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Reading Recommendations

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How to Write Exceptional Resumes and Cover Letters to Forward Your Career

Here's How This Book will Help you, Specifically.Inside this book you will find a simple Blueprint for making successful job applications. It is the guiding light, the logic that underpins everything we do, making for an easy and sensible process to follow. You'll find plenty of examples, tips and advice to support you in creating exceptional job applications focussed on one thing: advancing your career.Here's the Blueprint: -Align the job application precisely with the job advertisement-Communicate directly to the recruiter-Make it easy for the recruiter to find the information they want-Produce clean, simple documents that are easy to read-Eliminate errorsHitting on these 5 points will improve your chances of success and the simple step by step guide covers these points and much more. Here's what you'll find inside: IntroductionHow to get the most out of this book, the job application process, the Successful Applications Formula, rookie mistakes.Module 1Who job applications are targeted to, how recruiters deal with multiple applications, Automatic Tracking Systems, Blueprint for making successful job applications.Module 2The job advertisement, Selection Criteria, capturing all information, company information.Module 3Providing evidence - this is all about supporting your skills and experience with numbers, results and facts that back up your claims. A host of examples, ideas and tips are provided to help you come up with as much evidence as possible. Everyone uses the obvious numbers like KPI scores, performance to target percentages, amount of revenue responsible for etc. And there's so much more! With some thought and effort, you'll find there's a lot more information you could be bringing to the table. Module 4The cover letter - first impressions, cover letter structure, structure in detail, example cover letters with notes. Module 5The Resume Part 1 - The structure. Every component of the structure shown and explained with plenty of examples, guidance and advice. Includes how to use job history dates, how to deal with gaps in your job history, optimising company descriptions, how to describe each job in your work history, Results with plenty of examples and explanation, education/professional qualifications/development, the finished product, re-cap.Module 6 The Resume Part 2 - What not to put in your resume, where to put education/professional qualifications/development, how much space to allocate to each job, how to use company information, how to cover as many of the Selection Criteria as possible, what if you have a limited job history, addressing weaknesses (we all have them)!, summary, checklist, a reality check!Will this Book Work for You?Think about this: you have a logical framework that drives every step of this book - the Blueprint. It's a simple and sensible process over 6 Modules that describes each step, with a stack of tips, examples and ideas to show how every component works and why. This is a practical book, no fluff and bubble here!BUT....THIS BOOK IS NOT FOR EVERYONE!This book cannot write your cover letters and resumes/CV's for you. It's for people prepared to understand the concepts and implement them. It's for people prepared to invest some time to maximise their chances of career progression.If you are dissatisfied with your current job applications in any way, I sincerely hope that this book can be a valuable resource for you. Wishing you well with your career aspirations!

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Next Job, Best Job

"This generous and useful book strips away the shame and fear from a job search and can help you get past the resume and see a better way forward." —Seth Godin, bestselling author of This is Marketing

If you’re struggling to find work in an uncertain job market, Next Job, Best Job by headhunter Rob Barnett delivers game changing strategies to get you hired now. For readers at any phase of a career, Barnett saves you months of wasted time surfing random job postings and uploading resumes into oblivion. His new process gives you the end-to-end tools to find the work you want.

Rob Barnett is an innovator, a two-time entrepreneur, and a senior executive with five decades inside legendary media companies. As an advisor to thousands of job seekers and company heads, he is uniquely positioned to disrupt the job search industry. His inclusive platform is a life-saving escape hatch during the darkest hours of unemployment and an expert guide to the work you deserve.

With humor, compassion, and a healthy dose of tough love, Barnett covers everything from the essentials of a modern job search to ageism, ghosting, navigating LinkedIn and Zoom, and mastering the voodoo of social media.

Pivot from worrying to winning with inspired steps to:

  • Score perfect job interviews
  • Negotiate like a pro and get to “yes”
  • Rebrand yourself with a unique resume, digital profile, and killer cover letter
  • Ignite focus and restore motivation
  • Identify the best career path
  • Define the right job title
  • Get immediate replies and callbacks
  • Master networking
  • Banish self-defeating thoughts
  • Embrace success
  • Pay it forward

New strategies replace ancient job search rules that lead nowhere. Rise above every other candidate with an empowering, easy method that finally works.

“Rob Barnett reimagines today’s career search and offers a proven process to land the right job (or client) fast.” Small Business Trends

“(Barnett) leads the reader through a birth-to-earth version of job search, starting with being fired or laid off and culminating in his advice for negotiating the next offer. He peppers the steps along the way with anecdotes from his own experience and the kind of advice meant to help you keep the job once you land it.” St. Paul Pioneer Press
 

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Interviewology

"A must-read for seasoned and new managers alike." --Johnny C. Taylor Jr., SHRM-SCP, CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM)

A groundbreaking guide to mastering the job interview, offering proven advice and techniques to discover your unique interview style that is key to interviewing better--for those on either side of the table.

