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Got an interview with Amazon within their Advertising department. I hear working for Amazon can be great if you get into the right department. Anyone have insights to their advertising department? Good or bad? Also, would love some interview tips if you have them! (It’s for an Executive Assistant position) thank you!
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If you've worked for yourself, on your resume state you were self-employed. And accurately describe whatever it was you were doing. You could also call yourself an independent contractor, or an entrepreneur. If you've had great results in sales, include some metrics backing that up.
Can I ask why you're looking to leave the self-employment life and enter the workforce? I know so many people making the opposite move, so I'm curious what's leading you to want to enter a traditional job. I would still have a typical resume structure, just list Contractor or the name of the entity you were working for (even if it was your own business). And in terms of conveying success, find a way to use numbers and data to represent your success.
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Interesting!
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The commentors all have relevant comments and suggestions.
I completely understand wanting to change from being an independent contractor or being self-employed to now wanting to becoming an employee. My father was a General Contractor for 30+ years and tried for 30+ years to leave the profession although he ended up putting time and quality into his work hence why he was in for so long.
With companies using AI / ATS, I would make sure your resume is able to pass through the systems with using both keywords and phrases.
My suggestion would be not to completely leave being an independent contractor especially now with the job market and global economy being so bad but also keeping your eyes open and applying for roles in your next journey. You are in a unique position as you do know what it takes to be and think like a business owner and not an employee plus you are able to go either full or part time in corporate America and still have a supplemental income if you want and need.
I've seen a few different ways of doing this. Check out random people on LinkedIn to see a few. Most seem to have a business name even if operating under their own name. Some even go with the "President" or "CEO" route, although to me that just adds more questions imho. If it were me, I think I'd put my company name as the main part, then self-employed or freelance under the job title section.
I would be VERY hesitant to hire you if you were in my profession. I have worked with a number of people who worked for design agencies or even owned or co-owned design agencies who switched to working for an internal design dept in a large company. They were all disasters. The skill sets are completely different. For the most part design agencies just throw a design over the fence to a client and walk away. They don’t even know how the product turns out and aren’t there to answer questions or work through design compromises. They are also completely unprepared for getting things done in a large organization with multiple layers of stakeholders and decision makers. I would ask you why you were making the switch. I would ask you what relevant experience you had.
My manager asked me to interview someone who claimed to own a successful design agency. I asked him why he wanted to work for a big old tech company and couldn’t give a coherent answer. I told my manager he failed the interview, but she hired him anyway. I suspect he had only been an administrator for many years. He was an incompetent hands on designer and he was hired into a senior hands on role. Ironically, the manager who hired him left the company and I inherited this employee as the acting manager with a PIP for him already in progress. He failed the PIP and was fired.
I can and will use attractive verbiage in my resume, however, I am very forthright, andI would like to think sincer., so
Someone interviewing me would know my confidence is from experiences I've had, and what I know. I would not say I sell apples if I sell oranges, or that I have experience that I do not have. I think I would also convey, if seemingly necessary, that although I'm not as young as others in the job market, I am still moldable and trainable in specific work-as not everyone is, and that my ability to learn and outwork others would be a good reason to hire me. It sounds like you ran into someone who was playing fake it till you make it. I have actual skill sets and abilities others may not have that would be advantageous for many companies, especially in sales.
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The most important thing: In interviews people usually want to understand three elements. What exactly you were selling or working on, how you generated business, and what kind of results you produced. They may also ask why you’re looking to move into a more traditional role now, which is a normal question.
On the resume, just treat your independent work like a normal job. Give it a title that reflects what you actually did, something like “Independent Sales Consultant” or “Self-Employed Sales Contractor,” then list the years and a few bullet points about what you handled.