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Careers

Writing an awesome resume

Getting on the road to employment can be really tough, so we’ve asked the experts what they think makes the big difference. The third part of our series shares some helpful hints to write an awesome resume from Ernst & Young. 

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Learning about resume writing and practicing new skills at Ernst & Young, July 2016

Resume writing… at some point we’ve all got to do it. And we’ve got to keep on doing it throughout our careers, adapting it to new opportunities, including new experiences, shaping it so it lands you that dream job. The thing is, what makes an awesome resume? There’s lots of confusing and often conflicting advice out there coming from a wide range of sources. Ultimately, it really depends on what industry you’re aiming for; a graphic designer’s resume is going to look pretty different from an accountant’s. Or at least, we hope it would!

We’ve teamed up with our partners at Ernst & Young, who hosted a fantastic session on resume writing as part of our recent 3-day residential University Pathways Program for Year 10 students, to give you some top tips and helpful hints to make your resume an awesome one.

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What’s HOT

Bearing in mind that many are at the very beginning of their road to employment, the Ernst & Young (EY) crew were keen to emphasize the importance of  having a diversity of skills and experiences in order to impress the top dogs. Showcasing your volunteering or part time work alongside your studies is a really good way of demonstrating what transferable skills you can offer to a future employer.

They dropped these pearls of essential wisdom in order to create a bang tidy resume:-

      • What to include – personal info, work experience, career goals, extra-curricular volunteering, student societies, sports – employers love to see a diversity of of experiences. Just make sure they’re relevant – playing PokemonGo! probably isn’t the best thing to put on there!

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    • Do your homework – read up on the company’s values, ideas and work so that you can mirror language, skills and ideas in your resume and prove to them that you are proactive and suitable for the role.
    • Match your resume – fit your resume to the job description, comparing and linking to your own personal experiences. If you want to earn extra brownie points, make sure you develop any skills where there are gaps – it’ll look super impressive and give you something to talk about in an interview.
    • Proofread answers – check for any typos or bad grammar; creating a good first impression is very important and many people get let down by a lack of attention to detail like this.
    • Be clear, concise and honest – don’t over-complicate things, apply the KISS principle (KeepItSimpleStupid) at all times and don’t get caught out later down the line or in an interview by embellishing too much!
    • Update regularly – make sure you update your resume after every new experience or project whilst it’s fresh in your mind – this will save you time later down the line and ensures you have an accurate record of your experience to date.
    • Active words – start each dot point with an active word like “created” or “implemented” – it sounds more dynamic.

What’s NOT

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However they were NOT so hot on a few things:-

  • Coloured fonts – deemed unprofessional and distracting. Bear in mind that this is just Ernst & Young and this is not definitive. If you’re in a more creative field, then coloured fonts and graphic design features might be just the thing to demonstrate your creative flair. But for many of you who are applying for jobs in traditional areas, then listening to the wise words of Ernst & Young is probably a winner.
  • Photos – again, this often a case of personal preference but Ernst & Young definitely weren’t keen on seeing your latest selfie!
  • Dates of birth – removing your age from a resume is a good idea as it also removes any conscious or unconcious bias associated with your age, level of expertise and thus suitability for the role.
  • Spelling errors / long sentences – a big no no for all the obvious reasons. Resumes need to be clear, concise and easy to read for the recruiter. Spelling areas shout sloppy and long sentences are complicated to read.

Thanks to Ernst & Young for hosting the interview session for our University Pathways Program. 

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How to ace your first interview

Getting on the road to employment can be really tough, so we’ve asked the experts what they think makes the big difference. The second part of our series shares some wise words and interview advice from Ernst & Young to help you ace your first interview. 

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Interview advice from Ernst & Young

As part of the University Pathways Program we visited Big 4 firm EY (Ernst & Young) with a bunch of Year 10 students who are just sussing out how to navigate the confusing maze of life to get on the road to university and meaningful employment. To kick things in this two part session, we were taken to Level 23 with panoramic views of the city symbolically setting off the scene.

UPP participants at Level 23, EY, Melbourne CBD

UPP participants at Level 23, EY, Melbourne CBD

The first session was all about interview skills and how to sharpen up your tool kit in preparation for any future interviews, be they for a part time job, a university position or that first grad role on the far horizon.

According to our pals at EY there are two types of interview most commonly used to select awesome new candidates for roles in a company; they are discussion based and behavioural based interviews. We’ll give you a run down of each along with some hot tips on how to ace your first interview.

