Lights, Camera, Resume!

For those of you that don’t know, I love going to see a good movie at the theater. A few nights ago, I went to see Christopher Nolan’s Inception. Without giving any of the movie away, there was important dialogue continually brought up throughout the film that revolved around the power of an idea. While it starts out as something very small and unique to its creator, it’s capable of expanding and becoming very powerful. Some ideas are never given the time of day, others are pushed and pushed until everyone in the world is familiar with them. But the in between – an idea that is introduced and seems to grow, but never reallytakes off – seems to be the story behind the video resume.

I recently read a MashedReport article on video resumes that talks about the uphill battle the phenomenon faces should it become the future job search standard. According to the July 21 post, the first video resume sites were made available on the web in 2007 and 2008, but the video resume has been around since the days of VHS tapes. A number of companies accept video resumes from job-seeking applicants today, however the concept is definitely not considered mainstream.

My question is Why not? If I was a recruiter looking to hire top talent on the Web, I’d much rather watch candidates tell me about themselves than read off a piece of paper (or Word document). The Web is a gold mine of opportunities for both companies and job-seeking candidates. Anyone actively searching for a job should know it’s about being social and interacting with potential employers, and what better way than to showcase your personality (and your ability to speak clearly) right on the Web!

What’s your opinion on video resumes? Do you see them becoming the standard for employment in the future?

You can read MashedReport’s article on video resumes here: http://www.mashedreport.com/2010/07/21/video-resume-the-future-o_m_...

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About the author:

Dave Hennessy is a third-year Marketing Communications student at Columbia College Chicago and an intern at SmashFly Technologies. SmashFly is the provider of the first recruitment marketing platform called WildFire that enables companies and staffing firms to easily distribute and more importantly measure the performance of their recruiting efforts online through real-time recruitment metrics.

To read more of Dave's thoughts on recruitment marketing and being an intern at SmashFly, visit our Intern Recruitment Marketing Blog.