Resumes for SCA-types

[cormac]

Please note: This is a list in development. Please give feedback.

The following is a list of SCA offices and positions, translated for use on a modern resume (as has been requested around LJ from time to time). While not an official list, I've tried to keep the translations honest yet still impressive.

Seneschal - President/CEO
Herald - Director of Protocol/Master of Ceremonies
A&S Officer - Director of Art and Education Services
Chatelaine - Intake/Recruiting Director
Marshal - Safety Officer/Referee
Chronicler - Editor-in-Chief/Communications Director
Webwright - Webmaster/Electronic Communications Director
Lists - Scorekeeper
Children's Ministry - Children's Education Director
Chirurgeonate - Medical Officer
Exchequer - Treasurer / CFO (if you use this, specify that you're the chief financial officer for your area only, i.e. the Exchequer of Lyondemere would be the "Chief Financial Officer for the Coastal Los Angeles Area")
Constabulary - Security Officer
Autocrat - Event Planner/Event Director
Baron/ess - Area* Director/Co-Ceremonial Head of local chapter
King/Queen - Regional* Director
Prince/ss - Regional* Subdirector
Ambassador - Regional Liason
Courtier/LiW - Assistant to the Regional* Director
Chief LiW - Executive Assistant to the Regional* Director
Guard - Stage Crew

*Terms used for the size of the group should reflect mundane boundaries. So, for example, the Kings of Trimaris and Atenveldt, the Princes of Oertha, and the Barons of Grey Niche and Western Seas should state that they are the State Directors for Florida, Arizona, Alaska, Tennessee and Hawai'i, respectively. Depending on the territory to population ratio, it may be more impressive to cite population vs. region (Officers of the Barony of Calafia, for example).

If listing positions for both local (shire, barony, etc.) and regional (principality, kingdom), try to use terms that reflect the shift in size, stature and importance. Use terms consistently. I've used "area" and "region" above, but branch, chapter, etc. can be used.

If you have your own suggestions for officers and event stewards, or corrections (Lists, Guard and Marshal, for example), please leave them in comments, and I'll put them up on the big board.

Comments

Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[the-celestia.livejournal.com]

...but I used to hire/fire, and if I saw any of this puffery on a resume, you'd not have seen a first interview. I did once receive a resume with a detailed listing of that individual's SCA awards. LOL.

I don't put SCA on my resume. I do put service-oriented volunteer work on it *if* the field of service is relevant to the position being applied for, but the SCA is not philantropic, it is selfish, something we do for ourselves. Ergo, not resume material IMO.

t_C

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[selenesue.livejournal.com]

It depends what the job is. Unpaid experience for a non-profit organization is still experience and some could very well apply. If one had been a baronial exchequer, and was now applying for an accounting job, that certainly would be worth mentioning. Likewise, webmaster and chronicler positions. "Army chief of staff" maybe not so much, those jobs are not easy to find, certainly not in California anyway. As you say, RELEVANT experience.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[abbybob.livejournal.com]

I have been submitting my resume for a lot of NPO's in my area and they specifically have asked to see a resume detailing/outling any work/positions held in Non Profit orgs. I've been in 3 interviews in the past week where I have been asked about NPO involvement. I have 2 call backs for next week. I must be doing *something* right. The 3rd interview ended when they told me the pay was... a whole $10/hour. oooh. pass.

Having Done HR in the past, I agree that people do put some amazing crap on their resumes. And some people have amazing crappy resumes.

It all depends on how you approach your job search and whether posting your Non-profit experiences on your resume is needed. For most jobs, I would say no.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[(Anonymous)]

True, if you want to *work* for an NPO that experience is relevant. Kudos for you for wanting to work for one, that line of work takes a special sort of person - and is 180 degrees from anything I'd want to do!

Good luck with your job search.

t_C

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[lady_songsmith]

For most jobs, I would say no.

One caveat: Recent grads are usually advised to put clubs/activities/volunteering on their resumes if they held positions of responsibility. I have SCA on mine, still, as two years of college Seneschal and some event planning gave me useful job skills -- more useful for the jobs I was looking at than the IT job that paid the bills while I was in school.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[lady_songsmith]

Someday I'll gather my thoughts before submitting comments.

What might be more useful than job titles would be skill translations. What's the mundane way to describe the duties of the various positions?

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[cormac.livejournal.com]

The problem that I ran into when doing this list, that most job titles don't translate well in and of themselves and need to rely on the individual's experience in the job for the translation, would only become more individualized when expanding to duties (not to mention experience and skills learned).

After doing this exercise, I'm planning to write a more expansive article on how to translate titles, duties and experience into a modern setting. I could use some help, if you (or anyone else) is interested.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[mysryael.livejournal.com]

Unto the Honourable Lady Celestia,

With all due respect, to the last three letters of your post (IMO), not all the "hobby" and unpaid experience in the SCA is without value.

