What do you want your résumé to say in 2015?

What will you improve about yourself between now and then? What challenges will you overcome?

One well formatted email attachment lists your degrees, work experiences, and common phrases that do not serve a real purpose in my opinion. Words like "took responsibility over" or "completed stated objectives."

Both of those are cop outs. What they are really saying is, "I could not think of what I actually did, so I used the words that my friend put on his résumé." Be creative and realistic. What did you really do?

"Completed stated objectives." Really? Might as well have put, "I did the bare minimum and nothing more. I will simply shoot for completion and not excellence. Want to hire me now?"

I am off my soap box now. Promise.

Until we come up with a better way to convey who we are and why you should hire me, a résumé will have to do.

I understand what it tries to communicate, but are your past accomplishments or future ambitions more important?

My vote is future ambitions.

I honestly do not care what your résumé says. I am curious what your goals are and how you plan to make them a reality.

It is easy to live in the past. Constantly reliving past successes and reminisce about the " good ol days."

What do you want your résumé to say in 2017?

How are you going to make that happen?

Set out a list of goals you want to do between now and January 1, 2015.

A résumé tells me where you have been. I want to know where you are going.

Do not get me wrong, past experiences are important. They have shaped us into the person we are today.

The past is the past. We cannot change what happened. We can learn from it, but ultimately it is gone.

You can change the future.

How are you going to do it?

QUESTION:

What are you doing today to make yourself more marketable?