Today's working environment has gotten very competitive and we have to possess a certain uniqueness to get the job we want. We have to be able to catch the eye of the hiring manager and we can do this by writing what is called as Pain Letters and Human-Voiced Resumes.

Forbes contributor Liz Ryan wrote about how these two ways can help you attract the attention of a hiring manager and possibly land a job. She says stepping up our job hunting game requires forgetting the generic, stereotypical cover letter and the usual resume.

Pain Letter

According to Ryan, a pain letter is similar to a cover letter with the exception being that you don't talk about yourself. You talk about the firm.

Refrain from writing about yourself in the beginning of the letter, but hook the reader or the HR employee with a praiseful paragraph about the company.

You can cite examples about the firm that particularly impressed you. Afterward, you can mention a similar experience from your previous work history and how you managed to address the matter.

Close the letter with an invitation. Perhaps the firm would like to work with you and talk more about certain things.

For a sample of a Pain Letter, click here.

Human-Voiced Resume

A Human-Voiced Resume, on the other hand, is not an audio version of your CV. Ryan writes that it is simply a resume that uses the first-person point-of-view, uses easy-to-comprehend words—it is a CV that makes you sound human and not like a robot.

Ryan's job hunting tip is that you write your human-voiced resume the same way you would talk to people. In addition, she says to forget listing down your duties and tasks from your previous work and instead write down the mark you left behind in the company.

This is because recruiters already know the generic task and duties that a position conducts. But they do not know what you did, they do not know your unique story.

Click here to read what a human-voiced resume is like.