Getting a rejection for a job you were excited about can feel defeating, but it doesn’t have to be all bad. Using this time to reach out and get feedback can be a valuable way to keep moving forward.

First, acknowledge that you aren’t a bad person, or worthless, or stupid. Sometimes an employer was looking for something you couldn’t offer. Sometimes you were a great candidate, and someone else just edged you out. And sometimes, the employer didn’t know what they were looking for in the first place. Your resume might have been filtered out before a person even got a chance to read it. None of that is your fault.

When you do receive a rejection, it’s always appropriate to request feedback. You might never hear back from the employer, but they might be willing to share some insight into why your application was rejected. Send a brief, polite email that thanks them for their time and consideration and then add:

“Would you be willing to share any feedback with me on your decision making process and what I might improve upon in the future?”

If you get a response, take the criticism at face value (assume they are telling you the truth). They may point out that it wasn’t clear how your experiences would make you a good fit for the role, in which case you should customize your resume to match the job description more carefully in the future. They may have felt that you were under- or too-qualified for the role, in which case you may think about how you are presenting your level of experience (and know that it's okay to apply for roles that you aren’t 100% qualified for). There may have been a typo or something irrelevant on your resume, in which case you’ll need to fix that before applying next time.

In any case, be coachable. Be willing to adjust your job search strategy and take any feedback you receive to heart. Know that employers can be bad at hiring and may give you confusing or misleading information, or they may make hiring decisions based on bad data or biases. You’re still a professional worthy of a good job. Adjust where you can, continue customizing your resumes, and you’ll eventually get to the interview.


Rejections sting, but they don't have to be the end of the process

What To Do When You Get Rejected from a Job

At Jobward, our motto is that everyone is a professional worthy of a good job. Above all, a good job is one that provides you psychological safety.

Having psychological safety at work means that you feel that if you speak your mind, you will not be made fun of, embarrassed, or punished. Furthermore, it means that you feel that even if your idea isn’t the one that everyone accepts, that your colleagues and managers will listen carefully and sincerely consider what you say. You understand that you won’t always get what you want, or be the best at everything, but that you will be treated with respect at all times.

Workers that have psychological safety feel free to bring up new ideas or suggest better ways of doing things. They are also coachable, and remain open to new ideas and ways of doing things that others bring up. 

To put it succinctly, psychological safety means really listening and really being listened to.

Sadly, this is not a feeling that is common in many jobs where we can feel distrusted, unseen, or even threatened. If you are feeling that way, you should start searching for a new job with psychological safety as a criteria for your employment. Remember that you are a professional, and no matter what, you are worthy of being treated with respect as a human being with dignity. Regardless of your level of experience, skill, education you deserve psychological safety at work.

Even if you feel that you have psychological safety at work, you should strive to maintain and even grow the amount of safety that you and your colleagues experience. Have open, frank conversations about the importance of psychological safety at work with your coworkers and leadership. Read, understand, and try to enact policies that help protect the psychological safety of the people in your workplace. Fight hard for it, and when you feel you have it, protect and sustain it!


If you don't have psychological safety at work, you don't have anything.

The Most Important Quality in the Workplace

When you’re ready to grow your role, add a new responsibility, or suggest a new project at work, it can be difficult to feel like you are being heard. Your best strategy is to have regular check-ins, make clear plans, and be coachable.

Before making any suggestions, make sure that you and your manager have a regular schedule of check-ins, at least twice a year, but preferably once a quarter (every three months). These check-ins should be special meetings just between the two of you, where you specifically discuss how your role is growing or changing, what new skills or tasks you are being asked to do, your aspirations for growth or additional responsibilities, and your ideas for how to improve the workplace or the business. It’s also the right place to provide constructive feedback on how you and your manager can improve, or to clarify anything that’s been confusing or demoralizing since the last period of time.

