Yes, Volunteer Work Can Go on Your Resume

If you choose to do substantive professional volunteer work or participate in a charitable action group, such as Habitat for Humanity, it’s fair game to include it on your resume. If you’ve been laid off, as time passes, your resume will show a gap that may raise questions for a hiring manager or recruiter. One way to fill that gap is with volunteer work.

Here are some ways you can leverage your experience for the benefit of others as well as your resume:

• Become a volunteer leader in a professional organization.
• Judge a competition that uses your skills and expertise.
• Teach a class at your community center or local adult education program.
• Tutor a high school or community college student.
• Teach English to non-English speaking adults.
• Get involved in planning a local event, such as an arts fair or charity auction.

Reader Janet Falk recommended the following additions to the list of volunteer sites I posted earlier in No Pay, But the Rewards Are Many:

• www.smartvolunteer.org
• www.idealist.org

She added this one for readers living in New York City: www.nycservice.org.

I invite you to suggest additional volunteer resources and activities.

That Important Fleeting Moment: Your elevator speech

Have you been in a professional networking situation and participated in a round robin, only to realize—after you’ve given a brief, dull “here’s who I am and what I do” statement and others have taken the floor with a flourish—that you missed out on something?

Once you passed on the baton, your moment in the spotlight was over and gone. What happened, and how can you make sure this misstep doesn’t occur again?

First, be clear to yourself who you are and where you want to be going. As a jobseeker this is vital anyway, so now you need to articulate it in a value statement—the statement usually referred to as your elevator speech because it’s short and to the point.

Brainstorm key words that especially apply to you. Your statement needs to sound natural, not like a canned speech using generic terms. Write out several versions and test them aloud to yourself. How do the words roll off your tongue? Can you state your case in 30 seconds? Edit and rewrite until you have something that works for you.

Second, get some practice. You have a fleeting moment to let people know that you are knowledgeable in your field, experienced, passionate and goal oriented. These are not words that will slip off your tongue at a moment’s notice in a coherent, impelling fashion. So, unless you are one of the extremely rare birds who can speak eloquently off the cuff, practice with family or friends before you try it in a professional setting.

Next, go to a networking event and give it a go. Remember, you don’t want it to sound like you memorized it, and each time you speak to a new person, the one you just spoke to may overhear you, so mix up the words. This is not the time to sound like a parrot. Stay calm and keep talking, but keep it short. Blather on and people will stop listening.

The more you network, the more you will become comfortable sharing your value statement, and the more people will listen...and remember you.