I can and will make a very serious argument that medical training and use of expertise does count. IN non-paid capacities, ask any person who has ever volunteered for the American Red Cross. Ask the victims these people have provided almost instant care for in uninhabitable conditions.

Now I already hear you saying, "But the ARC is different.”
We require our chirurgeons to be "Red Cross" trained, or it's equivalent. How can a person working in the middle of the night without any compensation, often in miserable conditions be considered any different from that Red Cross volunteer? Can you show me the “selfish, something we do for ourselves” here?

Let's take another case.

Autocrats aren’t selfish. Autocrats don’t do their job because it is “something we do for ourselves.” You have recently been an autocrat and I would be very surprised if you hadn’t used the valuable experience obtained by doing so – as puffery – on your own resume when you needed to make the point to someone that you had skills they wanted to rent or hire.

I am going to make the assumption that when you posted this comment you were talking about people who maybe half finished a job somewhere else and then decided that putting in their hobby “experience” time would look better on a resume than what they had actually done. At least I hope that was what you were trying to say because otherwise you have just managed to belittle any person who has ever learned valuable skills and practiced them in a non-modern work setting and that doesn’t sound like something you would do.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[the-celestia.livejournal.com]

Firstly, I gave back the title 'lady' and have not ever held the title 'honorable', just so you know.

As someone who has several Advanced ARC certificates (betcha didn't know that, since I keep my First Aid training a secret in the SCA), I can affirm that the ARC is VERY different from the SCA.

We do whatever service we do in the SCA to benefit ourselves. Yes, even Event Stewards. We put those events on for ourselves and our own enjoyment. There is NO real-world NEED for there to be SCA events.

My time spent working with ARC and the Veterans Adminstration Volunteer Corps is for the benefit of others. There IS a real-world NEED for volunteer services in times of natural disaster and for those who have been injured in the service of our country.

You don't have to agree, or to like what I have said, but I stand behind it. You, of course, may feel differently.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[cormac.livejournal.com]

Lady Celestia (and I will address you as Lady so long as your AoA, Harp and Dolphin appear in the OP),

I have to ask: what has made you so bitter about everything in the SCA lately? I read that you had some trouble at Pennsic, but this has been building for far longer than that. In your comment below, before you deleted it, you said that you would dismiss out of hand the experience I described as irrelevant and further stated that during the hiring process, "I consider that level of involvement in a hobby activity of any kind to be a negative, not a positive." Why?

Is it that you've found your own level of participation in two kingdoms on opposite ends of the country damaging to your modern job prospects, and therefore consider anyone's high level of involvement to be necessarily as damaging and negative? Is it that you feel you've not received enough recognition within the SCA, and feel that such neglect should be reciprocated in the modern world? Or does this all come back to your feelings of alienation and isolation within Caid?

I'm seriously concerned here, because I feel that every time you come onto my LJ on subjects regarding the SCA, you've got nothing but negative, hostile things to say, and I have to wonder if this is a cry for help.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[the-celestia.livejournal.com]

1) To refer to an unmarried Venetian lady of my (actual) age, in my chosen time period, as Lady, is to imply you believe she would appreciate your solicitation of certain intimate services from her. That is why I 'gave back' the title Lady...you're basically calling me a high-class prostitute when you persist in using the title.

2) Henceforth I will attempt to remember to refrain from posting in your journal. In fact, that is why I deleted my comment, because I felt you would find it too negative, and comment upon that.

And no, none of your suggestions as to why I wouldn't hire someone who was deeply involved in ANY particular hobby as the scenario you posited, are currently representative of my personal situation - but thanks for thinking of me.

Re: Dunno what sort of work you are submitting resumes for...

[cormac.livejournal.com]

I didn't write this post so that people who needed to pad their resumes could put everything they've ever done in the SCA out there in the most impressive manner possible. I did it to help those with oodles of experience in one or two of the jobs listed above translate the value of the experience to those who don't understand what "exchequer" or "chronicler" means.

When I got my job with KP, I wasn't hired for what I'd studied in school, or for my 10 years of experience owning and managing a restaurant. I was hired because I'd worked with PeopleSoft, a software that I'd picked up almost by accident through work/study with the office that handled campus organizations. This was exposure to a software I could not have picked up in the general workplace, because no one hires people to work with PeopleSoft who have never touched it before.

In like manner, there are those in the SCA who wouldn't be given the time of day in the modern world if they applied for, say, a senior managerial position, because the work section of their resume only reflects entry-level to middle-management experience. However, if you had a resume cross your desk that showed 15 years of experience as senior staff at Pennsic and kingdom-level senior officer work (let's throw in a landed baroncy for good measure), and you understood the experience, skill set, and dedication that such positions entailed, would you not give them more than just a glance?