If you don’t have a regular meeting like this, your first step is to get one on the calendar as soon as possible. Regular check-ins are a normal part of most jobs. If your manager isn’t open to the idea of regular check-ins where both of you can talk about what could be done better, what is going well, and what things are coming up soon, that should be a major warning sign. Psychological safety is the basic requirement of a good job.

If you are going to bring up grievances or propose new work, be sure to spend a little time writing a plan of action. If you’re bringing up a grievance, be sure to take some time to write out what happened and how it affected your work. Don’t attack anyone or assume that lack or caring or intelligence was the cause of the event. Listen carefully to your manager’s response: be coachable if they suggest a way to resolve the issue, and note if they are being coachable by listening to your feelings on the matter.

If you want to suggest a new project or responsibility for your role, think about what event created the idea for the new project. It should include a suggestion of what should be done, a description of the cost (in money, time, and effort) that the new work would probably take, and who should manage the work. Again, be coachable whether or not your manager accepts, rejects, or has questions about the new work.

Whether you bring up a grievance, suggest new work, or things are going great, be sure to write down what promises and assurances your manager has made. Ask for estimates on dates when you can expect changes to be implemented. And here’s where it all comes together: at your next check-in, bring up these issues that were created in the last check-in. Use this method to stay on top of your improvements and hold you managers accountable. 

If you promised to do something and you didn’t do it, you would be expected to provide a good excuse for your failure or you would be reprimanded. Managers should be open to being held accountable to the same standards. If you’re having regular meetings with your manager, making clear plans, being coachable, and following up, you are acting in a way that is professional in any field or role.


If you think you can improve things at work, do these things.

How Do I Get My Manager to Listen to My Awesome Idea? 

The ability to be coachable isn’t just the most important skill in getting a job: it’s also the most important ability for growing as a professional in whatever role or field you’re in.

To say someone is coachable means that they ask for feedback, listen carefully and without push-back, and then make adjustments in their approach. That doesn’t mean that coachable people just do whatever anyone says. They seek feedback from people who know more about a subject than they do, people with a different perspective than their own, and people with more years of experience. Coachable people aren’t defensive when people provide fair, professional feedback on their work. In fact, they are excited by the chance to grow and gain a new perspective.

When you’re looking for a job, it’s likely you’re going to experience some rejection. When you do, it’s important that you understand why you were rejected, what (if anything) you could have done differently, and what you can improve on in the future. To the extent that companies you apply to are open to it, you should usually ask for feedback following (or even at the end of) an interview, and always when you are rejected. Unless you are very familiar with the hiring manager, the best way to ask for feedback is by sending a polite email.

Coachable job seekers always do their best, but they do so believing that there is always more to learn. They are flexible: if an approach isn’t working, they adapt. If you are sending the same resume to several jobs and not hearing back, consider sending optimized resumes that are specific to each role. If a job asks you to add a certain skill to your resume, or to prepare for certain questions during the interview, be open to making changes.

Even if you’re not hearing back from companies or they are unwilling to give feedback, be open to being coached by peers, colleagues, and family members. Seek the advice of people you feel are successful in their career. If they tell you that they “just got lucky”, ask more questions! Ask them their advice on your job search, their feedback on your resume, or to help you prepare for an interview. 

While being coachable means being open to trying new ways of doing things, you should never violate your personal morality. If you are given advice, feedback, or suggestions to do something that you understand to be illegal, or that feels immoral, wrong, or inappropriate to you, stand your ground. In your career, you should always strive to act with integrity, even when things get difficult or frustrating.



Being coachable is the best skill you can develop.

The One Skill That Successful Job Seekers Have

The best resume format is the one that is easiest to scan, contains your most relevant professional experience, and puts the most important information first.

When you send a resume to an employer as part of an application, it will be read by a resume parser (software that reads a resume looking for keywords), a recruiter (a person hired to help a company find good candidates for a role), or a hiring manager (the person who this role will actually report to once a candidate is hired). Each of these is likely scanning - not reading - your resume, and the difference is important.

