Employers hate them. Job-seekers hate them.
But for some reason, everyone continues to treat resumes as the primary gateway to hiring.
Take a look at just a few of the reasons no one likes resumes.
Employers hate resumes because…
- It’s too hard to find relevant information
Buried between all the dates and job titles, you’re looking for something real, something concrete, something that will give you a real insight about this applicant. But alas, the only earth-shattering tidbit you can find is that they’re a “hard working team player.” Great.
- Objective statements are nearly worthless
Enough people have been convinced these are helpful that now just about everyone includes them. But what do most of them say? Almost nothing useful. Is this a place an applicant can stand out? Probably, but usually it’s for the wrong reasons, like misspelling a word or putting the wrong company’s name.
- References are irritating
Employers loathe having to play phone tag with someone who might not have seen the applicant for ten years or more. And references often aren’t good sources for real insights about the applicant, unless you have a twenty minute conversation. And who has time for that?
- They’re filled with worthless information
Employers don’t care about your high school summer job, you college GPA from 15 years ago, or the endless lists of daily tasks you did at all your jobs.
- They have to read them
It sure seems like there should be a better way to screen job candidates, but they don’t know of one. The only upside from having to slog through stacks of resumes is that it probably leads to a lot of profitable trips to the vending machine.
Job Applicants hate resumes because…
- Few resumes would stand up in a court of law
Some people fake or embellish details, and no one has time to verify most of them. The high profile cases of people claiming to have degrees they didn’t earn represents just the tip of the iceberg of falsified and misleading resume claims. It makes it even harder for the honest people to stand out.
- Gaps in employment dates are frowned upon
It’s a fair question to ask, so ask it and move on. People are out of work for all kinds of reasons – most of them valid and reasonable. But why does this even matter, especially if it was more than five years ago? Who cares? Employers call gaps a “red flag.” Is having a baby a red flag? Was getting laid off their fault?
This is an artificial barrier that keeps some great applicants out for no good reason.
- References are irritating
What if my last boss was terrible, but I worked there for ten years? What if I worked for a tiny company with just one other person, and they’ve since died? What if I was self-employed? For many applicants, finding relevant references is nearly impossible.
- True strengths don’t come through
An employee’s best qualities never show up on a resume. If you try to write them down, it sounds like the generic jargon employers hate reading. But this really is the most important stuff – what kind of employee will you be? How well do you learn on the job? Handle failure? Respond to criticism? Are you committed? Easy to work with?
- My ‘experience’ doesn’t represent my talent
We’ve all been there – how can you get experience if no one will hire you? But it’s true. Sometimes the best employees have little experience. But they are teachable, committed, smart, and have a strong academic foundation. You’ll rarely find those people if you rely on resumes.
Can we circumvent the resume?
A resume simply can’t deliver what employers really need to know.
It can be one piece of the puzzle, and probably always will have some value. But the solution to the frustrations on both sides isn’t to “write a better resume.”
Applicant Pre-Testing – The Way Around the Resume
Do people want to be hired for jobs they aren’t qualified for? Of course not. But a resume simply isn’t a valid tool for determining true qualification for most jobs.
Pre-testing offers the solution, and it addresses the frustrations on both sides, for employers and applicants. Here’s what pre-testing does for the hiring process:
- Saves employer’s time – by the bucket load
Pre-testing takes the burden of having to sift through hundreds of resumes away from frazzled employers. Why do they only look at resumes for 5-10 seconds? Because they don’t have time.
What if they use recruiters? The recruiters barely look at resumes either. They’re just hunting for keywords. But if a human can’t properly assess the true quality of an applicant from a resume, a computer most certainly can’t.
If employers use a recruiter, they’ll save time on the resume front, but they’ll still be interviewing many more candidates than they’d need to if they used effective applicant pre-testing.
- Real insights are finally known
Employers no longer have to bother with scavenging for relevant insights about applicants. They don’t have to be annoyed at all the worthless information on resumes that makes their heads swirl. Pre-testing brings the best people to the top of the list.
Pre-testing eliminates unqualified applicants without the employer having to do anything.
- Respects the applicant
Applicants prefer pre-testing over resumes too, because it’s a more respectful way to assess their qualifications. Am I really right for this job? Assuming the assessment is a valid one, the results should be fair. Way more fair than a resume that gets looked at for five seconds and then passed over because they used the wrong font.
- You can’t fake out a pre-test
Pre-testing eliminates the problem of fake resume data. You can claim all the degrees you want, but if you don’t pass the pre-test, you won’t get interviewed.
- Reveals true strengths
Pre-testing reveals true strengths – the things the employer really wants to know, and the things the applicant wants them to know.
It also reveals far more than references ever could. When good references are available, they can be helpful. And they serve as a simple verification of truthfulness. But pre-testing delivers far greater confidence about how an applicant will perform on the job.
Yes, you want to know what an employee has done. You want to know their job history. That’s all good, and a resume can provide that.
But what you really want to know when actually choosing who to hire, you’ll never find on a resume. Interviewing helps, but if you’re interviewing the wrong candidates to begin with, you won’t get very far.
Pre-testing places people you will want to hire in your interview room. It gives employers a real choice between qualified applicants. And it teases out the deeper qualities of applicants and gives them the chance to demonstrate their value to your company.
Recruiters Use Resumes. PainLess Hire Uses Pre-Testing
PainLess Hire uses our proprietary pre-testing method to bring employers the very best job applicants. When you work with our hiring consultants, you will never again have to stress out about resumes or references.
We are so confident our hiring system will work every single time, that if your new hire doesn’t work out, we’ll find a replacement for no extra charge.
Use PainLess Hire to hire well.