Build your resume by helping others

“I’m sorry we are looking for someone with more experience.” If that’s not the response that defines searching for a job after college, then I don’t know what is. I mean it makes sense, by the time you graduate college you should also have accumulated 2–3 years of experience in the industry that you were studying full time to join… right?

Tons of post grads fall into this super fun circular logic. I don’t have enough experience to get the job that would give me the experience; I need to get the job. There is, however, one way to start to break the cycle, and that is to #volunteer

Now when I say, volunteer, I don’t mean handing out meals at a soup kitchen. While that is very noble and a super way to show the Pumpkin Spiced Latte crowd on Instagram how super “in touch” you are. It only qualifies you for the job you’re already qualified for, which is waiting tables.

What I am talking about is using your overpriced degree from a “competitive” party school to provide a service to a charity that they can’t afford. Charities, especially local and regional ones, don’t have a shit load of cash to pay salaries and therefore rely heavily on volunteers

Volunteers are not just the people you see planting flowers; they also include the board of directors, project managers, accountants, and other official-sounding titles. Volunteering to fill one of these roles; while more time consuming and not nearly as instagrammable, as working the adopt a puppy booth at the Harvest Festival, will allow you to start building your resume with real experience.

I learned this last year when I joined the board of the homeless shelter in my county. I got involved after spending a day handing out meals and asked if there was anything bigger that the center needed. The director mentioned they were planning on expanding the shelter and had just put together a committee to start exploring options.

I attended the first meeting and after mentioning my finance degree, leaving out my GPA, volunteered to be the project’s treasurer. Over the next nine months the project snowballed from adding a few more rooms to the shelter to adding a whole new building; with additional bedrooms, a computer lab, classroom, a VA office, a job placement service, and a medical services room.

What started as a $100k fund raising goal ballooned into $1.4M; in grants, donations, and county funding. Not only did I get to do the budgets and write the grant proposals, but I expanded my role to include recruiting and managing volunteers, designing the landscaping, and handling media relations. After multiple build days and more than a few setbacks, we cut the ribbon during a big dedication ceremony with all the volunteers, donors, the mayor, and a couple of representatives from the Governor.

We helped a lot of people in the community; which alone is reward enough, but you better believe that I used the project to promote myself. Did I hand out my personal business card to every donor? Of course, I did. Did I get my co-workers to volunteer for the build day and have my boss be one of the ribbon cutters? Yup!

“Hey remember that time, I did all the work, and you got your picture in the paper?” is an excellent way to start a performance evaluation.

You better believe I shared the shit out of every article written about the project and added project management, construction management, grant writing, media relations, and public financial management to my skills on LinkedIn. These things may seem self-serving, and it’s because they are, but that’s ok.

You can and should take credit for everything that you do when it comes to building the strongest resume possible. People want to know that you’re someone that can get shit done and if no one else is willing to take a chance on you, then what better way to prove yourself than doing something that helps others.

There are endless possibilities for applying the skills you think you got in school and then gain a whole bunch of real skills through volunteering. If you’re an engineer donate design work, an artist could paint a mural, tech majors could build them a website, and the list goes on and on.

Being a volunteer is also an excellent way test out different jobs and figure out if they are the career path worth pursuing. If applying your craft for the betterment of the less fortunate still doesn’t get you out of bed pumped and ready to take on the world then you apparently hate it and should consider changing things up.

Volunteering could also open your eyes to a new way to apply that piece of paper you spent four years intoxicated to get. It can even inspire you to take on more crippling debt to get another one. So get out there and get to work, for free! Gaining the valuable experience you need to land the entry-level middle-class job that your parents were handed along with their diploma.

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That's what Maryland does! Every time I buy beer in the store I die a little inside. @CrabCakesHBrew

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