Scanning a resume may take a few seconds at the least, perhaps three minutes at most. When scanning, parsers and people are looking for key phrases and words from the job description to appear on the resume. To be clear: if the resume is using lots of the same words, phrases, and numbers from the job description, it is more likely to make it to the next step. The best resume formats use a single easy-to-read font and leave lots of white space around individual blocks of texts (or bullets) so that scanning is easy and fast.

The best resume format also contains just your relevant work experience. Your most relevant items are the ones that sound similar to things listed in the job description. The next most relevant information to include are things that weren’t specifically asked for in the job description, but which you feel would be valuable and relevant to the role. Do not include anything on your resume that doesn’t directly tell an employer why you would be a good fit for a role.
 
Once you have the relevant information and it’s easy to scan, you’ll want to order the information so that the most important items appear first. Start by putting your name, email address, and phone number at the top of the page. Next, you’ll need to make a decision. If you are qualified for this role because of past work experience that is similar to this role, list that work experience in reverse chronological order (most recent job first), then list any relevant skills, then your educational background. If, on the other hand, you are just starting your career, or your skills and education are more relevant than your previous work experience, list your education or skills first (whichever is most relevant, followed by the other), then list any work experience in reverse chronological order. 

If this sounds intimidating, don’t worry! You can use Jobward for free to upload your professional information. Then we’ll do the hard work of wrangling everything into the right format.


Keep it simple, easy to scan, and free from fluff

This is the Best Resume Format

Never include a photo or headshot on a resume unless the job you are applying for specifically mentions that one is required to apply to a position.

The first reason is that a photo of you might be used to make a discriminatory hiring decision. A recruiter or hiring manager might have a bias (maybe even one they are unaware of) for selecting candidates who look a certain way. They may make a decision based on your race, or have a preference for someone who looks serious, or is smiling, or appears to have a certain style. All of that information has nothing to do with how to do the job. You don’t want to work for that kind of person or company.

The other reason for not including a picture of yourself is less common. Some businesses will not even consider a resume if it includes a photo, usually because hiring managers and HR professionals are so risk-averse, that they never even want to have a conversation about discriminatory hiring practices. For this reason, they will automatically reject candidates who reveal what they look like.

There’s no reason to include an illustration, emoji, or stylized portrait either. While these might get around the issues outlined above, they still have the same problem: they don’t tell a person why you would be a good fit for the job.

If the role you are applying for involves appearing on-camera, on television, or as a spokesperson for the organization, they may ask for a headshot, which is a professionally taken photo usually used in the entertainment industry. In these cases, the employer will tell you that you must include the headshot in order to be considered for the role. 

Once you are interviewing for a role, it is normal to meet in person or virtually through a video call. At this point, the employer will obviously know what you look like and that’s okay. If the employer is interested in making more diverse hires based on gender, race, or culture, the appropriate time to begin making decisions based on that information is after they have selected a qualified pool of candidates to move forward for consideration.

After you are hired, the company may want to put your photo on their website or share the news on social media. They may ask you for a headshot, in which case you can provide one (or request that they help you acquire one) if you feel comfortable with them sharing your face publicly. It’s okay to tell them if you don’t want your photograph to be made public.

Some hiring managers and HR professionals will disagree with the information above. They may prefer resumés with photos on them, or believe they are free from bias when it comes to making hiring decisions. The truth is that as a candidate, you simply don’t know these preferences. That’s why we recommend you do what’s safest, and leave the photo off your resumé.


Don't give employers an easy reason to reject you

Should You Include a Photo on Your Resume?

When you are changing careers, it’s important that your resume explain to your new employer why you would be a good fit for the role, even if you’ve never done the job before.

Responsibilities from your previous job might relate to requirements for a new role, even if the job title or the tasks aren’t an exact match. The process of explaining why skills from a previous job would fit well into a new one is called “skills translation.” The best way to translate your skills is to use the job description as a template, just like when you write a customized resume.

