September 2026 Newsletter Articles

Here are the full-text articles from our most recent monthly newsletter. To receive the full newsletter issue each month, which contains additional career-related content beyond the articles below, feel free to sign up at this link!

Resume Tips

Almost without fail, every job hunter who applies to a job of interest today and doesn’t hear back ends up wondering: “did I not hear back because my resume isn’t ‘scannable’ by the tools that HR departments are using to screen candidates?”

These tools, known as Applicant Tracking Systems, have become a huge topic of discussion in the field of resume effectiveness and (sadly) thousands of fear-mongering companies have sprung up to browbeat people into thinking that their resume isn’t set up properly to “pass” such technologies. They capitalize on the lack of knowledge most job hunters have about these things and realize that they can easily manipulate the fear, uncertainty, and anxiety of out-of-work professionals to make a quick buck.

In practicality, ATS systems really aren’t all that complicated. And if you ask anybody who is heavily involved in the modern hiring process, they’ll tell you that the issue of “resume scannability” is actually very, very low on the list of potential challenges an applicant may face. In most cases, there are far more traditional reasons as to why a person might not hear back from an application, with the primary one being the simple (but frustrating) reality that companies have tremendous access to talent these days and often can track down candidates with an even more note-perfect mix of credentials to offer. Additionally, in many other cases, an internal candidate or referred party is given preferred status over a “cold” applicant. Or where your lack of response is simply due to bureaucracy, such as when a job gets filled — but nobody actually gets around to removing it from cyberspace.

All of this being said, sure, it’s still wise to double-check that one’s resume doesn’t truly contain any “scannability” issues that might be holding it back. But the process is far simpler than some folks would have you believe, and essentially just comes down to:

• Avoiding columns, text boxes, and graphics on a resume whenever possible, since they can make it difficult for resume scanners to “parse” one’s data effectively

• Using standard section header names (Experience, Education, Key Skills, etc.) instead of ‘creative’ ones like “About Me” or “Here’s My Jam” and the like

• Sticking with a conventional business font and font size (and no, the “hidden white font” trick doesn’t work, despite people trying it for 30+ years now)

• Making sure you don’t place your name and contact info (or any other important data) in headers or footers, since some ATS tools can’t access text in these sections

• Including as many relevant keywords as possible that are mentioned in the advertisement, ensuring you’ve phrased them in their most common forms

• Submitting the document as a Word, PDF, or Text file for best results (and if you use a PDF, make sure it’s not a graphic and the text is “selectable” within it

That’s pretty much the drill — and again, given how relatively straightforward these rules are, I urge you to keep your guard up against services/sites claiming otherwise — or implying that your current document is way off the mark!

P.S. One can also simply ask any AI tool to review your resume for ATS compatibility and you’ll get a near-instant analysis that should point out most issues in this regard. And if you’re a client of Career Horizons, feel free to utilize the new AI-based “Career Horizons Resume Analyzer” tool I’ve developed at the top of my website’s Client Resources page!

LinkedIn Advice

Ah, LinkedIn. For all of the amazing networking and research capabilities the site offers, there have always been an equal amount of frustrations involved in using the site — and numerous changes have been made to the platform that are downright head-scratchers.

As an example of this, many users may have noticed that LinkedIn recently decided to adopt an AI-only search approach that replaces the conventional job search filters that worked like a champ for 20+ years. Given this change, users no longer have the ability to tell the site EXACTLY what they’re trying to find. You can’t say you only want to see jobs that have “Director of Product Management” in the title, for example. Your only option is to spell out your general desires in the top box, hit the button, pray, and hope AI gets you close. And generally it does. But again, sadly, the new AI approach doesn’t offer nearly the precision that one used to have access to through the “All Filters” menu.

All of this being said, there’s still ONE key setting most people overlook that can help you cut down on erroneous leads flooding your inbox. If you haven’t done so already, visit LinkedIn and click on the Jobs > Preferences > Job Alerts menu — then scroll down and see if the “Top Job Picks for You” setting is enabled. If so, I’d recommend you switch it off, since it’s turned on by default and gives LinkedIn permission to send you listings for roles that (in most cases) only relate marginally, at best, to your career goals. Honestly, in most cases where people accuse LinkedIn of sending them completely unrelated employment leads, this setting is the culprit. So double-check and switch it off, if you haven’t already!

Job Search Strategy

While younger professionals might not realize it, a common element of job hunting in decades past involved joining dedicated “networking groups” where people would band together to share job hunting ideas, review progress, access moral support, and get direct feedback from their peers around their job hunting approach.

