Employment Tips & Strategies You Need to Know

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published on Medium.

Read the original here: https://medium.com/@klarakabelik/employment-tips-strategies-from-a-former-employment-specialist-ae5161c5de77

Looking for work is difficult, especially in this economy with rising prices, tariffs, and ever-changing dynamics in the labour market.

If you’re reading this, you may be in a similar position, applying to jobs relentlessly, on indeed and other job boards, with no prevail.

My name is Klara, and for the last few years, I have worked in Employment Services, primarily as an Employment Specialist. In this article, I will be giving tips on various strategies you can use to improve your chances of getting hired. Starting from the basics, of how you structure your resume and cover letter, to preparing for an interview, and looking up your salary range (for those of you who live in Canada). So let us begin…

Resumes:

The first thing I want you to know about resumes, is that there are 3 types. There is a Chronological Resume - the one which you may be the most familiar with. In this format, you are listing your employment history in reverse chronological order, up to the oldest, relevant role within the past 10 years. Under these listings, you are putting a minimum of 3 bullet points per position, providing an overview of the type of work you did.

Another type, is known as the Functional Resume in which instead of expanding on your employment history, you expand in a section which is called “Relevant Skills”. These resumes are best for those of you who are looking to transition from one field to another, or for those who have a gap in their work history. This is because it takes the attention away from your previous roles, and expands on the (usually 3-4) main skills that you want to highlight.

For instance, if you were looking to transition into the role of an Administrative Assistant, you would want to put your “Core Skills” at the top of your resume, which would be all the transferable skills from your previous role. Then, in the “Relevant Skills” section, you would pick 3-4 of those skills to focus on. This could be ones such as, “Customer Service”, “Data Entry”, “Organization” and “Time Management”. You would then provide a minimum of 3 bullet points under each skill, that elaborates on the type of work you ever did, specific to those categories.

When finished, you would list your Employment History in a separate section below, but you wouldn’t expand on it, as you would in a Chronological/Hybrid Resume.

The last type of resume is a Hybrid Resume which combines elements of both. It combines looking at the skill set, as well as listing your employment history in reverse chronological order. These resumes will usually list a variety of skills at the top, followed by employment history in the middle section.

If you are still feeling a bit lost in terms of the whole resume layout situation, you can purchase a Hybrid Resume Template from my Etsy or ko-fi Shop, which is a pre-made word document (digital file) that you can save, and fill out with your personal information. Not only is this an affordable option that gives you a good place to start, but it is ATS - Friendly, a topic which we will now discuss.

The Applicant Tracking System - ATS:

So, what on earth do I mean, when I refer to the Applicant Tracking System (ATS)? Basically, long, long ago, when people used to apply to jobs, a real human being would review countless applications, with stress and overwhelm until a candidate was screened and selected.

Now, with the thousands of applications being submitted per job posting, many companies have opted to use a tool, known as the Applicant Tracking System. This is an AI computer software, which screens resumes based on the information that was originally provided in the job posting. The higher the compatibility of words, the higher the chance that your resume will be accepted.

In addition, if your resume is formatted incorrectly, it may be automatically rejected.

Here are a list of things you can avoid, to ensure that your resume won’t be thrown in the discard pile:

Use appropriate fonts, such as “Arial” or “Times New Roman”, and avoid using “creative” fonts which may not be accepted.

Avoid putting any information in the “Header & Footer” of your document. The information in these sections is not visible to the ATS. Instead, put your contact information directly on the page.

Avoid using any visuals, graphs or images. For some fields, such as graphic design, people think that they need to impress the employer by creating a fancy resume. However, if you are applying online, and the employer is utilizing the ATS software, your resume will be automatically rejected, as it cannot process images or visual effects.

Do not save your resume as a strange file. The ATS predominantly accepts word documents, followed by PDFs.

Now, onto the topic of Cover Letters…

Cover Letters:

Cover Letters are an important step, especially when trying to make a good impression on the employer. But in order to do this, you must follow a specific format.