Discussion based interviews

Discussion based interviews centre around talking about you and include questions around your resume, work experience, goals and motivations. An example question might be something like “so tell me more about your weekend role at Coles?” or “you say you are motivated by personal development opportunities, why is this?”

This means you will have to brush up on your personal story, experience, career goals and be ready to talk about them and answer any interrogative questions about anything you’ve included on your resume.

Some hot tips for acing a discussion based interview are:-

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  • Know your resume: this one’s pretty simple, but very crucial. Familiarise yourself with what you’ve included, why you’ve included it and be able to talk confidently and competently about it.  Remember it’s all about telling your personal story.
  • Link your skills to the position description: make sure you are the ideal candidate for the role by mirroring language, skills and key words from the position description and talk about these in the interview.
  • Answer questions completely: make sure your replies are comprehensive and cover all aspects of the question.
  • Sell yourself: this is your moment to shine and to show off all that is wonderful and amazing about your personal and professional skills in order to persuade the interviewer to hire you. Talk up your experiences and ideas. Be your own cheerleader.
  • Know what you want: set clear objectives about what you want from the role and why you are applying. You will be asked about this!
  • Silence is OK! this is self-explanatory but honestly, don’t feel the need to fill every gap with words. A well thought out answer is always better than a hurried one. If you need time to think just say “please could I have a moment to think”.
Group work during UPP session, July 2016

Group work during UPP session, July 2016

Behavioural based interviews

Behavioural based interviews use past experiences to predict future behaviour.  The interviewer will ask you to talk about your experiences, share an anecdote where you have demonstrated certain skills skills or ask how you have reacted to a particular situation. An example question might be something like “can you tell us about a time when you demonstrated great leadership skills?” or “how would you respond to a difficult and uncooperative team member?”

This means you will have to think of some good examples of where, when and how you demonstrated key skills before the interview – these may come from professional situations, school, part time work or volunteering opportunities.

Some hot tips for acing a behavioural based interview:

        • Find a relevant example of skills used to obtain an outcome: go through your resume and pick out your key skills, then think about some examples or situations you were in where you really demonstrated them to other people.
        • Use a variety of examples to draw from: be sure to have a range of situations up your sleeve; talking about that one time at your part time job which demonstrated teamwork, negotiating, using initiative and everything else under the sun, will not show the diversity of your experience!
        • Give detail  but keep it concise: there’s a balance between setting the scene and going into painful detail. Practice with someone else in order to get the balance right.
        • Use STAR technique: this is a great way of getting all the details in. STAR stands for Situation you were in Tasks required Action taken in response to situation Result of the action taken)

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Thanks to Ernst & Young for hosting the interview session for our University Pathways Program. 

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How to be a personal branding machine

Getting on the road to employment can be really tough, so we’ve asked the experts what they think makes the big difference. The first part of our series is about personal branding. 

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What is personal branding?

Does it matter? How do I use it to my advantage? These are all questions that might come up for you. James Freemantle from Red Gum Communications has the answers! He recently shared his ideas, approaches and top tips in an engaging and dynamic workshop at NAB Village with a group of curious Year 10 UPP students.

So, let’s think about branding. The definition of a brand is the promise of providing a consistent experience to a consumer. Personal branding isn’t too dissimilar. James explains personal branding as the alignment of the way you present yourself with the way others experience you. There are three ways of communicating: visually, verbally and vocally. All are equally important in terms of defining an interaction, a relationship and in defining individuals. To demonstrate this, the students participated in an activity where they had to deliver a word with an action and correct voice tone in order to deliver the word with impact and sincerity.

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James Freemantle, Red Gum Communications presentation; align your visual, vocal and verbal messages.

Does it matter?

In one word: YES! The choices we make with our body, face and voice have a big impact on those around us. How do you cause other people to feel when they meet you? How do they remember you? How can you take control of the impression people have of you? How do you WANT to be experienced?

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How can I use it to my advantage?

When you’re meeting someone for the first time, think about your habits of communication that create an impression of who you are, make someone remember you or to take action as a result of interacting with you. Think about what you can do to make this a better experience. In addition to this, think about your default response to a particular situation.  Pretty confronting hey? But really useful in order to hone your personal brand and create a good impression. Other tips that James was keen to highlight to the students for maximum effect were body language, breath and voice as these are all things that influence outcomes.

