Career Advice from Edelman PR for Public Relations Professionals
What better mentor can you imagine to give you career advice, than Edelman Recruitment? Today, it is easier than ever to get in touch with this team of professionals to ask tough questions and follow career opportunities. Just follow Edelman on LinkedIn, and enjoy all the benefits. Among these, to celebrate 50,000 LinkedIn followers, the team is offering career advice in a series of three short videos, and we have the first two for you.
First, Richard Edelman’s PR company wanted to know the most important questions their LinkedIn followers had to ask, then produced a promotional YouTube video, exclusive for this campaign. This shows that social media milestones (likes, reach, followers) can be used to boost awareness for brands and products, provided they deliver a strong value proposition.
What does Edelman look for in PR candidates?
Both of these videos are short (1 minute each), but we’ve also included much of the information they share in text format.
What Qualities do you look for in candidates? Edelman looks for people willing to take risks, have an entrepreneurial spirit, and those able to innovate and be creative.
What experience is most helpful when looking for interns? Experience in the business world and an understanding of communications and how that is a factor in PR.
How can candidates stand out, especially if they don’t have experience with agencies? Know your strengths, how they can be applied for the company you are applying with, and make sure your digital skills and understanding are the best you can get them.
The second video focuses on tips for your resume and cover letter, especially useful if you are new to job hunting, but also great for those who believe they are already “experienced” job hunters. See how Edelman experts insist your resume needs to be error free, creative, relevant and designed exclusively for the employer you want to work with.
Make sure your resume is up-to-date, accurate, and without any errors! Have several people look at it to make sure there are no errors in it – we cannot stress this point strongly enough. You can have amazing experience, great contacts, killer skills, but if you have even one typo on your resume, don’t expect anyone to take you seriously enough to consider you for the next step in the process.
Within your resume, include actions you’ve taken showing the difference you bring to the company because of your choices and efforts. Don’t just list the responsibilities you had in a job. Add in what was accomplished because you took on those responsibilities. So, instead of saying you planned a successful event, say you did that and because of that event the company saw X number of new customers and grew by Y percent that month.
Since you don’t always have control over the program and default settings of someone else’s computer, it is best to submit your resume in a “pdf” format, so it always looks the same, no matter if it is printed out, sent via email, viewed on a tablet, desktop or iPhone.
Know what that firm requires when submitting your resume. Some want a cover letter, others think they are a waste of time. But also consider unique approaches to present more information. Use infographics or charts to share information as well as show your diversity and skills.
Expect more updates from the company in the near future. In the meanwhile, tell us what you think about this campaign?