To begin, you want to change your font to either “Arial” or “Times New Roman” and set your size to either 11 or 12, depending on the amount you end up writing, keeping it to 1 page overall.

You then proceed by putting the date at the top, left corner. Such as, “Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025”.

You proceed by leaving a space below, and in the next line, you put who you are addressing the cover letter to. If you know the name of the Employer or the HR Manager, you should address them directly. However, if you are unsure, use a vague title, such as “Hiring Manager”.

On the next line, you want to put the company name. The subsequent 2 lines will give the company’s address. Such as, “Street Number & Street Name” followed by “City, Province/State, and Postal Code”.

Now that you’ve addressed it properly, you can move on to the next step, which is writing the body of the cover letter.

I would personally begin with an introduction. This is where you give your name and your educational background. You can also reference the job posting which you are applying to.

In the next section, you provide an overview of your past employment history, and the skill-set you provide.

With the paragraphs that follow, you begin to wrap it up, by explaining why you would be a good fit for the role (how you can benefit the company).

Lastly, you include a closing statement, such as: “I have submitted my resume with this application.” In the next line, “I thank you for your time and consideration”. And finally, a complimentary close, such as “regards” or “sincerely”, followed by your full name.

Interviews:

Interviews may be one of the most nerve-wracking phases of the job-hunting process, but they don’t have to be. Below are some ways that you can prepare ahead of time, to ensure that your interview runs smoothly.

When you receive an interview offer, spend the time before, researching the hell out of the company. Look at their “About Us” section, and at all the products and/or services they provide, so that you are well informed about their history and what they have to offer.

Type into Google, “interview questions for ______ (the role you are applying to)”. Such as “Interview questions for an administrative assistant”. You will most likely see a link to Indeed for that specific topic. I highly suggest reviewing “indeed’s” interview questions, as they provide in-depth examples of the types of questions and answers you might be asked yourself.

Bring a bottle of water to your interview. If they ask you a tricky question, you can take a sip of your drink as you process what they have asked you, slowly buying yourself time to answer. If you still cannot think of a reply, ask them to circle back to the question. In some instances, they forget and you can just skip it altogether. If not, it will still give you more time to figure out an answer at a later point. - A major shout-out to my former colleague who taught me this tip!

Now, for the moment you may have been waiting for (if you are Canadian). I will be moving on to my last topic, where I discuss where to find and calculate your salary range based on your position.

Using the Canada Job Bank Resource for Labour Market Information:

If you’re not already familiar with Canada’s Job Bank, you will be after you’re done reading this article. Provided by the Government of Canada, this website provides statistical information on the Labour Market in our country.

While it can provide many reports, today we will be focusing on the Wage Reports section. By clicking on the hyperlink, you will be taken straight to the page where you can search for your job title. As per my continuous example within this article, we will be looking at the “Administrative Assistant” role.

For your own reference, make sure that the search bar is set to “Job Title”, and type in “administrative assistant”, it will auto-populate a bunch of options, with the correct one being number (13110). When you first click on it, it will show you the “low”, “median”, and “high” pay for all regions across the country. You can filter it however, by typing in your province or territory, so it only shows you the data for the part of Canada in which you live.

You can then take the median number which shows you the average rate per hour, and multiply it by the amount of hours you work in a week. Let’s say the median rate was $25.00/hr, and you work 40 hrs a week. There are 52 weeks in the year. Thus you would multiply $25.00 by 40 hrs by 52 weeks and you would get a gross income of: $52,000 annually.

To further break this down, you can calculate your yearly net income by multiplying the gross income by your tax bracket. In Canada, for 2025, the tax rate for an income less than $57,375, is 14.5%. So you would multiply $52,000 by 14.5% which = $7,540. Subtract $7,540 from $52,000, and you will have your net income for the year, leaving you with $44,460 CAD before other taxes and deductions.

This concludes my lengthy article on Employment Tips & Strategies from a Former Employment Specialist.

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With much love,

KlaraK.