I still don't know what to do here.

Hi tifosiotaku,

We can't tell you what you should do. There are so many factors that go into determining a career target -- interests, life goals, values, salary requirements, job availability, skill levels -- just to name a few.

As authorjln suggested, you have diverse experience and skills, so the next career step is in your hands. You need to think about your future, research possibilities, and figure out your job target based on what is right for you. Check out the careers section of libraries/bookstores or enter "career development" as keywords on Amazon or bn.com. You will find many excellent books that will help you decide on next steps.

You can also visit Monster's Self-Assessment forum, hosted by Susan Aaron. Here's the link:
Self-Assessment Forum

Best of luck to you!

Hi tifosiataku,

I can identify with the frustration and how lost you are with the countless inputs you've been getting from different sources. But I wouldn't say who's right or who's wrong. Instead, I would urge you to take a step back and review their comments objectively and then decide for yourself whose comments you're most objectively comfortable with before following that person's comments and improve your Resume.

Personally, I would suggest a resume be written in the following structure. I would suggest that you adopt this to allow your ideas to flow smoothly and orderly to the reader.

Name & Contact Details
Career Objective
Professional Experience
Education
Other Relevant Skills & Experiences
Language Competencies
Hobbies & Past Times (Optional)
References (Optional)

In your 1st paragraph, I had difficulty identifying what the keywords of interest were. Having the important keywords at strategic places especially in the 1st paragraph will give you increased advantage over your other competitors. Do take note that keywords differ from position to position and therefore should be unique for each position you're applying to. You might also wish to consider adding more powerful words to "spice up" your language. Done correctly, your 1st paragraph will impress upon the reader sufficiently to entice him to read further and find out more about you while concurrently creating a good 1st impression to the reader.

As for the main bulk of the content, I see that you've listed quite a few things you've done in school but these are all "scraping the surface" only. These are too shallow to show how important your work was or how good you were at your work. Take for instance the line "Wrote articles for college newspaper blog reviewing new and upcoming video games", you might want to include additional information such as:

The viewership ie how many people read the newspapers.
Was the newspaper sponsored by any commercial institutions.
Were your reviews well received and did you win any awards.
Did any big companies approach you to write reviews for them as a result of your editorial work.
etc. etc. etc.

Think deeply to each of the points you've listed. Put down as much value-adding information as possible. Hiring Managers are more likely to call you in for an interview if he's taken an interest in the results you've achieved with the things you did. Simply listing down the things you did is not enough. Showcase your results with numbers if applicable in order to catch the right attention in the shortest time possible.

Hope these inputs are useful to get you started.

 

What you should do is recognize that your real problem is how to get interviews with people that can hire you. That should lead you to question if relying on a resume is the most effective solution to the problem. I don't believe it is in your case.

Employers use resumes to screen people out - especially those who are not currently employed in the kind of job as the one they're applying for. You would be far better off making an offer to be of service to the hiring authority based on some of the benefits and advantages you can offer him/her
as the RESULT of your education and background (past jobs, volunteer work, organizations you may have been a part of in college etc.).

Write a letter to the hiring authority and tell about some of the capabilities you can offer him/her. include a plain, no-frills standard resume.

What you want to do is get yourself evaluated on your capabilities, rather than your prior jobs, time in each, what your degree is in etc. A fairly decent marketing letter is a proven way to influence the hiring authority make a decision about whether or not to contact you - on the basis of factors that you are more likely to win on.

Okay, any advice on making a marketing letter? This seems like a high risk-high reward kind of thing.

You will not get anywhere if you don't post your resume on Monster.  Not having any marketing for your skills is dangerous.  If your not getting enough views on your resume then there is something wrong.  Resumes are marketing tools.  Try to put only relevant work.

Hi tifosiotaku,

Can you explain what you mean by a marketing letter? Do you mean a cover letter to accompany your resume or something else?

Thanks!