We are featured in the latest issue of Peninsula Living Magazine. We would like to support those that have become unemployed due to covid by providing resume and interview advice. We thought we would share some useful tips to use when updating your CV, we hope you find them helpful.

As Recruitment consultants we are often asked ‘’how long it take to read a person’s resume” and “do we have any tips” for making a good resume.

Make sure the first page is like the cover of a book, it needs to entice people to turn the page. Remember that most recruiters take 8-10 seconds glancing over a resume, so all questions need to be answered on the first page. Make sure you start with a short note or Profile, if you prefer letting the reader know about you, where you have come from, where you’re at now and what you’re looking for, soft transferable skills, WP skills and your employment timeline.

1)  Don’t be tempted to use images or fancy software.
2)  Optimise your resume with keywords used in the job’s advertisement.
3)  Customise your resume to the job description.
4)  Unprofessional email address. Miss_HottyHotPants@hotmail.com seemed fun at the time, right?
5)  Irrelevant or outdated information, every word needs to help you get that job.
6)  Show achievements, quantify outcomes you created, describe projects you delivered.
7)  It doesn’t matter how many pages as long as the first page answers most of the hiring managers questions. Subsequent pages should give lots of depth to each role you have had, be easy to read and clear about your duties with these organisations.
8)  Stick to simple bullet points – not too many though, and not big chunks of text.
9)  Don’t underestimate the power of a covering letter. Address it to the Recruiter/Manager, appeal to them directly and personally again using key words from the job ad.
10)  List any achievements i.e. made budget each quarter for so many years etc.
11)  List the contact details of your referees at the end.

Take advantage of all the templates that are available online, most of them are free you just need to download them and enter your details.

You’re in control of your future career prospects. Your Resume should be 90% there and 10% should be the slight adjustment you need to make for each individual job you apply for. 

Let’s hope you make good use of these tips!

Congratulations Pricilla Carlessi, our Temp of the Month for June.

Pricilla is one of our temporary staff members that continues to receive outstanding feedback from the host employers. We even had one company ‘s HR Manager ask for another ‘Pricilla’ as they were using her as the benchmark for another employee.

Pricilla has been a temp with us for sometime now and even taken 2x Temp of the Month Awards last year. It is very rare to be afforded this recognition once but to be awarded it three times shows how consistently fantastic she is!

We would like to say a big Congratulations and Thank You to you Pricilla. You well and truely deserve it. Keep up the good work!

Kim Seeling Smith recently released an article stating that 20 to 30% of employees would like to be able to work from home as their primary location. The statistics show the same figure for those who see their primary location as the office environment. Then you’ve got a middle portion who sort of fluctuate between the two.

I think one of the opportunities for organisations here is leaders who can manage that hybrid environment well. It will also be a time to focus a lot more on attracting and retaining great talent. We have had many conversations with clients & candidates alike and it’s definitely a mixed bag. Take the image of one of our staff, heading for a swim at lunch, now that’s living!

As we at PP are well and truely settled back into the office, we do understand some companies need to adapt. Take this video as a great insight in how your company can adapt.

We really enjoyed listening to Dorie Clark, Author, business professor, and coach. She learned to be a master at reinvention after she lost her job after 9/11. In the years since, she’s written a number of books, including one called Reinventing You. It’s one of a few she’s written on business, entrepreneurship and branding. She’s also a communication coach, and she has taught at the business schools of both Columbia and Duke. On this episode of Hello Monday, Dorie and Jessi chat all about making a good Plan B, how willingness to learn is a key to success, and why you shouldn’t wait until things seem dire to plan for what might come next.

Author Dorie Clark on Plan B: “You can reinvent yourself into almost anything.”​

Quick question, don’t overthink it: what’s your Plan B? That idea for what you’ll do without your job or what you can also do on the side. This is definitely a hot topic at the moment!

Here are some highlights…

On branding yourself: “When you are creating content, you’re putting something out into the world. That is the way that people who do not already know you personally can get a better sense of who you are as a person.”

