Prospect resume writer helps people land new careers

For 15 years, Katrina Richards has quietly built a business out of something many people dread, writing about themselves.

Based in Prospect, Richards runs Resumes and Cover Letters by Katrina, helping people across the state and beyond reposition themselves for new career opportunities.

“I stumbled into it because one of the guys I worked with, he’d been applying for jobs for 12 months and hadn’t even had an interview,” she says. “So I got him to send me through his resume.”

What she saw surprised her. “I redid his resume and sent it back to him with a cover letter. He applied for three jobs that weekend and got a job out of it.”

Word spread quickly. Friends told friends. What began as a favour turned into a steady stream of requests. “Then I thought, I can actually probably do something with this!” She contacted the Resume Writers Association, completed courses and built a website. “Got myself on the internet and people find me that way now.”

Today, her business boasts hundreds of five-star reviews. Yet for years it ticked along quietly. It was only just before COVID that demand surged. When the pandemic hit, she feared the worst. “I thought ‘this is gonna not gonna help me at all.’” Instead, the opposite happened.

“When COVID hit, I think that’s when everyone reevaluated what they wanted out of life and the jobs that they were in. And it just ballooned after that.”

Much of Richards’ work is about confidence. She speaks animatedly about a recent client who had worked as a deli assistant and doubted she could move into administration. The woman not only secured an interview but was called back within hours for a second. “And they hired her on the spot.” After 16 years in the same job, she had shifted industries entirely.

Richards’ packages include a 30-minute mock interview session. “It’s just like an interview. I’ll run through questions and then at the end of it I’ll give them feedback.” One common pitfall is the closing question. “When they get asked whether they’ve got any questions, at the end of the interview, many often go silent. When there’s heaps of questions you can ask.”

Her favourite suggestion flips the script. “What do you like about your role? Why should I choose your business to come and work at?” she says. “Interviewers seem to like that. Ask about themselves.”

“No one’s good at selling themselves. It takes somebody else to see the qualities and identify what skills that you can actually bring to a role.” That outside perspective can be life-changing, particularly for clients leaving workplaces that do not align with their values. “Not every workplace is like that. It’s just finding one that’ll fit.”

Artificial intelligence, she says, has not replaced what she offers. Clients often ask if she uses it. “I don’t.” She experimented with her own resume and was unimpressed. “It doesn’t make it at all personal. Like it’s just very generic and very it’ll give you like really weird wording and it’ll come up with some bizarre stuff.”

Integrity matters. She recalls a client who fabricated referees and claimed to have worked somewhere he had not. The deception was quickly uncovered. “Like things like that do not go down well, and she’s blackmarked him.” For Richards, honesty is non-negotiable.

After a car accident in 1997 left Richards with lasting health challenges, she developed a deep empathy for others facing barriers to employment. “I like helping people that are similar to me. They just need that extra hand and that voice. I can’t walk stairs. I can’t pick boxes up. But nothing’s stopping me from sitting at a computer typing away or picking up a phone.”