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UPP participants, team leaders and staff at NAB Village with James Freemantle, July 2016

Action & feeling goals

We’re about to get serious and talk about goal setting but this is important. We’re going to think about action goals and feeling goals. So first things first, let’s get things clear: an action goal is something you want to achieve in the short term. A feeling goal is the emotional context of the action goal or how you will feel when your action goal has been reached.

Imagine if you were going for a job interview – your action goal might be to create a positive, memorable impression and your feeling goal would then be feeling connected to the interviewer and having your comments affirmed with body language.

Have a think about how YOU can put all these ideas into practice and refine your own personal branding and use it to achieve greatness and success.

James Freemantle works for Red Gum Communications and is a personal branding expert.

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Fix Stuff. Make Stuff. Create Stuff. This Is Science.

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Well, there’s no denying it Science, Technology, Engineering & Maths (STEM) is a hot topic for millennials, the world of education and career pathways in 2016. But, according to The Grattan Institute, by the time students reach Year 9, more than 1 in 3 lack the scientific and/or numerical literacy they need to thrive and for students from disadvantaged backgrounds, the numbers are far bleaker. In addition to this, they report that the proportion of young Australians who study science or maths to Year 12 is in long-term decline.

What can we do about this? Well, getting young people excited and informed about science, inspiring them and opening their minds to the world of possibilities that a career in STEM offers is a good starting point.

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University Pathways Program visit CSIRO 

We recently took a group of University Pathways Program participants to CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) HQ in Clayton to discover more about careers in STEM, 3D printing or “additive manufacturing” and generally get them enthused and inquisitive about all things scientific.

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First of all, we were enlightened to CSIRO’s diversity as an organisation, with nine business units covering:
agriculture | health & biosecurity | data61 | energy | food & nutrition | land & water | manufacturing | mineral resources | oceans & atmosphere

Within CSIRO and the scientific world in general, the career possibilities are numerous, from research scientists, engineers, technicians through to communicators, educators and their very own legal team. Heaps of options right?

Top career tips – interested in a career in STEM?

[gdl_icon type=”icon-asterisk” color=”#0048BB” size=”10px”]Do things that give you options
[gdl_icon type=”icon-asterisk” color=”#0048BB” size=”10px”]Do what you enjoy
[gdl_icon type=”icon-asterisk” color=”#0048BB” size=”10px”]Do as many things for as long as you can

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How do science & industry work together at CSIRO?

Something that was heavily emphasized during our trip to CSIRO was the relationship between science and industry. – it’s in their name after all, remember?

For those that think they’re not interested in science, the guys at CSIRO reminded us that it is at the essence of every process as we fix stuff, make stuff and create stuff. If we apply scientific knowledge to a purpose – or an industry – we can relate to then it becomes interesting.

Within the context of additive manufacturing (3D printing), industrial businesses visit the CSIRO lab to test out the $800,000 machines and see if they can harness the new technology for application within their industry. Through this process, the business works out if 3D printing is going to be beneficial for them and CSIRO scientists are exposed to new ideas and creative solutions, triggering new scientific development. It’s a win-win situation!

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Women in STEM

As well as a lack of young people opting for careers in STEM, there’s also a big gender issue across the sector. An Australian government report looking into the ‘Pathways Of STEM graduates in Australia’ found that across the whole STEM graduate workforce, less than 1/3 were females.

Not cool, hey? But the next generation can do something to change that. And they will. Jasmine and Martina, two UPP participants, were both super keen to talk about their passions for science.

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Martina, age 15:

“I love science – especially biology, chemistry and psychology. There’s always something new to discover in science. It’s always progressing. It’s mind blowing that things you never even thought about can come true. I’m also a strong believer that whatever your age or gender you should give it a go!”

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Jasmine, age 15:

“I’ve always wanted to go into medicine and be a neurosurgeon. This is because when I was younger my stepdad got a brain tumour. I helped looked after him and was always asking the nurses and doctors questions, I went along to the meetings and learned a lot. It would be a great feeling to save a life – this has a huge impact not only on the patient but also their family.”

Yeah science!

We’re really stoked that our UPP students got so much out of this visit and were so interested in careers in STEM. A big thank you to CSIRO for hosting the UPP session and opening up all our eyes to the boundless possibilities of a career in STEM… hooray for science!