Conventional interviewing advice doesn't work. That's what Anna Papalia learned through years of experience as an HR professional, consultant for Fortune 500 companies, and teacher at the Fox School of Business. None of the existing tools work for one simple reason: they don't get to the heart of what actually makes a great interview--self-awareness. At its core, an interview is a set of questions about you. If you don't know yourself, you won't do well.

Determined to make the process better, more inclusive, and less obscure, Anna spent years researching how people interview and uncovered a new science to interviewing. In Interviewology, you'll learn:

  • How to determine your interview style, whether you're a Charmer, a Challenger, an Examiner, or a Harmonizer
  • How your interview style influences how you view, approach, and perform in interviews
  • How to lean into your interview style's strengths and minimize your weaknesses, so you can nail your next interview

Packed with wisdom, Interviewology offers clarity and a dynamic, scientifically validated approach that challenges everything you thought you knew about interviewing, providing unique insight into the process, debunking some of the most common myths, and explaining how you can perform better, whether you're applying for the job or looking for the right candidate.

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I Hate Job Interviews

"For anyone wanting to elevate their interview skills, this superb book does the job!" --STEPHEN M. R. COVEY, New York Times bestselling author of The Speed of Trust

Go into your next job interview with confidence, ready to knock any question they throw at you out of the park!

The key to landing that dream job or big promotion often comes down to how you perform in the job interview. After bombing some interviews early in his career, Sam Owens vowed that would never happen to him again and began work on a system to ensure he was ready for even the most oddball questions in future interviews. The system he developed proved so successful, Sam built a career coaching business around teaching it to others and has now coached thousands of people on how to prepare for interviews.

In I Hate Job Interviews, Sam shares his proven methodology and provides simple frameworks and demonstrations on how to answer any type of job interview question. Using this proven system, job candidates will gain confidence in answering introductory, behavioral, hypothetical, opinion, personal, think-on-your-feet, salary, and self-awareness questions. You will learn:

  • How to craft "power" examples to show how your skills align perfectly with the job you are applying for.
  • To conduct practice interviews so you are ready when the big day arrives.
  • To make a big first impression with that first question.
  • To tell compelling stories that clearly demonstrate your abilities.
  • Simple strategies and frameworks to nail hypothetical and scenario questions.
  • Salary negotiation skills to maximize your job offer.
Interview: The Ultimate Guide to Crushing Every Interview Question to Land Your Dream Job

Interview

"Be confident." "Relax." "Be yourself." While your friends and family may give you advice with all their best intentions, the information that they provide may be inaccurate and confusing. The fact that you're looking at this book means that in your gut, you know that acing a job interview takes more than just "being yourself." Sure, there are plenty of books out there that are filled with frequently asked interview questions and how to answer each question correctly. It's all well and good until you find yourself face-to-face with a question that the author failed to cover. The problem with such how-to guides is that they neglect to take into consideration that each interview situation is unique, and therefore, a standard answer does not exist. Rather than teaching you what to say, this book will train you in how to think so that you will be prepared to answer any question that your interviewer asks. In this book, you'll find the following: *The 10 Most Important Interview Questions and How to Answer Them *How to be a Dynamic Listener and a Smart Speaker *How to Sell Yourself like a Pro *How to Change the Way You Think About Interviews *How to Get an Interview *How to Receive an Interview Invitation like a True Professional *How to Plan and Prepare for an Interview *How to Make a Brilliant First Impression This book will walk you through the whole process of the interview, from the preparation phase to the post-interview stage. More importantly, it will transform you from being just another applicant who needs a job to being the valuable person that the employer needs and will eventually hire. Outperform all other interviewees to get the job you always wanted. Get your copy today!

Universal Class - Continuing Education

Get ready for your next interview and sharpen your professional skills with Universal Class. The following Universal Class courses are free to stream with your TCPL Card. Click here with your TCPL Card (tcplXXXXXXXX) for these classes and more. 

  • Customer Service 101
  • Office Skills 101
  • Typing and Keyboarding 101


 

  • Effective Communication Skills
  • Interview Skills
  • Resume Writing


 

  • Business Etiquette
  • Business Ethics
  • Vocabulary Building


 

KYVL - Careers and Job Hunting

KYVL is a database of nearly 300 Kentucky libraries and institutions, including colleges and universities, public libraries, K12 schools, hospitals, and Department of Defense libraries. Click here for KYVL's Career Preparation, Job and Career Accelerator, and Career and Technical Resources. For the KYVL password, call TCPL at 270-465-2562 or email at info@tcplibrary.org.

Other Helpful Job Search Websites

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