When applying for a position, job seekers often are presented with the choice of an application and submitting a resume. Having an option might seem like a great opportunity, but really it is an opportunity to make the wrong decision.
If you have spent the time preparing a good resume, almost always select the resume.
It is important to understand why your resume is the better selection. An application is typically a rigid template selected by the employer’s human resource department to help the staff quickly identify candidates they want to interview and candidates they want to discard. Most applicants will fall in the latter category.
The application is for the benefit of the human resource department. Your resume, conversely, was written by you – or someone you paid – to make you look good to an employer. It is pretty obvious your resume is the better choice since it emphasizes your attributes.
An application permits only limited information about an applicant to help place him/her in a type of “cookie-cutter” mold for the ease of the human resource staff. Rarely are explanations allowed to any extent and, when they are, they often are to explain something negative, such as why the applicant has an arrest record.
Applications are used to easily identify any potential imperfections in the job seeker as they pertain to the available position without the chance for elaborations or accomplishments. The HR department is looking to see if the applicant has ever been fired, has gaps in his/her work history, has the wrong types of education, does not have enough experience in a particular field and any other perceived flaws.
It is important to understand the HR staff probably does not include the manager who makes the actual hiring decision. Your goal should be to get past the initial screening process to the hiring manager. This way you get to sell yourself. You have no chance if you are screened out by human resource staff or recruiters early on.
Your resume should expound on your education and accomplishments. It should show how you get things done, save money, make money, improve quality and have progressed. Applications rarely allow this.
If the employer permits only an application, ask if you can substitute your resume for work history and/or education. You want the hiring manager to see how good you are. If you get past the screening out process, the hiring manager will probably get to see your resume prior to the interview.
You will likely find larger employers have human resource departments with more rigid specifications. If they only allow applications, there is little you can do except fill it out.
Smaller companies will generally have less bureaucracy and more flexibility in the hiring process or, in other words, fewer layers of management and staff between you and the prospective job. Sometimes they may have no human resource department at all and you will deal directly with the hiring manager, which is good news.
So, if you are given the choice of filling out an application or substituting your resume, choose your resume. Because you want to do everything you can to enhance your chance of being hired.
M.B. Owens is a Nashville-based columnist and journalist with a decade of experience writing on employment topics and business. He can be reached at [email protected].