Recently I gave away free resume critiques to my subscribers and got amazing feedback. My resume critiques are in depth and have several components, including a Look Through the Hiring Manager’s Eyes, three things I love, three suggested improvements including action items. 

I recently found out that CareerBuilder was providing free resume critiques in order to promote their resume writing services.  As a professional with a resume of my own, I submitted my resume for critique, fully expecting a sales pitch to come along with it.  What I got was way, way worse.

Here it is:

Dear Amber Shah,

A well written, attention grabbing resume is crucial to getting an interview. It is important to be concise, highlight your qualifications, and present yourself as a proactive employee. Recruiters will only briefly skim your resume to determine if you are worthy of an interview. Therefore, it must be easy for recruiters to find the information that sells them on you.

In order to more effectively showcase your skills and abilities, we recommend making the improvements that we list below. If you need help making these improvements, the experts from cbResume are here.

 

• Include a quick synopsis of what you have to offer
• When an employer glances at your resume, what will they see? A brief summary of who you are and what you have to offer? If not, you might get passed over. We recommend that you grab the hiring managers attention with a brief overview of your most impressive and relevant strengths.

 

After you re-write your resume, don’t forget to check your spelling, grammar, and punctuation before using it to apply for a position. More often than not, people overlook their own spelling and grammatical errors. We recommend having several trusted friends and colleagues review your resume to verify that it is easy to understand and free of inconsistencies and minor mistakes. If you would like help re-writing your resume, just let us know.

Keep in mind that your resume is a marketing tool. You must display only the most pertinent and impressive pieces of your experience. cbResume, CareerBuilder.com’s professional resume writing team, can prepare your resume to make a positive first impression. We are experts in the field and know how to craft a resume that will get you interviews.

Sincerely,

cbResume

It’s basically a completely generic sales letter with only a single piece of information that purports to be about my resume.  It claims that I should include a “quick synopsis of what you have to offer.” Except that I do have a quick synopsis of what I have to offer, see below:

In fact, you can see that I have a quick overview right by my name, and then the first part of the resume is a quick list of the skills I have. Both are quick synopsis of what I offer. Only then do I actually go in to my experience and in-depth info. This leads me to beleive that no one even looked at my resume.

Conclusions?

• If you offer to do something, do it right. Otherwise it’s just annoying.
• Some people will help you in your job search and others only want to take your money. Avoid the latter.