Back in the eighties and nineties, for example, there was a very popular group called “Forty Plus” that had chapters all over the country and that was relied on by thousands of older job hunters as a source of peer support and inspiration. On top of this, there were also dozens of private and church-sponsored groups in every major city devoted to helping people who were unemployed — and I myself ran such a group called the S.A.F.E. Club (Serious About Finding Employment) for over 15 years for those who might remember it. Heck, even after social media took off, there were still many online groups like Linked:Seattle that tried to rally like-minded people together to help one another with job hunting and other types of business endeavors.

Interestingly, however, almost all of these groups seemed to utterly disappear after the year 2010 or so. They all just sort of … fizzled out. Whether this was due to the rise of social media, increased demands on peoples’ time, changing job market demographics, or other factors is hard to pin down exactly. But it was a stark and sudden change given how prominent such groups had been in decades past. During my initial 15-20 years in this field, I could easily point somebody to dozens of groups that existed to support job hunters and help combat the isolation of the unemployment process. Since that time, I’ve literally had almost no referrals I could even make.

But here’s the kicker. In the past few months, I’ve seen signs that such groups might be making a comeback. As just one example, I’ve had multiple clients inform me of a group called Never Search Alone that is spinning up volunteer chapters all over the country. I also came across another organization called the Open Water Group with a similar charter — and recently spoke to another private group called One Connection Away that is geared toward Pacific NW Marketing professionals and that has recently been resurrected by its founder, Kelly Evans, after a bit of a break.

Going forward, I’ll be curious to see if this renaissance of job search support groups continues, given the many positive benefits they can potentially provide to those in transition. If you happen to know of any such groups not mentioned above — or are a job hunter who might be interested in joining such a group — please don’t hesitate to let me know!

Career Change Resources

While job titles are useful shorthand in the world of work, and can give you a general sense of what people do for a living, there’s no question that the number of titles out there has exploded in recent decades. Back in the pre-2000 days, for those who might recall, most people would simply say they were a salesperson or marketing professional or IT manager and the like and you’d get the gist of it. Fast-forward to today’s market, however, and there are thousands upon thousands of new occupational niches that have emerged — and even a career coach can’t necessarily keep up with all of them!

This being said, I’ve felt for many years that there’s a single overarching definition that EVERYBODY can use to accurately explain their career focus. All you have do is answer the question “what kind of problems do you solve for money?”

To me, this question is really telling. Some people don’t miss a beat and offer up answers like “I collect blood samples from people in safe, comfortable fashion” (phlebotomist) or “I help ensure corporate events run on time, stay on budget, and are extremely memorable” (event planner) or “I make sure executives have the most accurate data possible about the business so they can make good strategic decisions.” (business intelligence analyst).

Other people who struggle to answer this question give me pause, however. At the end of the day, if one has difficulty connecting the work they do to the bottom-line of the business — or the mission of the nonprofit, school, or public sector institution — that can be a sign of a career that’s at risk or where a person may not be in a position to market themselves very effectively. Ultimately, after all, people are offered jobs not out of the goodness of the hiring manager’s heart, but based on the perception they’ll be able to solve a problem or capitalize on an opportunity the company currently isn’t able to address with their existing staff.

So what does this have to do with career change? Frankly, when you realize the dizzying number of new occupational paths that are out there, I sometimes think it’s easier to reverse-engineer your options using the problem/solution framework. Think hard about all the problems you HAVE solved to date, both personally and professionally, and which ones you’d be energized to solve again in the future. Ask the people in your network to talk about the problems they’re witnessing in their organizations and the talents that likely would be needed to address them. And if you think you might have the right chops for self-employment, ask yourself which nagging challenges you’ve wrestled with as either a consumer or within your work roles to date — and then brainstorm whether there might be an innovative, lucrative way that you could make a living solving these issues.

Case in point? I had a client who had been working as a civil engineer and who became more and more drawn to the idea of applying her talents to solving humanitarian issues in developing countries, given her own background of immigrating from such a nation. As a result, we brainstormed a whole mess of problems such countries are facing — ranging from the need for economic development opportunities to access to clean water to the promotion of human rights — and these topics propelled us to researching/identifying over 200 employers in Washington State working on these exact issues. Following this compass heading, she set up 5-10 networking meetings each week with people at these organizations until the “stars aligned” and one day a mid-level manager at a water purification technology company said “Hey, with your background, is there any chance you’d be interested in helping us teach people in other countries how to use our products and adapt them to different cultural environments?”

