OK, folks, last time we got you halfway through your resume, so we need to finish up this week and then move on to the other aspects of the job hunt.
Once you’ve gotten your qualifications tweaked, you should list your experience. I prefer the term Career Summary as a header, because it gives the reader the impression you’ve been on course all along, even if it seems you’ve gotten side-tracked from time to time. Don’t worry if some of your jobs haven’t been in your chosen line of work. In this era of downsizing, company reorganizing, corporate bankruptcies, and wage-freezes, most of us have had to take a detour or two.
While these out-of-field jobs may seem like negatives, you can easily turn them into positives by looking at them and highlighting them a little differently. For instance, the fact that you’ve been in roles that don’t necessarily line up with your preferred career path shows that you’re committed to staying employed in a tough economy. It also shows a willingness to be flexible, an ability to learn job duties outside your skill-set, and that you do whatever it takes to meet your financial obligations. These are all attribute employers appreciate.
Let’s use the nurse from the last column as an example. Let’s say she was laid-off for four months and worked as a waitress while she secured another nursing role. She could list that job like this:
6/8/09-present: Joe’s Diner, Waitress
Fast-paced environment to keep me active, motivated, & fresh while securing a permanent position in nursing
Personally, I would much rather see this on someone’s resume than big gaps in employment. Even if the applicant has enough severance to survive for a significant amount of time, the longer a person goes without working, the easier it is for him or her to become complacent. The nurse in our example has shown the hiring person that she recognizes this possibility and is being proactive in overcoming it. Again, for someone who is able to read between the lines, she has made a seemingly negative career detour look like a great move on her part!
For the jobs you’ve had within your chosen profession, you should list enough information to highlight your proficiencies without getting too wordy. Someone within your field will understand the skills necessary to be successful in those roles, so focus on results and achievements versus job responsibilities. If you’re a retail manager looking for a position in a retail environment, you don’t want your resume to say this:
4/14/02-9/26/09: Joe’s Department Store, Store Manager
Responsible for hiring, firing, training, banking….blah, blah, blah!
If I’m looking for a retail store manager, I know what your responsibilities were at your last job. Why not tell me something that will separate you from the pack; something like this:
4/14/02-9/26/09: Joe’s Department Store, Store Manager
Reduced losses to one half of the company goal; trained 3 Store Managers for my District; maintained a sales increase above 6% for my entire tenure at the location
The difference between the first Store Manager and the second one is that the first one is task-oriented and the second one is results-oriented. I’ll take the results-oriented individual any day!
After your career summary, you can list any number of items. Education is important. If your schooling is in your field, the reasons to list it are obvious, but even if you’ve taken unrelated courses, you should put them in. It shows a desire to expand your horizons, a willingness to spend your free time constructively, and an ability to handle additional responsibility and work (trust me, every employer is looking for this skill!)
You can also list volunteer work, additional accomplishments or endeavors, awards, extra-curricular activities, or anything else that will help market you as an exceptional individual. It all comes down to how you present the information.
If you have space, there’s nothing wrong with adding a closing paragraph. Remember, you’re selling yourself and all good sales people close the sale! You could put something like this:
I’m a winner. I think like a winner, I act like a winner, and I find ways to win! We need to meet to discuss how I can bring this attitude and my passion for success to your organization.
If I saw that as the last statement on someone’s resume, I would be hard-pressed not to call him or her! I would want to talk to this person just to see what he or she considers passion for success!
Lastly, construct an appealing layout, and make it consistent! If one of your section headers looks like this:
QUALIFICATIONS
make them all look like that. You must assume the decision-maker is a number-cruncher and/or an “A” personality. This means he or she has an analytical mind and prefers logic, order, and consistency. Don’t use more than two font styles, and only change from your main font style if it really adds to the visual presentation. Less is more when it comes to the layout; otherwise, your resume can come across as cluttered and make you look unorganized!
I’ve seen every kind of resume layout you can imagine. The best ones always help me determine who the person is and what he or she will do on my team. As you construct and edit your resume, keep asking yourself if what you’re putting in or taking out helps to answer one or both of those questions for the reader. If not, it doesn’t belong in your resume. Be wise and selective in what you put in and what you leave out.
Make sure it is no more than two pages. Any more than that and you’ll bore the reader. You will immediately give the impression that every conversation with you will be a long dissertation of non-relevant or unnecessary information. Never end your resume in the middle of a page. Either lengthen or shorten it to fit perfectly on the page(s). This is where font sizes can be really helpful. A one-page resume is superb, and a two-page resume is acceptable, but only if you have too much relevant and necessary information to fit on one page.
That should do it for your resume. If you take your time and follow my suggestions, I am certain yours will stand out from the pack and garner some attention from prospective employers. So next time, we’ll begin looking at researching jobs and making calls, so you can figure out who to send these hot resumes to!
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