On using social platforms: “What you’re trying to do is give people a lens into your thinking and how you see the world. And when you do that, they get a better sense of your personality and what you might be like to work with.”

On launching a side hustle quickly: “What is the thing that you can do as rapidly as possible? It is typically performing some kind of professional service. It could be coaching. It could be consulting. It could be a service that you happen to be good at, like photography.”

On what makes a good entrepreneur: “I think that entrepreneurship is something that is a constellation of different skills. It is a lot more about willingness to learn and to try than any kind of natural disposition.”

On the importance of timing: “The truth is you can reinvent yourself into literally almost anything as long as your runway is long enough. The problem that a lot of people have is that they assume that things have to be an all or nothing proposition. They assume that, oh, well, I’ve decided I’m not happy in my current career, so obviously, I’m going to quit my job and then suddenly find another job. In a down economy, it often takes a while to find another job, and it can be very, very hard, especially if you’ve built up a certain level of seniority, to find another job right away at that same income level.”

On networking, a tip: “Oftentimes, people underestimate their own ability to be the host of something, but it is actually such a low bar. And people appreciate it so much if you are the host and you invite them.”

Reinventing You: A step-by-step guide to reinventing you Are you where you want to be professionally? Whether you want to advance faster at your present company, change jobs, or make the jump to a new field entirely, the goal is clear: to build a career that thrives on your unique passions and talents.

Article Published by Jessi Hempel Senior Editor at Linkedin News.

Have you been working from home during COVID-19? While working from home has its benefits, there may be extra expenses incurred. These can range from printing costs to the need for more internet data and perhaps even additional equipment.
There are two different ways to claim deductions for additional running costs you incur. Costs you may be able to claim include:

– the work-related portion of any heating, cooling and lighting for the area you’re working from
– work-related phone and internet costs
– work-related decline in value of a personally owned computer and associated office equipment

To claim these expenses, you must keep specific records ranging from diary entries to receipts and keep a record of the hours you worked from home.

Since COVID-19, the ATO has introduced a new method to claim running expenses when working from home. This method allows a deduction of 80 cents per hour worked without the need to calculate actual costs incurred, from 1 March 2020 to 30 June 2020.

#peninsulapersonnel #workingfromhome  #workingremotely #covid19

This year’s Northern Beaches Art Prize (formerly Warringah Art Prize) is adapting to current times of social isolation during COVID-19 and is being hosted online. 

The 2020 art prize invites artists and designers to submit digital artwork in the format of a digital postcard that responds to the theme Postcards from the Home, drawing on experiences and emotions connected to home isolation during COVID-19. Works can be across any art practice that is photographed and submitted as a simple postcard. 

The award is open to all level of artists and designers, from hobbyists to professionals. And better still, to support our local creative community we are waiving the entry fees. 

The exhibition will include 60 chosen artworks, across Open and Youth categories, providing a snapshot of what ‘home’ means in the year 2020. 

Being online means that art lovers can also enjoy the exhibition from the comfort of their own homes. 

Submissions are open and the dates are as follows:

For more details, check out https://www.northernbeaches.nsw.gov.au/things-to-do/arts-and-culture/northern-beaches-art-prize

We all know how stressful recruiting can be, it doesn’t matter if you are the recruiter, the hiring manager, the CEO or the applicant. But why when recruiting is so stressful do a staggering 30% of new employees leave within the first 90 days?

Well Jobvite have looked into this and they have found the top 3 reasons people leave their new jobs.