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Deutsche Bank Internship

Hi I’m Ewe-Jin Tan. I’m a 3rd year Doxa Cadet. I’m studying at the University of Melbourne and my work placement is at JB Were. My long-term goal is to utilize my studies in Commerce and passion in finance in the asset management industry, investing in ideas and disruptors that bring revolutionary changes to their respective fields. I believe we all have a personal responsibility to use our skill set and education to benefit local communities and societies globally.

Ewe-Jin2Doxa Cadet Ewe Jin Tan

My internship

At the end of my penultimate year, I interned with Deutsche Bank in Hong Kong and Singapore. The internship was incredibly unique and eye-opening as it provided me with practical experience in a global investment bank in the context of the Asia Pacific region.

The atmosphere on the Global Markets trading floor was highly driven and motivating. The work culture was lively, collaborative and intellectually challenging. This resulted in open conversations and discussions where stimulating ideas were bounced around on a daily basis.

My role

I was assigned to the Equity Sales desk in Hong Kong and the Credit Sales desk in Singapore. In both rotations, I saw first-hand the importance of China in the global economy. In my role, I was regularly exposed to diverse equity and credit markets in the Asian region, including China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, Korea and India.

Kowloon Harbour, Hong Kong

This photo of Kowloon Harbour was taken in the Deutsche Bank offices in Hong Kong, which happens to be in the tallest building in HK!

No two days were the same. In both my rotations, I was given responsibilities from day one through assigned projects. I wrote several investment pieces on China’s outbound winter tourism, the trading discount of Chinese banks due to its hazy corporate governance, fundamentally undervalued stocks on pricing metrics, asset valuation discrepancies of Chinese property developers and relative value trading opportunities involving the diverging spreads of similar-rated sovereign and corporate bonds.
I also had the opportunity to present mock client stock pitches to my colleagues, imitating an integral role of my desk on a daily basis. The stocks I presented were broad in geographic markets and operating sectors.

The internship also involved formal presentations. These presentations were a component of the overall internship evaluation. The presentation topics were open-ended, covering the challenges and opportunities facing clients, Deutsche

Bank and the overall financial services industry. These presentations provided me with opportunities to connect with fellow colleagues and build my knowledge of other desks around the trading floor.

Life in the Asia-Pacific

Living in Hong Kong and Singapore over two months was exciting, eye-opening, challenging and culturally fulfilling. There were many contrasting aspects of Hong Kong and Singapore compared to Australia. Key highlights were the friendliness and openness of people, the delicious local cuisine, endless after-work and weekend activities and the bustling night-life. The geographic proximity also meant I was able to sneak in a weekend trip to Macau and Malaysia!

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Investing In Future Talent

Doxa Alumni Preethi Jeeva

Doxa Alumni Preethi Jeeva

Imagine if you were the first one in your family to go to uni, had no exposure to the corporate world, and no access to professional networks. Getting to where you are now would be hard – right?

Each year we meet many talented young people through our Cadetship program who have the grades to get into university but may not have the financial support, positive role models or life opportunities to make that happen on their own.

That’s why we need you.

Do you work at an organisation that:

[gdl_icon type=”icon-asterisk” color=”#0048BB” size=”10px”]      invests in its future talent

[gdl_icon type=”icon-asterisk” color=”#0048BB” size=”10px”]      is committed to providing high-quality skilled volunteering opportunities to its workforce

[gdl_icon type=”icon-asterisk” color=”#0048BB” size=”10px”]      cares about its corporate social reputation

Yes? Then let’s have a conversation.

We need sponsors for our Cadetship program for 2016-17. Sponsor companies provide a young person with the opportunity to put their life challenges behind them and accompany them on a journey to complete university and gain the skills for an employable future.

To give you a brief overview of what’s involved; every young person on our Cadetship program receives financial support, an annual work placement and a professional development program.

Our sponsor companies (that’s you… we hope) provide up to eight weeks professional experience each year of the Cadetship. After getting involved in projects and generally being superstars around the office, some Cadets go on to secure graduate roles within their work placement organisations.

What’s more, the Cadetship program provides a fantastic skilled volunteering opportunity for your existing workforce, as in-house mentors play a large part in the Cadet’s development journey.

As a corporate sponsor you will play a vital role in a young person’s personal and professional development. That’s an awesome thing to be a part of. What do you think? Keen for your company to get involved?  Drop us a line.

T: 03 9328 8100 E: info@doxa.org.au for more info or to book in a meeting with one of our Cadetship team to discuss the opportunity to become a sponsor company.
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