One year into her role as VP of Talent Solutions at training certification specialist Credly, Bailey Showalter claims that “the modern resume is not sustainable for the future of hiring.” How come? It wasn’t too long ago that information technology gave that resume a new lease of life. IT has been able replace human beings as scanners of hundreds – sometimes thousands – of resumes, and do so in a fraction of the human beings’ time. Where lies the problem?
Showalter, having spoken widely about talent acquisition to both hiring managers and job seekers, asserts “The Talent Acquisition marketplace is broken. It’s extremely frustrating for a hiring manager (or a recruiter working for a hiring manager) to try to assess talent quickly when they’re getting flooded with resumes that don’t fit with the role. A lot of times the resumes are just a readout of experience. This can be an indicator of possible performance on the job, but it’s not the best indicator.”
Switching to the experience of the talent up for recruitment, she observes “From a job seeker perspective, there’s also a lot of frustration. The usual resume lists jobs held and some notable accomplishments, but it doesn’t tell the job seeker’s story of what they are looking for in their next position. Which of my skills are going to be most useful? What new experience will I gain? What am I passionate about? Where am I? Where do I want to lean in? And how do I see all of my skills fitting together in this role?” Some would say a cover letter can help here, but those letters are commonly filtered out of the applicant tracking system.
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