Are professional resume services worth it, or can you best tell your own story?

Q: You've found that writing your own resume is just too painful a task. You turn to various resume writers for help and learn that prices and services vary dramatically. Some resume writers will interview you on the phone. Others will create your resume from a set of forms that they ask you to fill out. Does it really matter whom you hire to write your resume?

Nick's reply: When you pay to have your resume written, what are you buying? Just a resume? I think you're buying a suit of clothes that shows off your form to your best advantage and makes you look good when you're walking the talk. Don't buy off the rack. Get custom fitted so you'll look your very best.

I still think a resume isn't the best way toward the job you want. But if you're going to use a resume, the best route to the best resume is to learn to be your own tailor. Learn to sew. Learn to write up your story yourself. But not a lot of people are going to do that or do it well. That's where an expert resume writer can help.

Resume mills -- companies that crank out one-size-fits-all resumes from a stock pattern -- do not create a unique image of the individual client. Like department stores that sell you a suit off the rack without the aid of a tailor, they provide no personal contact with a resume writer.

If you want to look really good, I think the tailor needs to put his arms around you and measure your body. The tailor has to see how your posture affects the way a jacket drapes over your body. It's not the same when you call in your measurements over the phone or fill out a form. Likewise, a resume writer can't be hidden away in a back room bent over a sewing machine ... er, computer. Yet that's how the mills operate. A sharp point-man sells you the service, but the work is done by someone else in the equivalent of a sweatshop, getting paid a tiny fraction of the fee you are charged. But cost does not always reflect quality of service. You could work with a resume mill and still pay handsomely for an "off the rack" resume.

While the creation of a resume might begin with you filling out some stock forms, I think a resume writer needs to talk with the client. I've got no problem with a salesperson making the resume sale. But there should be one-on-one contact between the client and the writer who is actually writing the resume.

There are two reasons this is important. First, a resume costs enough that any client should get personal service. If the client doesn't like the resume writer after a talk, then another writer should be assigned. (This is a benefit to the resume firm, too. A client who likes the writer is more likely to feel satisfied when they get the product.) The main complaint I hear from people who hire resume writers is that they pay for personal service but get production-line treatment. A resume is a very personal thing. Personal, one-on-one service is key.

Second, a resume is more than facts and data that can be tallied on a form. The substance needs to be tweaked to account for the client's style. For example, if a client is quiet and mild-mannered, the resume must bring out qualities the candidate is not likely to reveal in the interview. If a client is very outspoken, the resume should balance that by reflecting an ability to be patient and thoughtful. The resume should reveal qualities that may be masked by the candidate's behavior. No resume writer is going to see behavior in the answers a client provides on a form.

The point is that a good resume writer is a bit of a mentor and a coach who measures not just the client's experience, but the client's style and character -- and blends it into the resume. When I gave the keynote speech at the National Resume Writers' Association conference, the resume writers I found most engaging were the ones who projected the message, "My first job is to advise my clients."

Resume-writing firms suggest that you should let a resume professional write your resume because you can't really see yourself -- or "write yourself up" -- as others see you. It takes another set of eyes. It takes an independent perspective to produce a resume that elicits a positive reaction from a hiring manager. But along with that sales pitch is an obligation to show clients how to integrate their personalities with what's on the resume, because in the job interview, it's not the resume talking -- it's the candidate. When the resume doesn't fit the candidate properly, the candidate winds up defending the resume, and that spells disaster.

I just don't see how any resume writer could produce a custom resume or provide that level of service without one-on-one contact with the client.

The tailor should see how you walk. A resume writer should hear how you talk.

Copyright 2009. Distributed by Universal Press Syndicate

Nick Corcodilos is author of "Ask The Headhunter: Reinventing the Interview to Win the Job" and the host of www.asktheheadhunter.com. He can be reached by e-mail at seattle@asktheheadhunter.com or at North Bridge Group, P.O. Box 600, Lebanon, NJ 08833. Sorry, no personal replies.