1. 43% of people surveyed said that the role wasn’t what they had expected it to be
2. 34% of people surveyed said they had a bad experience or incident that made them leave
3. 32% of people didn’t like the company culture

We have some tips to avoid this situation arising:

1. Have a structured induction process – when a new starter comes in to the business on their first day have someone to meet them, have their computer set up with all of their logins, have policies and procedures ready for them to read through and most importantly show them around the office. I know this sounds obvious but it is missed a lot of the time when a new person starts.
2. Communicate with your new starter – make sure that your new starter is introduced to their team/ office. It is important that all new starters know that there are people they can go and speak to about any issues whether that is the recruiter who initially recruited them, the HR Manager, their manager, the CEO or a colleague. People want to feel like they belong.
3. Assign a buddy – before your new starter starts assign them a buddy for them and let them know who it is. Their buddy can be their ‘friend’ until they settle in.
4. Create a culture where people can speak up – it is important that all staff whether new to your organisation or not feel valued and respected at work, if you are noticing that new starters are leaving regularly or your staff just don’t seem happy ask them what is wrong! I think the best way to do this is an anonymous Employee Engagement Survey. Once staff have completed the survey make the results public and let everyone know how you are going to tackle the issues.

So what should you do if you do get a new hire leaving? Ask them why! It is so important when someone leaves your organisation that you know why they are leaving. All you need to do is have a quick 5 to 10 minute exit interview with them to see what is driving them to leave and what you could do in the future to stop this happening.

Article adapted from Sarah Hutchinson (Senior Recruiter at Maxima Group).

Emma has been a long term temp of ours at Peninsula Personnel. She stopped working for us in February to move to South Africa with her boyfriend who secured a work contract there. They were planning to live in South Africa for the next 1 ½ years. Emma and her boyfriend went to South Africa in February 2020 to make certain arrangements and then came back to Australia to apply for her SA visa. They decided that on the way back to SA they would go skiing in Japan but things took a turn for them. 

Casey’s brother suddenly died in Florida, so they flew straight to the U.S. Whilst in Florida the law changed and Casey could not re-enter Australia as he was not a permanent resident. Marriage was always on the cards for the two, but made the decision and had 3 hours’ notice to get married and did so on the 19th of March in Naples Florida. The wedding service was at sunset with two guests (there were in fact 9 people at the wedding in total, 5 of whom they met an hour before including the celebrant) while all their families were on zoom or similar – in San Diego, London, Devon UK and Sydney. 

They had no celebratory meal just takeaway and cake from the supermarket with Casey’s sons (who were there to spread Casey’s brothers ashes the day before). After an 11 hour honeymoon, Emma left the next day for Australia and didn’t see Casey for 4 weeks. It took Casey 9 days to get a visa and come back to Australia and then he had to isolate in a hotel for 2 weeks.

This story from Emma really moved us and is definitely one of the most interesting stories we’ve heard during this pandemic. We are just happy she is safe and now happily married in Australia. It is so nice to see some light at the end of the tunnel as restrictions ease and life getting slowly back to its usual pace. 

As of yesterday, we are back in the office and the door is now open and will continue to stay open. We look forward to connecting with you all again whether it’s a phone call, an email or a visit to the office. 

If not now might be the time to implement one as most KPI’s, targets and budgets for 2020 will have to be thrown out the window as they will be totally unrealistic and unachievable. So rather than recognising sales achievements maybe we should put the emphasis on staff effort & performance overall while also resetting goals.

Did you know that lack of recognition by an employer ranks higher than compensation as one of the reasons why people leave an organisation? So not only are you more likely to retain your staff for longer,  if you implement a recognition program you will also improve employee engagement and performance, it’s a win no matter which way you look at it. 

A few things to consider when starting a recognition program:

• Determine your employee recognition criteria
• Provide tools for employee recognition activities
• Communicate, educate, and inspire
• Get Senior Leadership Buy-in and Commitment
• Choose the right partner

Easy, simple employee recognition ideas:

• Start a meeting with a shout out to someone who put in extra effort or did something great that week
• Give recognition on the spot – when you see great work happening, or gather a small group of peers and create a “recognition moment” where you present recognition to the individual
• Publicise recognition on shared screens or spaces. Describe what the person did and why they are being recognised
• Spotlight recognition on the front page of your intranet or the first section of your company newsletter
• Recognise when employees make healthy choices or contribute to their own or someone else’s positive wellbeing
• Recognise up—often we forget to recognise our own managers and leaders. They want to feel appreciated too
• Recognise unsung heroes—those who do great work, day after day, to support their peers but may not be in very visible roles