subject: Jobconcierge Executive Job Search Strategy: The Career Expo Resume [print this page] The Job Fair resume-also known as your CV (curriculum vitae)-should obey all of the rules of a typical resume that you might submit online or bring to a typical interview. It should highlight your strengths, be free of errors, and be easy to read. At career fairs, however, you need to mix in some additional resume strategy.
The most basic and practical job fair resume advice is to bring enough copies of the resume as the number of companies that you want to submit your resume to. You don't want to come to the job fair short handed. One good note is to go through the job fair website and see in advance how many companies will be there. As a good tip, twenty five is a good number of resumes for most career fairs, while forty is preferred for larger career fairs.
Don't forget that your resume needs to be able to be understood at a moments notice at career expos. Think about the number of people who are attending - the employers there will not have time to look at your resume in detail. Are you worth talking to? Do you fit what we're looking for? With the large crowds, be sure your resume does not exceed two pages.
The strategy does not stop at having multiple concise copies, however. Most job fairs publish (either online or on hard documents) a list of companies that will be in attendance prior to the event. Make sure that you do your research by looking over this list before you go. Additionally, many a few job-search-related websites provide some job fair pages. We recommend the the career expo database of JobConcierge.com as it has one of the most comprehensive list of job fairs and networking events online that lists details in a concise format. With always more than 300 career fairs online, you cannot go wrong with the JobConcierge database as a starting point. After researching, you will be able to tailor individual resumes to each company at the fair and to each job for which you will be applying. For marketing firms, you can highlight appropriate marketing career experience. For consulting firms, you can adjust your resume bullets to focus on consulting career, etc.
Another job fair strategy is to always be sure to carry generic job fair resumes. After you're finished covering the grounds at your preferred choice companies, then you can move on to second choice and third choice companies and hand your generic resume or simply drop them at the company booths.
