English 421: Technical Writing

To: Ms. Catherine Schuler

From: Andrew Buesking

Date: October 2, 2008

Re: Project Assessment Document

 

 

Applying for the science internship at Abbott directed me to focus on my academic credentials and leadership experiences.  While job ad gave very general qualifications, it clearly communicated Abbott’s desire to hire “students with proven academic performance and leadership potential.” As a result, I choose to tailor my resume and cover letter to these two topics. To highlight my “proven academic performance” in my resume, I choose to bold my GPA to make it more noticeable and to list only academic honors and awards (some of which I had initially forgotten in my Skills Inventory). In my cover letter, I decided to highlight my research experience, which I believe is my strongest academic qualification. Not only have I been able to succeed in the classroom but I also have the hands-on experience in the laboratory.

 

With respect to leadership, I listed activities on my resume which particularly demonstrated my leadership ability. Specifically, I added my role as large group coordinator for InterVarsity, which was not initially in my Skills Inventory (I had just begun serving in the position), to my resume in order to strengthen my leadership abilities. Unfortunately, the resume limited the amount of space I had to describe the position. However, the cover letter allowed me to expand my description and to emphasize my best leadership qualification.

 

After reviewing my academic and leadership credentials, I believe that my experiences are currently well-developed. I have acquired a good theoretical background as demonstrated my academic success. Through my research experiences, I have also gained hands-on technical skills which will help me to succeed in the future. Finally, extracurricular activities have allowed me opportunities to demonstrate my leadership ability. However, I must continue to build on these skills in order to pursue a scientific career; for this reason, I choose to apply for this particular internship. 

 

My resume was my most challenging document to produce.  After review of the first draft, I discovered that although my resume’s content was good, it was difficult to scan. However, increasing the “scannability” required me to utilize shorter descriptions without losing content. To solve this problem I decided to list my technical skills separately from my experiences. While this change made the document more readable, it also introduced a design flaw. I first used a two column format which resulted in a large white space in the center of my resume. However, I was finally able to solve this design issue by moving to a three column format, utilizing a table as a template.

 

Time management was also a challenging aspect of the project. Initially, I underestimated the amount of time this project would require because I already had a basic resume and cover letter. However, due to the challenges I had with my resume, I spent more time on the project than I had expected. If I had realized my underestimation earlier, I definitely would have worked more on the project initially, especially before the first draft of the resume was due.

Through research, I learned a lot more about Abbott Laboratories and its mission. While I had talked with Abbott recruiters in the past, I had never really investigated their website. The website helped me to better understand the company’s history and their mission. As a result, I was able to use some aspects of the Abbott vision of “Turning Science into Caring” in the second paragraph of my cover letter as I discussed how my passion for interdisciplinary research fits with Abbott’s own objectives. I believe that my cover letter is now stronger because of this change.

 

Probably the least helpful resource was the general readings on the OWL website (e.g. the reading on the cover letter). While these articles contained basic information, I had already written a cover letter and so had already seen the information presented. However, I think this resource would have been more helpful had I not known where to start.

 

 

Peer review identified the readability issue of the resume discussed in the Project Management section. While I did not recognize the issue the first time I read the review, after getting feedback from you, I was able to understand my reviewer’s broader concern. Reviewing other people’s work was also helpful. Although it did not lead to many overt changes to my documents, several times I double-checked my documents after a peer review. For example, I reviewed a cover letter whose tone was very forward. As a result, I checked my own cover letter again to ensure that I had not utilized a similar tone. In the end, I only changed the last sentence of my cover letter. However, without reviewing another person’s letter, I would not have reevaluated this sentence even though a reviewer had suggested it sounded slightly cliché.

 

After the redesign I discussed above, I believe that the overall layout of my resume represents the most effective design aspect of my project. The document maintains the professional, systematic tone of a scientific resume while utilizing several design elements to increase readability. For example, the separate section for technical skills shortens the descriptions of my experiences without losing the content. In addition, this separation allows for easy access to my technical skills without having to search my experiences.