The New Career Objective & Why You Need It!

If you are up-to-date with your resume practices you would have most likely eliminated the ‘Career Objective’ section in your resume.

Most resume writers advise this once-common section of your resume is no longer needed and has been replaced by the profile section of the resume.

The logic behind this is that employers don’t really care about what we want, only how we meet their needs, but this isn’t actually true.

Yes, employers are definitely not interested in reading self-indulgent statements from job seekers stating:

“Seeking a well-paid position with great flexibility and strong advancement opportunities”.

Aren’t we all?

What employers are interested in however is finding out if your future goals are a fit for their future needs.  Their ideal outcome is to find someone whose motivating strengths and skills, aspirations and preferences for the work environment align perfectly with functions of the job, their operating environment and expected needs for the future.

So how do you craft a well-defined career objective? The answer is to turn this little statement on its head.

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Start by getting clear on your vision for the future. Specifically you want to pinpoint the types of roles that will make you happy and you will bring the most value.  Make a note of your motivating strengths and skills – the types of things you do well and that energise you.

  1. Next find positions that can benefit from these and then market your strengths, potential and skills to the employer in line with their needs.

For example replace this:

Seeking a position offering flexibility and advancement

With this

Ideally suited to organisations, who can benefit from someone able to rapidly assume responsibility and work flexibly across all areas of the trading floor.

 or even…

Thrives when working across the business to build collaboration, support and engagement and known for being able to lead and motivate.    

The simple little career objective isn’t dead it’s just evolved from telling the employer “its all about me” to a more collaborative statement that says to an employer “it’s all about us”.

Good luck.