Chef Jobseeker – 5 Tips to Stand Out

Chef jobseeker tips to stand out

If you’re a chef looking for your next career move, here are five top tips to get noticed as a jobseeker and hired by the best employers…

Chef Jobseeker Tip 1: Find ways to let your creativity shine

As every HR manager will confirm, CVs can only tell a potential employer so much. After all, how much information can applicants really fit onto one or two sides of A4?

If a candidate has the requisite qualifications, shows steady career progression and participates in hobbies outside of work, their CV is very likely to blend into similar CVs written by other chefs competing for the job. CVs in their traditional form made sense before technology allowed people to express themselves in other ways, so their role is undoubtedly changing.

Read: CV Aren’t Dead Yet Chef! 

Creating a video CV is one way to stand out. In a video you can show your enthusiasm and passion for being a chef in a way that no CV can. Don’t send an hour-long monologue, though! Remember that recruiters only have a limited time. It pays to keep it short and compelling.

Read: Creating a Chef Video CV – 12 Steps to Success

Video might not be for you, but it’s important to find a way to highlight your talents, so your application stands out and doesn’t just sit alongside hundreds like it.

Tip 2: Think outside the box

Go against the grain. A US chef jobseeker created an online ad that would appear every time employers he was targeting searched their own names. It cost him $6. He got hired.

Ads won’t necessarily get you a job, but doing something people aren’t expecting, or that hasn’t been done before, will get you noticed.

Demonstrate that you are willing to learn new things, undertake challenges, and have different experiences.

Chef Jobseeker Tip 3: Social media espionage

Facebook is for friends, Twitter is for catching news, and LinkedIn is for job seeking – right? Wrong. Facebook, Twitter and other social media tools allow you to study, connect and interact with prospective future employers and colleagues.

Learn their likes, dislikes and priorities. Interact. Seize the opportunity to get noticed and even build a relationship, before you’re officially interviewed. Remember, likeability has always been a key factor in people getting hired. Positive social interactions can only help.

Of course, your social media interactions can work against you, too. Remember – a good HR department is likely to check your social media presence just as much these days as your actual CV.

Tip 4: Study a company’s top performers

If you’ve set your sights on a particular role with a particular company then it pays to do your research. Deep dive the backgrounds of chefs in the roles that you’ve got within your sights.

Look for trends and themes in their backgrounds to ascertain the type of chef that company looks to hire. See where you’re a match, and draw up a list of things to learn and improve before approaching them for work.

Tip 5: Be proactive

If you know the company you want to work for, don’t wait for any official job posting.

Many companies – the more creative ones who want talent to find them – accept CVs at all times. Being proactive means you can get noticed before the race has officially begun. This is a perfect moment to send a tweet “pitch” and to make sure you get seen early on.

And when you apply, show why they should take you even if they don’t have a current open position. How do you do that? Re-read Tip1.

If success in property is location, location, location, success in job seeking for chefs at all levels comes from standing out, standing out and standing out. Take our 5 top tips to get noticed as a jobseeker onboard and see them pay dividends in your next job search.

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