December
31

Nearly all job seekers are well aware of the importance of a resume when applying for a professional opinion, but few realize the vital role that an accompanying cover letter plays in the selection process. In fact, your cover letter is just as important to your job search as is your resume.

Consider this: recruiters and managers often receive dozens, if not hundreds, of applicants for every one available position. With so many applicants to review, interviewers do not have much time to determine if you are qualified for the job. In fact, a recruiter typically spends between one and two minutes quickly glancing over a resume, hardly enough to thoroughly investigate if your skills set and experience is a good match for the position.

This is why a cover letter is such a critical tool to the job seeking process. The purpose of a cover letter is to clearly express your interest in and qualifications for a position to a prospective employer. So while the resume is a generic advertisement, your cover letter tailors your application to each specific job. By condensing your resume into key points and drawing the recruiter’s attention to the most relevant areas of your experience, you are assisting the recruiter in matching up your qualifications to that of the open position. And by taking the guesswork out of your resume, you greatly increase your chances of getting a call for an interview.

A cover letter has to “sell” your qualifications to a complete stranger and convince them that you are worthy of an in-person meeting. Therefore, as you can imagine, it is not an easy document to write. There are several guidelines, though, that should assist you in the cover letter development process.

Typically a cover letter is less than one page in length and has four main sections: the introduction, a highlight of your qualifications, a summary of why you are interested in the position, and a concluding follow-up. Before you start listing a litany of skills, though, it’s important to do some research on the company and the position for which you are applying to give you a better understanding of the company’s products or services, history, values, and target customer market. This will help give you a better idea of what recruiters are likely to be seeking in a candidate, and allow you to tailor your cover letter to specifically address those areas.

Part 1 - The Introduction:

1. Your cover letter should be addressed to the hiring manager, whenever possible.

2. Specifically mention the position(s) that you are seeking

3. Let the recruiter know how you heard about the position. If you saw the position advertised or were referred by someone, be sure to include this information.

4. Grab the reader’s attention and stimulate their interest in you right away!!

Part 2 - Summary of your Qualifications:

1. Highlight your strongest qualifications for the position you are seeking. Be sure to limit your qualifications to only those that are the most relevant to the position.

2. Show, rather than simply tell, the manager your qualifications by including specific, credible examples from your experience.

3. Quantify these qualifications whenever possible by focusing on pertinent figures, projects, awards, and equipment/software/tools you’ve used that are relevant to the job you want. For example, rather than highlighting your “excellent customer service skills” indicates that you “achieved a 98% customer satisfaction rating” or “increased department sales by 25% in the first quarter”.

Part 3 - Why you are Interested in the Position:

1. Let the recruiter know why you want to work at their company. What is it about the company that appeals to you?

2. Why does this particular position appeal to you?

3. Indicate why you are a good fit for the company. How will be an asset to the team?

Part 4 - Conclusion and Follow-up:

1. Refer employers to your enclosed resume so that they can review your qualifications in further detail.

2. Request a personal interview or meeting with the hiring manager.

3. Indicate how the recruiter should contact you. Be sure to provide a working phone number or e-mail address.

4. Set a time to follow up. For example indicate that you “will call to follow up on Monday afternoon”.

5. Thank the reader for his or her time.

One final note: your cover letter is the first impression that recruiters will get of you. A strong focused cover letter can convey a powerful, positive first impression. A weak non-focused letter, though, can kill any interest a recruiter may have in your qualifications, regardless of how strong of a fit you may be for the position. Be sure that you proofread carefully for grammatical and typographical errors before sending any correspondence.

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December
30

Civilizations have always tried to hide secrets from their enemies, allies and even trading partners so they could advance their political will, wealth or power over another, a peoples or an entire world. This should not be all that surprising to people at all. There are numerous examples of this and even to this day we see it in industry, first world nations and with world power brokers, spies, arms dealers, dictators and capitalists. And the hiding of secrets is so pervasive that nations have spies to uncover the truth often hidden in misdirection, deep underground bases and some out in the open to blatant that no one believes it.

Today nations like ours spend huge amounts of time and dollars hiding information using all sorts of tricky little tactics, most are well known. What are some of the ways to hide information, communication and knowledge from others to maintain control. After all knowledge is power and if you control the knowledge well you have all the power. Hiding information in symbols is an interesting idea and it is the same whether it is a book, ancient text or some other fashion if you are hiding it from those who cannot read the language or understand all the symbols you see?

Remember the Twilight Zone “To serve man?” Right now with encryption we hide things in symbols representing numbers; these symbols representing the human world’s definition of units or virtual units of a thing, many things or no thing. Certainly one can hide information in pictures like da Vinci or .pdf (Russian Spies). In recent past periods words like Nursery Rhymes told stories and gave information but it was hidden from the King and sung in the open all in the disguise of children’s stories. We too hide computer data in numbers. Previously we had for decades hidden secret communications and data which used de-coder and decipher readable machines during the cold war. Now we use 64-bit or 132 bit encryption for pass words and data. In the future quantum computing will blow that out. Or in shapes too:

http://ezinearticles.com/?4-8-15-16-23-42,-What-Comes-Next?&id=114966

Shapes and numbers or in light, you can hide information in light, atomic spin, frequency or patterns.

Indeed the best place to hide is in broad daylight, as the saying goes. “Trojan Horse Theory of course.” A lot can be hidden by simplicity and by generally applying Occam’s Razor and allowing your hidden message to be somewhat over glossed and with an alternate answer, which is more readily detectable, thus no one suspects a 13 move chess strategy to get you to your end goal, when there are obvious and normal explanations?

Hiding something in a virtual dimension of a quantum space is not so difficult and no one will find it unless you train your mind to see thru the clutter. And there are ways to do this and with proper training and education this can be overcome, so there is no information, which can ever be hidden, although some humans will not be ready for that, it is still better to move forward and train the human mind to see beyond. Recognizing patterns quickly can help the human mind to decipher codes and or create them, even build algorithms to detect them quickly. Think on the truth, which is hidden from view.

Lance Winslow

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December
29

The best technique to standout among the thousands of applicants is to write a good cover letter. As much as possible make it also creative but never jeopardize its professional presentations. It is your way to catch the attention of your potential employer and finally get an interview. The employer could easily make their hiring decision by just reading the cover letters of their applicants.

But sad to say, some potential professionals failed mostly in this area. In order to avoid mistakes and write the best cover letter, they should remember these useful tips.

1. Make sure that you will standout from the rest. You must get an edge over the competition. Mention your exceptional and unique qualities. Tackle about specific reasons that will support your application. Be concise, persuasive, and strategic to be considered as an ideal candidate.

2. The name of the person must be addressed accordingly. It is the proper way of sending your cover letter. Never use generic addresses like “Dear Sir/Madame”. Make a phone call. Get the name and the position of the addressee who posted the job ad. Remember to inquire for the right spelling.

3. A cover letter must be brief and simple. The ideal length is only

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