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USING YOUR BLOG AS A RESUME- BE CAREFUL, AND BE RELEVANT
October 22nd, 2007
If you use your blog as a resume, you take some risks. A blog can be used for evidence of a range of skills, but it’s a mixed blessing. As a resume, it makes the blog the definition of your abilities.
In a conventional job, the blog is better suited to media and communications work. It does prove a level of ability with the internet, the related software, and to some extent proves computer literacy on a higher-than-office-work level.
There are two basic applications for using a blog as a resume:
Online jobs
In online work, it’s relevant, particularly when producing online content. It’s a mid level degree of basic website competence. It’s extremely relevant when going for blogging jobs, obviously, but with that comes a much higher level of scrutiny. People care what a blog does, and blogging for a third party is nothing like doing your own blog.
You need to be sure that your blog is an asset in these cases. Check out the online content of the employer, make sure your work isn’t clashing with it. If it is, the employer will notice that too, and you’re both wasting your time.
Quality is another issue. People hiring bloggers have a very thorough knowledge of the blogging world, and they will naturally discard anything that looks below par. By rights, you should be checking out other blogs yourself, to keep track of the current top end of content and presentation. The net is a very visual medium, and what looks good tends to win any comparison.
Content is vitally important. Basic production errors, typos, use of language, can all add up to missing the target. Forums can be a turnoff, or simply prove that your blog about new online computer games doesn’t really have much to do, socially, culturally, or literally, with their blog job about the health industry.
Which raises another issue: Relevance.
Many blogs are written by actual experts in their field. A lot of paid blogs are recruiting quite specifically for professionals, people with degrees in their subject. That is necessary, because they need people who can talk to their professional audience. Newspapers are a classic case, with many of the blogs written by professional journalists with expertise in that subject range.
Content and relevance are inseparable. For a blog to work at all as a resume, you can’t avoid that.
Then you have to have a standard of work, pieces you can use as relevant examples proving you can do the job. This isn’t a raffle, either. The people you send your work will be covered in other bloggers’ work, too. Your pieces need to stand out. Send your best, most popular, and above all your most subject related pieces.
You can prove a bit of depth as a writer with pieces not directly related, but don’t send them too much, only one or two, (preferably separate saying “other blog work”) or you’ll just give them the impression you didn’t bother to read their ad.
If you do send extra material, make sure it’s top quality. Remember, this is a job application, and don’t get casual about what you send.
Mainstream jobs
Some employers still don’t know what a blog is. A job might advertise “computer literacy, familiarity with online business”, and you could use your blog as evidence of your online credentials.
In a case like this, just don’t do it.
At best it might be a footnote, if you think it’s wise.
Blogs have come a very long way from their inception. But there’s still the image of people ranting on computers for the mainstream, and it just does not go down well. It can be a real own goal.
Blog content tends to be personal. It contains opinions, views, relationships, etc, which may be a massive turnoff to an employer. It may even contain a long monologue cursing a former employer, or some other form of self-condemnation. Equally likely would be a piece which disagrees with their corporate policies, or the employer’s personal politics.
Employers, naturally do background checks. The blog may receive a lot of scrutiny, because it will be seen as who you are, online, at least. If you include a blog as part of your resume, that’s the level of scrutiny you can expect. Understandably so, too, because you’ve invited it. The assumption is that your blog is some sort of reference to your skills.
Expectations and realities
Anything to do with blogging and paid work needs to be viewed with ruthless realism. There’s a very relevant piece here called Your Blog Is Not Your Resume, by Harry Joiner of marketingheadhunter.com
http://www.marketingheadhunter.com/executive_search/2006/06/robert_scoble.html
This is a particularly important piece of information. Joiner shows what’s wrong with the blog as a resume at some higher levels. It includes a fairly bizarre episode in which a blogger names a six figure salary, which he probably got out of a cereal packet. Six figures worth of what? is the question, and the answer is you could probably get at least six other bloggers as good or better for that sort of money.
Some people make big money out of blogs. Some make a reasonable living. The other 99% don’t. A guy called Brian Stelter got hired by the New York Times, doing a media blog. Stelter is an expert, he’s been blogging for years, and has a reputation very few bloggers can expect to ever have, and he’s earned it.
This is top end blogging. It’s what can be done with a blog. You’ll notice, however, how he got that job, and why. His content has a massive, influential audience. He’s extremely efficient with his content, he’s relevant, and he delivers better than Dominos. (Note to bloggers: his writing style is excellent, worth a look) The NYT got a good deal. He attracted their attention, and they hired him about a year after the article they did on his work.
That’s where you can use a blog as a resume.
Where it matters.
***** Other very useful links, with different perspectives on the blog as a job-getting tool:
http://technosailor.com/job-hunting-your-blog-as-your-resume/
Technosailor explores the merits of blogs both as jobs and as income streams. This is the blog in its other incarnation, as a niche position, both independent and as part of an employment context. Successful bloggers tend to be those positioned in the right place, the right pegs in the right holes.
Photo Credits Via Flickr: honeyrider
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