I feel like I am back in school doing my homework over and over again. This is because a recruitment agency has asked me to ‘re-work’ my CV to make it more ‘attractive to employers’.
This follows a discussion with both Shiro and Amisi, my life coach regarding my work situation.
Things have not been good since I was appointed acting ‘ finance manager’ and I have found that I do not like going to the office. For starters, the HR manager said they would only be offering me a meagre five percent acting allowance since according to her,” there is only a minimal change in job and the company is not doing very well.”
Now that I have visibility of the numbers, I do agree that the company is not doing well. However, this acting role has resulted in me putting in additional working hours and the earliest I get home is 9pm.
On the second week of these new changes, I found myself venting to Shiro and to my life coach.
Both of them were rather candid and tough in their responses. Shiro said: “I do not see why you keep complaining about this job, yet you have been working there for more than 10 years. You are like a fossil you need to move.”
Amisi gave me some philosophical sounding self-help quips about moving on if the situation is not working for me. He then challenged me to list the things that I have done (besides whining) to change my situation.
After examination, I realised he had a point. I have not refreshed my CV in five years, I have not visited a recruitment agency or headhunter in three years — basically, no one knows my worth.
The next day, I made a few calls to some reputable agencies.
The second agency I called appeared to be a bit more progressive as they invited me for a ‘consultation session’ where they asked me to bring all my documents.
The session was a bit interesting to me.
First, they told me I had to pay ten thousand shillings for an ‘evaluation and direction.” This was news to me and I asked for more details.
Basically, they said this means “looking at your CV and determining the gaps and what can be done to address them”.
Since I do not want to appear like I am chickening out I decided to proceed with the process. I then had a session with Lee, a recruitment agent who appeared to be fresh out of university. He started off by asking me to “introduce or sell myself.”
At the end of my introduction, he gave me his feedback which I must say was a bit of a shocker. He told me that I appear “challenged in highlighting my achievements and accomplishments”.
He also told me that my CV “does not do any justice to my job search.” He plucked out a red pen as he proceeded to highlight the elements of my CV I need to change.
Lee then asked me to go “back and incorporate the changes we discussed”. I told him “my understanding was that you would rework the CV”. He chuckled in a patronising way and said, “we guide you the process, but you make the changes since we want you to own the final product”.
I felt shortchanged by this response but now there is no turning back. So, we have just been going back with Lee over many changes some that seem petty and irrelevant. I cannot wait for the day when he comes back and says we are finally done and can get round to the actual work of looking for a job. In the meantime, I am hating my job more and more — I need out as soon as possible.
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Note: The results are not exact but very close to the actual.
