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Photo by Shannon McEnerney

PR professional Bruce Hetrick gave a talk about resumes and critiqued several of the attendees’ resumes at the Thursday night PRSSA workshop. He said resumes should set the applicant apart from the hundreds of others most businesses receive.

Related PRSSA meeting to focus on event planning (Nov. 23) NABJ launches service projects, sets networking objectives (Nov. 10) Four students to attend PRSSA conference (Nov. 4)

Sophomore Amy Bishop has been working on her resume since last spring, when she applied for her first internship. But now the heat is on: This week, she had to submit a final version of her resume to employers offering summer public relations internships.

Bishop was one of about 20 who attended Thursday night’s resume workshop and critique session hosted by the IU chapter of the Public Relations Student Society of America. The session featured Bruce Hetrick, president of the public relations firm Hetrick, as the keynote speaker who shared shared advice, and five other professionals who then critiqued resumes for the attendees after the talk.

Bishop said she found the critique helpful because it showed her how to incorporate into her resume the tangible effects of what she’s done and demonstrate how her experience can help a prospective employer.

“I thought I was going in a good direction, and the critique affirmed my belief while also giving me a few pointers to show me how to get more out of the information I already have,” she said.

This was Hetrick’s second year attending PRSSA’s resume event.

“People tell me that it’s helpful and I like to help people,” Hetrick said. One of the students came up to Hetrick after the event and thanked him for his advice, telling him of her positive experiences in pursuing her first internship, fixing her resume and improving her networking skills after she heard Hetrick’s talk last year. These success stories, Hetrick said, are gratifying to hear.

In his talk, Hetrick said the resume and the cover letter are only tools. The critical part to securing a job is through networking and meeting people in the industry.

“In my experience, it is rare that someone gets in the door from just a resume and cover letter,” he said. “Get people to remember you and recommend you.”

The resume and cover letter are tools to help employers remember applicants. But Hetrick said the biggest mistake applicants make is crafting an application that is more about themselves rather than the employer. He said the objective statement included on most resumes includes details about what the applicant wants but has nothing to do with what the employer needs. Most objectives revolve around education. But the employer is not running a continuing education program, Hetrick said. The employer is hiring someone who can solve things for the company, not someone who wants to have a great experience and is excited to apply for the job.

He said that students need to rephrase self-serving statements to be “you get” statements. Applicants should address what the company will be getting in return as a result of potentially hiring them. Applicants should tell the company how their particular skills will benefit the company as a whole.

“You take the same information and write it differently,” Hetrick said.

Research is important, Hetrick said, because most companies have Web sites and statements explaining to whom and to where job applications should be sent. Addressing a cover letter “to whom it may concern” or to a “sir or madam” is not personal. Hetrick said cover letters need to be addressed to a person and applicants should carefully check to make sure all names are spelled correctly.

“Timeliness is next to godliness” is Hetrick’s advice to students when it comes to applying for internships and jobs. He said his company has already begun receiving recommendations and applications for summer internships, and it is important for students to send out internship applications now and not in April or May because positions fill early and quickly.

His advice to aspiring public relations students is not to limit themselves. He said he encourages students to find a specific passion in public relations and pursue it because this passion will make certain applications stand out from others.

Photo by Shannon McEnerney

Cover letters should explain how the applicants’ talents will benefit the company, not the other way around, Hetrick said, and they should be free of errors.

Hetrick shared a handful of bad resume and cover letter examples that his company has received over the years. These examples reiterated how important it is to proofread and edit all of the materials before sending them in to the employer. Of the examples, one applicant sent in a cover letter that had Xs where the company’s name should have been; another applicant misspelled public by forgetting the ‘L’; and another applicant mentioned how it would be nice to work for a firm that is one of Hetrick’s competitors.

Junior Abby Hull attended the resume workshop because no one has critiqued her resume and she wanted feedback on it. She said she found Hetrick’s opening advice to be valuable in warning of the do’s and don’t’s. She plans to meet with more people and continue to improve her resume. Thursday’s workshop, she said, was a good starting point.

Of the resumes Hetrick critiqued, many needed a summary statement of what sets the applicants apart from others. In the current economy, companies receive 300 to 400 applications for a job opening, he said, and the aim of the summary is to quickly explain what sets the person apart.

“Stand out,” Hetrick said. “Don’t blend in.”

Besides Hetrick, the other professionals involved in the student resume critique sessions were School of Journalism professors Jim Bright and Craig Wood; Career and Resource and Development Center representatives Crystal Smith and Matt Wells; and vice president of human resources at Star Media James Keough.

Taylor MacKenzie, PRSSA president, said the organization’s next event will be an event planning workshop in December. He said the group plans to invite event-planning professionals to come and explain the job logistics.