Updated On Fri, 04/09/2010 - 3:19pm

Gary O'Neal has been a recruiting manager in Texas for more than a decade. O'Neal says most job seekers define themselves by what they did in the past instead of what they can accomplish in the future.

O'Neal says, in this economy, people must "turn [themselves] from a job seeker... into a businessperson [or] problem solver who is moving forward and making things happen."
 
"It all starts out with doing something that makes you stand out," O'Neal said. O'Neal recommends job seekers use their resume to "paint a picture that someone can see what kind of results they're going to get when they hire you."
 
To learn to list list your problem solving abilities and your accomplishments, O'Neal says you must think about times when you have been most productive or happy in life. He says you examine the chararacteristics of those opportunities and define yourself by the strenghts you discovered about yourself while there.