Read over the job description carefully. Any time a specific skills is mentioned, make sure that skill is included on your resume.  Many times, the employer is more interested in knowing what skills you have and what tasks you’d be suited for than if you have tackled the specific problem they are trying to hire for. They want to learn about what you’ve done in the past, and how you’re going to bring those skills to bear in the future. Using the same language as the job description to describe those skills is how you’ll convince the reader that you can do the job.

You may have to do some work for the employer. There are also lots of skills like customer service, sales, technical support, and project management that translate well across industries. If the job description calls for these skills, re-write your bullets so that you highlight those skills in light of your previous experience. The job description might not call for a background in customer service explicitly, but if it’s a customer-facing role, you’ll probably want to bring up that you have successfully worked face-to-face with customers in the past.

Finally, you may be coming from an industry that the employer is unfamiliar with, so don’t expect them to understand what you did in your previous job. For example, if you were a military veteran who worked on vehicle maintenance, an employer might not understand that your role involved managing people, strategizing logistics, and balancing complex timelines. In a role that involved project management, all of those skills would be extremely relevant (and much more valuable than your ability to work on engines). Highlight the parts of your experience that relate to that job, specifically.


Make it easy for employers to understand what you can actually do

How to Write Your Resume When You’re Changing Careers

If you’re applying to jobs and not getting anywhere, it can be frustrating to figure out why you aren’t making progress. By focusing on the stage of the process you are getting stuck on, you can adjust your approach and move forward.

Your job search begins by trying to find open jobs to apply to, and if you aren’t finding any you’re interested in, you might be feeling stuck already. Spend a few moments going through your career scorecard and make sure you know the kind of job you are seeking. Spend some time on your social media platforms (especially linkedin) looking for people who work in a market, sector, or company you are interested in and see if you can make any connections. Your goal is to connect with someone at a company who will talk to you for 10-15 minutes about what it’s like to work there. Talk to your friends, family, and coworkers about your job search and ask them where they think you would be happiest. Listen carefully and adjust your job search based on the feedback they give you.

If you’re applying for jobs and getting ghosted, your resume is what’s getting stuck. You need to send a customized resume for each job you apply to. You should always make sure your resume is tailored to the job description for the job, and doesn’t include any information that isn’t relevant. Make sure your skills translate well, and mimic the same language that’s used in the job description.

The resume is your ticket to the interview, so if you’re interviewing and not getting job offers, there’s something in your interview responses that you need to adjust. Think through your last interview and consider the questions that were confusing, unclear, or you didn’t have a good answer for. Next, write down a response to that question. Google common interview questions and write your responses to those questions, too. Your goal here is to write your responses as many times as you need to until you feel they are authentic, complete answers. Be sure to include as many specific examples from your career to back up your answers with stories and anecdotes. This is your interview cheat-sheet. You don’t need to memorize it, but review it regularly, especially right before you interview.

If you’re feeling stuck in the hiring process, zoom out and look at things as a linear process. Know what you want, find a job to apply to, send a customized resume, and prepare for the interview. Dial in your strategy at each step to get unstuck, feel in control, and get that offer letter.


Get unstuck by focusing on the steps of the process

Here’s Where You’re Getting Stuck in Your Job Search

Employers probably aren’t paying close attention to your social media, but just in case they do check, you need to make sure your profiles are private, or at least look professional.

Most employers want to know that you can perform the tasks of a job, that you are eligible for employment, and to know if you’d make a good fit for their team. Whether it’s fair or not, some may go a step further, looking into your professional references and even checking your social media profiles. 

Like much of the hiring process, this isn’t about searching for reasons to hire you, it’s about looking for reasons to eliminate you. So don’t give them any! Make sure your social media doesn’t raise any eyebrows by keeping your posts and pictures professional.

Clean up your social media profiles before starting your job search. Do a quick audit of your accounts, performing the following checklist:

**1. Make your profiles private- or follower-only. **The first and easiest step is to lock up your accounts. Don’t make it easy for a biased employer to find your posts.

