips to rapid-fire resume reading:

Scan for what doesn't work

One of the quickest ways to filter through a pile of resumes is to scan for deal-breakers. There's nothing more frustrating than getting halfway through a resume and realizing that the person doesn't possess one of the critical characteristics required for the job.Or they left out their contact info. Or they are still using their crazy email address from high school. If you are looking for a top-level marketing executive and quickly scan a resume to see that Joe Smith has extensive experience in the fast food and retail industries, you can probably stop your reading there. If you notice Judy Jones has everything you're looking for, but she lives in Oklahoma, she probably won't be a good fit for your Orange County business.

Knowing what your deal breakers are and scanning for them in the beginning will help you quickly narrow down the resumes in front of you and find the right candidate faster.

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Analyze The Physical Resume

Once you've scanned for what won't work, it's time to look for what will work. This process is a visual inspection of the resume. Without even reading it, you can make a lot of judgments based on the appearance of the resume. Is it neat and tidy? Did they use a professional font, is the paper crisp and free of smudges and rips? If a resume looks unprofessional, it shows they aren't truly invested in the position, aren't concerned about first impressions, and don't have a significant eye for detail. This probably isn't the type of person you want working for you.

At this point, you've probably already eliminated quite a few resumes based on either deal-breakers or the condition of their physical resume. Now it's time to analyze the remaining resumes and look for specific keywords or characteristics that you're looking for.

Search For Successes

It's not an industry secret that job-seekers will take some of the keywords from the job description and input them into an overview or summary on a resume. This doesn't tell you much about the candidate except that they are proficient at copying and pasting.

What you're looking for is actual evidence of success and experience. Look for numbers, analytics, and resources that show your candidate knows what he or she is doing. Long, lengthy, keyword-stuffed descriptions are often a sign that the candidate is trying to make up for their lack of experience or knowledge in the industry. Resumes that list quantifying numbers and success rates show that a candidate is not only experienced but confident in their abilities. This is the type of person you want to investigate further and possibly hire onto your team. Things to look for include:

A reply that is customized to your company's specific hiring needs. Does it look like they've copied and pasted a standard formal letter that lists basic hiring generalities? If so, it doesn't demonstrate that they've looked into the job requirements carefully or have an interest in working for your company specifically.
Job growth. Look for a consistent stream of promotions and growth within the industry. This shows they are a go-getter.
A clear understanding of the job responsibilities and clearly stated goals that line up with these responsibilities.

When you know what you're looking for, and what you're not, it makes it easy to divide resumes into two piles: the people you want to investigate further and the people who aren't going to work for your business.

Another way to quickly get through the resume reading process is to outsource the process altogether. Instead of spending hours a day scanning, reviewing, and reading resumes, outsource your hiring processes to an Orange County staffing agency. They not only have the time to go through hundreds of resumes carefully, but they also work with an extensive network of qualified candidates that may be perfect for the position.

Hiring a staffing agency saves your company time and money. If you are about to enter the hiring process, and don't want to spend a lot of time reading resumes, work with a Los Angeles staffing agency that'll do it for you.