Micro-resume: selling yourself in 140 characters

[shootingstar]

My current job sucks, yet is so demanding, challenging, technical and exacting that it prepares me for anything you need me to do ... in Seattle

I like that Trek!

Ultraviolet: I was raised by a mother who swore alot..in Chinese. It's not pretty. That's all I have to say.

I also report to a manager who does use sh*t often. She has 12 people reporting to her. She hasn't used s*ck yet. Probably just not part of her vocab.

She and I are....librarians by training. But that's not our jobs for the organization that we were work for.....we have both moved into business analsysis and entreprise-wide content management systems.

So ....we do fit the norm? Yea, sure some llibrarians with a profile in the world, do use "suck" ....just for effect in their speeches/presentations, just to break the stereotype.

You mentioned you were a direct person in style. I have been assessed as a manager in other organizations...as shooting from the hip, abit too directly. Some of MY sarcasm, irony was totally misinterpreted and worked against me.

Maybe that's why I can tolerate certain management styles if I understand what happens on the job that causes present manager's frustration and anger. The manager does tend to be direct, ironic and saracastic...which really only shows continuous anger, etc. Not good, not healthy. (I suggested to her, carefully, maybe exercise to de-stress. She told me she lives right by a bike path.)

I have learned my lesson. So "suck" away.

But then other things have happened in my personal life, which probably have tempered my style a great deal ..things that have nothing to do with work but have made me realize it's just easier...to be myself, and for work, the very best of me on the job.

[Trek420]

... we shouldn't create sweeping judgments just because something doesn't fit into our own particular experience of the world. The world is a more interesting place than that.

+1. Those in the job market right now whether unemployed, underemployed, relocating can (depending on industry, company) face subtle or not so subtle discrimination based on age. I'm using all the tricks to give my resume a digital face lift. Don't even mention the land line, nobody uses one, only the cell. The previous 2 careers; souse chef, art director? Don't directly mention them, just the skills. It's too far back. College yes ... don't say when.

In the old days (here Trek shakes her cane "you kids get off my lawn! I'm trying to figure out how to fax my resume") one never mentioned "hobbies". Now since sadly I'm more active than coworkers half my age yeah, sure; I bike, hike, do martial arts.

Posting to Twitter seems another digital hurdle to prove I'm "with it". Ooops, old jargon makes me seem "old". Gotta watch the buzz words too.

[shootingstar]

In the old days (here Trek shakes her cane "you kids get off my lawn! I'm trying to figure out how to fax my resume") one never mentioned "hobbies". Now since sadly I'm more active than coworkers half my age yeah, sure; I bike, hike, do martial arts.

Posting to Twitter seems another digital hurdle to prove I'm "with it". Ooops, old jargon makes me seem "old". Gotta watch the buzz words too.

Instead of resorting to s*ck, Trek, I have mentioned my hobbies (art, cycling, etc.) in my resume and I included some of my blogs so employers know that I can actually create stuff with social media and it is another skill set (with all that writing, marketing stuff).

yea, some employers did read my blog stuff. It becomes social lubricant in job interviews. That's why I choose not write too jargony /inflammatory blog articles ...because employer can trace me.

Did it make a difference for why I was chosen (after 18 months of unemployment)? I know the sort of skill sets the dept. wanted, but also the "fit" was probably helpful. Several other staff in the same dept., are physically active too. So skills, experience and workplace "fit" is important. So the hobby stuff sometimes is part of that "fit" to gauge the real personality of the person beyond the facade of the interview personnae that the person presents during the job interview.

The director for the division, under the umbrella of the bigger business unit where I am, is a mountain biker.

Believe me in your 40's and up, to be physically active, IS important than the s*ck /hip language.

[emily_in_nc]

How about this: My current job sucks, yet is so demanding, challenging, technical and exacting that it prepares me for anything you need me to do ... in Seattle

I love it!

[Crankin]

Well, not only do certain things not fit into my place in the world, they also do not fit into my profession. Or the one I was in before. In my new world, I am considered computer literate, which is a joke. In the two places I interned, there was more than one clinician (usually male) who could not do email or type. Hand written notes are the norm. Some people (not all my age) are looking for other things to do before 2014, the advent of digital medical records. So, in human services/healthcare, one does not have to know anything about social networking because we don't want our clients to know anything about us.
I am in the same boat as Trek. My resume has been sufficiently doctored to only show my jobs since 1992; not even my first job in Massachusetts. It may look like I was someone who is in her early 40's and/or was a stay at home mom. Dates have been left off of my BA and first MA degree. Age is definitely a plus in my new field. I talked to the director of career services at my university and asked her about this point blank. She verified the above about older is a plus in my field, and also said that my demeanor, obvious fitness, and my resume information about being a bike trip leader are huge plusses, not just for an older person, but for anyone. I do feel uncomfortable about putting hobbies there, as it seems "personal", but if it helps a hiring person see me as a whole person, I guess it's OK.
I don't think I use "old" jargon and no one pegs me as "old." Having to swear in order to seem hip seems, well, just silly. My kids, who are in their 20's don't swear at work. Even the Marine, who well, doesn't swear like a Marine anymore. I know that "suck" does not have the connotation it had in 1969, but I kind of see it like when people use the word "putz." They think it means "idiot," until I tell them the real meaning in Yiddish.
I'll probably never, ever use Twitter and neither do my kids. I am on Facebook and perhaps, will join Linked In. My son in the Marines is very anti Facebook. DH, who is in the software field and manages over 200 people, all younger, does not Twitter and although he has a Facebook page, thinks it's evil.