**2. Make sure your profile picture is something you wouldn’t feel weird explaining to an employer.** We’ve explained why a picture on your resume is a bad idea, but a professional headshot, or a picture where you are clearly in focus and not doing anything compromising, illegal, or that could be misinterpreted as such.

**3. Polish up your LinkedIn profile.** Chances are that LinkedIn is the first (and possibly only) place an employer will try to learn more about you or connect with you. Make sure your profile is accurate, succinct, and is tailored to your job search.

**4. Use social media to connect with employers - when it’s right. **Don’t spam employers with employment requests but do try to find people that work at the companies you are interested in and try to see if they’d answer some questions for you. It can be helpful to connect with other employees, especially on LinkedIn.


Employers probably aren't checking our your social media, but be careful anyway

Are Employers Looking at Your Social Media? 

Your resume should always include your name and contact information, a summary of your work experience, your relevant skills, and your education and/or certifications.

At its most basic, a resume is a summary that helps an employer decide whether or not you are relevant for a job. After reviewing a resume, an employer will decide to reject a candidate for interview them for the position. The resume is the first, best, and often only document that will be used to make that decision. So, it’s important to include the right information on your resume.

Your resume should never include a picture of you, but it should include your name, a phone number, and an email address. Make sure the phone number is one you can answer during business hours or has a voicemail set up on it (with a professional sounding voicemail message that includes your name). Use an email address that contains your first and last name, and doesn’t contain any inappropriate or unprofessional language. Try to use a simple email address such as “firstname.lastname@domain.com” and not words related to your interests, hobbies, or pop culture such as “AnimeFan420@domain.com.”

Next, your resume should include your work history in reverse chronological order. Include the company name and your job title at each company. For each role, include a few bullets that explain what you were responsible for, what actions you took, and what the results for the business were. Make sure each bullet you write is relevant to the job you are applying for by matching items from the job description to your experiences. Include more bullets (3-5) for your more recent jobs, and fewer bullets (1-3) for your older jobs.

Include a short list of 3-10 skills that you have that are relevant to the job. Each of these should be a single word, or a short phrase. Since each of these skills should be relevant to the job description, you don’t need to provide an explanation for the skills. For example, you may list programming languages you are proficient in, software that you have been trained on, or general skill categories like customer service, accounting, or project management. Be sure to include languages you speak, and your proficiency level for each one (limited, conversational, advanced, or professional).

Finally, add your education and any relevant certifications you might have. You should list the highest level of education you have completed: some high school, high school diploma (or equivalent), some college, associates degree, bachelor’s degree, or advanced degree. Only list certifications that relate to the job. For a Linux Administrator role, you would want to list your Red Hat Certification because that is directly related to the role. You would leave off your CPR certification, because that doesn’t explain why you’d make a good Linux administrator.

These are the basics that every resume you write should have on it. There’s lots more you could add. It’s optional to include volunteer experience, coursework, projects, and a professional objective to name a few. Whether you choose to include other information or not, always make sure that each item you add to a resumé speaks to a requirement in the job description and would explain to a reader why you would be a good match for that role.


Put the right stuff on your resume (and leave the rest out)

Always Include These Things on Your Resume

You should (almost) always have several resumes, ideally a completely customized one for each job you apply for.

When you share your resume with an employer, the first thing they are going to do is read it and see how closely it matches the job description. They are trying to see similar words in both documents, and make sure that the skills and experiences on the resumé match the requirements listed in the job description. Because each job description is unique, and might use different language even from a similar role at a different company, the language you use in your resume will also be unique.

For example, one role might ask you to talk about your “customer service” while a similar role at another company might ask for “helping patrons.” When you talk about your experience, you need to make sure you mirror that language. Don’t say “helping patrons” if they ask for “customer service” because most resume parsers won’t know the difference, and some humans may miss it if they’re not reading carefully. 

You also need to remove information from each resume that doesn’t relate directly to the job. You probably have a variety of skills, but you should only include the relevant information for the job you are applying for. Any skills and experiences you have that wouldn’t contribute to your ability to do that job, should be removed from that resumé. 