Again, focusing on the problems you would like to solve certainly isn’t the only way to go about the career exploration process, but it provides a slightly different lens for looking at things — and I’ve seen it lead to some great results over the years!

Interviewing Insights

As you can likely imagine, one of the most common questions I receive from clients is in regard to the prevalence of age bias in the job market — and how an older worker can best position themselves to land a new job despite this pervasive issue.

My answer to the first part of the question? Sadly, it’s a resounding “yes, it’s very common” since any way you slice it, and despite the legalities trying to prevent it, many employers either consciously or unconsciously factor age into consideration when hiring. The AARP organization, for example, found that nearly two-thirds (64%) of workers aged 50 and older reported seeing or experiencing age discrimination in the workplace — and another survey showed that 74% of older adults believe their age is a barrier to getting a new job.

Until our legal system grows enough teeth to actually crack down on this issue, however, I’d encourage every older job hunter to seriously contemplate the following question when they’re heading into an interview: “If the majority of age bias is based on stereotypes about age, and the risks companies feel they may face when hiring older workers, could I be accidentally reinforcing these perceived risks and weaknesses in any way?”

Simply put, I’d contend that much of the phenomenon of age bias is based on the following potential fears an employer might have:

• Older workers may not be able to adapt or keep up with a given corporate culture
• Older workers may not be as up to speed on modern technology as younger workers
• Older workers might have “coasted” and not learned new skills in quite some time
• Older workers may not be comfortable taking direction from a younger manager
• Older workers may want too much money based on past raises and market conditions

• Older workers may have health issues or experience greater absenteeism

• Older workers might be retiring shortly and less likely to make a long-term contribution

So again, if you’re a job hunter who belongs to the Gen X or Baby Boomer cohort, it’s worth a moment to acknowledge these potential hiring manager fears and make sure you’re not playing right into them. For example, I routinely conduct mock interviews with candidates in the middle-age-or-older bracket who answer the “tell me about yourself” question with a 10-minute monologue about every single job they’ve had for the past forty years. Or who take jabs at Gen Y or Gen Z beliefs, behaviors, or work mentalities. Or who poo-poo the capabilities of AI, instead of leaning into it.

Sure, in a perfect world it would be great if we all could be “free to be you and me” (heck, even that reference dates me!) and find a way to keep bias from creeping into the hiring process. Alas, we don’t live in that reality. So if you suspect your age might be a contributing factor in your job search results to date, double down and work on exempting yourself from the above stereotypes. Work on your health. Enroll in some training and career-specific learning activities. Get out in front of the AI revolution, not behind it. And most importantly, when interviewing, avoid telling too many war stories about the past and focus on sharing your enthusiasm about your career and what you hope to accomplish in the future.

At the end of the day, no hiring manager or recruiter (regardless of their age) wants to hire somebody whose best days seem to be behind them, not in front of them.

AI Usage

This is a hard confession to make. Since my time as a young lad in Alaska, I’ve always been pretty good with language and had a pretty good eye for writing, editing, and proofreading. With the rise of modern AI tools, however, these skill sets are becoming largely commoditized — especially when it comes to proofreading, where ChatGPT or its ilk can run rings around virtually any human screener.

For example, as meticulous as I try to be, there have been numerous times recently when I’ve updated a client’s resume or similar document to an AI tool, asked it to proofread the file, and been shocked by the range of minor glitches and inconsistencies that it caught.

Now to be fair, proofreading (and writing in general) is far from an exact science and one can’t take every AI suggestion at full value. There are obviously still plenty of cases when a good writer chooses to buck conventional grammar rules to make a point — or decides to handle something in a way that an English teacher might frown upon. But in terms of basic errors and inconsistencies? Outright typos, inconsistent punctuation, extra spaces, and that sort of thing? AI puts human readers to shame in terms of both speed and accuracy. Not only is it fast as all-get-out, but it doesn’t suffer from the #1 issue that leads to typos in documents — which is the fact that human eyes get fatigued and tend to see what we think we wrote, not necessarily the text that’s actually there.

Case in point? If you open this link in LinkedIn, you’ll see page after page of people whose opening headline, in big bold letters, showcases their background as a Project Manger.

So as obvious as it might seem and as many times as you’ve reviewed your key job search documents to date, I’d encourage all active job hunters to run their resume, cover letters, and/or LinkedIn profile text through any standard AI tool and simply put “proofread this” in the prompt. Experience tells me you’ll be thankful you did.