If you’re struggling to write your teacher transition resume, you may want to hire a writer to help. In this article, we will discuss how to get the most out of your resume writing process as well as share a few related resources for writing your own resume or hiring help.
Rewriting your resume for a career transition
Changing careers from teaching is difficult, and you must overcome a lot of hurdles. One of the most frustrating parts is identifying what you should be working on, especially if you aren’t receiving any feedback on what you can do to improve. One of the most common things that teachers need to work on is their transition resume.
And with that comes the question of whether hiring an expert to rewrite their resume would give them an advantage over the competition.
Yes, hiring a professional to help you with crafting a strong resume can be a great idea. But you’ll want to make sure you are ready for that step before investing and thoroughly vet a resume writer before purchasing.
What a good teacher resume writer can and can’t do
Think of a good resume writer like an editor that knows what hiring managers are looking for – and how to translate your skills into a way that helps you stand out. The teacher resume writer should work with you to get information about your past roles to showcase the most important parts for you. They know how to format resumes to ensure it gets through ATS (Applicant Tracking Systems), and are highly knowledgeable about a variety of positions and industries.
The biggest misconception that teachers have about resume writers have been that they will create a resume from nothing, tell them what careers to apply, for or create one resume that’s good for every type of job.
You will need to share a lot of information and past resume iterations for them to craft a quality resume. A resume writer cannot make up information about what your past experiences are, so they may require you to fill out a form detailing your career experiences and accomplishments.
And while some roles are similar enough in nature that you should use the same resume, if you are applying to roles like sales and corporate training using the same resume, you aren’t going to stand out for either role. Part of standing out as a candidate in a competitive job market is marketing yourself strongly for the role that you are applying for.
A teacher resume writer has a limited amount of time to do their job and produce results and helping someone identify the right career takes a lot of time and additional effort. If you need help with strategy or identifying careers, you may be looking more for a career coach or career counselor, not specifically a resume writer.
When should you hire a teacher resume writer
If you have been applying for jobs that you are qualified for but have not received any interviews, you may want to hire a resume writer.
With so many teachers applying around the same time frame, the best resume writers may have a waiting queue. Make sure to plan and check their wait times to purchase a resume far before your peak application season.
You’ll want to make sure that you have identified the career path that you are sticking with prior to hiring a resume writer. If you have not yet identified the path, you may want to set a goal to pick a path in the next few weeks. You can get started by taking my free career quiz here.
How to evaluate a teacher writer or coach
There are many reputable resume writers that you can invest in. But, unfortunately for job seekers, this is a highly unregulated field where ANYONE can change their LinkedIn to say they are a teacher resume writer or career coach.
And investment into these types of services is not cheap because of the level of skill and time it takes to craft a great resume. In order to make sure you do not get taken advantage of by someone with little experience trying to make money from you, you’ll want to evaluate if they are truly qualified to write resumes or career coach.
A resume writer or career coach should have a clear record of working in a hiring role or HR, recruiting, or career services. These types of roles write or read resumes in their full-time job, so they naturally have the truest experience in this field. You want to hire someone with true industry knowledge from a hiring perspective. A great resume writer can help you market yourself for the position by adding key language and persuade a hiring manager to take a chance on your experience for a new role.
Here are examples of red flags:
- Someone with less experience in their new role and especially one that has not overseen hiring.
- Someone guaranteeing a job within a certain amount of time.
- No reviews. In addition to looking for someone with the right background, look for someone with years of experience and PLENTY of public-facing reviews and real clients you can talk to about their experience. Here are our reviews for Teacher Career Coach as an example.
What to do before hiring a resume writer
As mentioned earlier in this article, you want to know what role you are applying for prior to hiring a resume writer. I can assume you don’t want to have to purchase more than one resume if you change your mind in a few months and pick a new path altogether.
This is one of the many reasons I created the Teacher Career Coach Course.
This is where I “teach you to fish” by taking our self-paced modules you’ll get support identifying your next step and translating your resume for a variety of roles on your own. You are actively involved in the entire process will ultimately help you be more successful when it comes to your overall job hunt.
And if you still choose to want a resume writer to do it for you when you are in the course, you can sign up with our in-house resume writers vetted with years of experience in career counseling, HR, or recruiting.
You can also check out some of our free resources on writing resumes here:
- Blog post: Teacher Career Change Resume: Tips to Help You Land that Job!
- Podcast episode: EP 29 Writing A Transferable Teacher Skills Resume
- Blog post: Instructional Design Resume; 8 Tips To Stand-Out