The possible exception to this rule is volunteer experience, which may be used to show your interests or demonstrate your commitment to service. Ideally, that experience would relate to their field your applying for, but it might not always line up directly.

The only time you might not have several customized resumes is if you’re applying to a role where there is a single certification that determines eligibility for the role. Medical positions like dental or nursing assistants and tradecrafts like welding or plumbing might be more concerned with what certifications you hold and where you worked in the past, but might not have highly specific job descriptions for you to react to. It’s still recommended that you read the job description carefully, and see if you need to add or tweak any bullets to make them match as closely as possible to the job description.


You need a custom resume for each job you apply to (unless you don't)

Should You Have One Resume or Several?

Resume (sometimes spelled “resumé ” and pronounced “rez-oo-may”) is a document that tells an employer about your work history. The word is French for “summary,” so you can think about your resume as a professional summary of your skills and experiences.

Employers usually ask for job seekers to send them a resumé as part of applying for a role. The resume will be read by a resume parser (software the scans the text of the resume), a recruiter ( a person who decides which candidates will be considered for the role and which will be rejected), or a hiring manager (the person that this role will report to once it is filled). Your resumé should be formatted so that it’s as easy to read as possible.

In any case, the person (or software) reading the resume is trying to see how closely the information on the resumé matches the requirements that were called for in the job description. At this stage, they aren’t interested in knowing everything, and they don’t want to read anything that doesn’t relate to the job.

That’s why it’s critical that you write a customized resume for each job you apply for.

Oftentimes, job descriptions or company websites will explain how many pages they expect the resume to be, if you should include a cover letter or references, and other information the company’s hiring process requires.  If this information is not listed, a one- or two-page resume is standard, and cover letters and references are optional (it’s okay to include them, but it probably isn’t necessary).


What is a resume, who reads them, and why?

When writing resume bullets, you should include a past tense verb that explains what you were responsible for, what actions you took, and what the result for the business was. Wherever possible, use the same language as the job description and include any relevant numbers or figures that you can.

_Format: Past Tense Verb + Responsibility + Action + Result_

Each item on your resume should tell the person reading it why you are relevant to perform the tasks of a job. The best way to convey this is to first explain what you were responsible for. Did you lead a team or a project? Were you tasked with hitting certain sales or marketing goals? Did you manage a budget, or have a limited time to accomplish something? Start your bullet with a verb in the past tense.

_Example: “Provided customer service.”_

Next, add an action you took or a problem that needed solving and how you addressed it. This explains to the reader that you didn’t just show up everyday: there were tasks that you needed to complete, and you took action to make sure that happened. You may list more than one item as long as each one showcases a different skill.

_Example: “Provided customer service including technical support, troubleshooting, and repair services.”_

Finally, explain what the impact on the business was due to the actions you took. It’s important that the result is about how you created great outcomes for the company, your team, or the customer. This shows the reader that you are focused on the bigger picture, and helping to achieve the goals set by your leaders.

_Example: “Provided customer service including technical support, troubleshooting, and repair services that contributed to an increase in customer satisfaction and retention.”_

That’s a good start, but you can improve your bullets by adding in numbers wherever possible. Numbers explain to the reader what the real impact of your contribution was. Numbers take your bullets from a claim to a reality in the mind of the person reading your resume. If you can’t give a specific number, an estimate will work. If you can’t provide a number, giving the frequency or scale of a task helps to explain your impact.

_Example: “Provided dozens of daily customer service interactions including technical support, troubleshooting and repair services on hundreds of mobile devices that contributed to a 30% increase in customer satisfaction and a 15% decrease in churn.”_

Resumes are usually read by people who don’t know how to do the job. They are going to compare your bullets to the requirements on a job description. As you write your bullets, make sure that you are copying as much language as you can from the job description into your bullets. After your bullets are in the right format, adjusting them to use the same language as the job description is the best way to show the read that you are a good match for the job.