2torial #0768:
Learn2 Write a Resume

The right tool for the job

You've heard the word from friends, parents, and pundits: If you want a good job, you need a fabulous, show-stopping, leave-the-rest-in-the-dust resume. A great resume, we're told, can get you the job interview you want; an imperfect one ends up "on file" or, worse, in recycling bins across the city. It all seems like a lot of weight for one little sheet of paper to carry.

Writing one doesn't need to hurt your brain, though. We'll explain how to create the best resume for you, whether you're starting from scratch or freshening up an old one.

Job-hunt gurus like to say that a resume is a sales tool--and, well, they're right. Good salespeople know what and to whom they're selling, and they make convincing connections between the two. As you craft your resume, it's important to remember your audience: hiring managers.

Hiring managers have problems: They need good, qualified help, but they rarely have time to both look for help and keep up with their own work. A good resume presents you as the possible answer to hiring managers' problems. It shows you understand their needs and are qualified to help, and that you won't waste their time. It makes them want to interview you and find out more.

Note: If you're an academic or researcher, you need a curriculum vitae, or c.v., which lists every detail of your education, publications, research, honors, affiliations, and work experience. This is usually several pages long, and is arranged chronologically within each area of achievement. It's much more detailed than a resume.

Decide on an objective

Perhaps the most important step in looking for a job is getting a good idea of what you want to do--that is, figuring out your job objective. An objective is a brief phrase describing the job you're seeking. Many job hunt experts say you should include the objective in your resume; others say there's no need. Whether you include it or not, writing it forces you to express what you want clearly and succinctly.

A job objective statement usually has two parts: What you want to do (job title or short job description), and where you'd like to do it (what industry, or what sort of company). For instance, "A&R manager for an independent record label," or "Entry-level nursery position in a public garden."

Be realistic. The objective statement shouldn't describe the job you want to have in five years, but the job you're looking for now. Your resume should demonstrate how you're qualified for the job you describe.

Be brief. A five- to eight-word limit makes you hone your objective to its essence. Also, if you include it on your resume, a short objective makes you look focused.

List your skills and experience

Skills are the things you know how to do, from managing people to driving a car. Experience includes the situations where you learned or exercised those skills. Together, they're the meat of your resume.

Write it all down. Take a pad of paper and a pen and list all your school, work, volunteer, and life experience. Write down where and when you did what you did, or learned what you know. Include awards, scholarships, and publications.

Now list every skill you have. Start with any special training that applies to your job objective, but include every ability you have, no matter how irrelevant to the work world it seems, or how long ago you gained it. This master list will remind you of all the things you can do--many of which may apply to work in surprising ways.

Mark relevant skills and experience. Run through your master list and mark things that seem applicable to your job objective. Make a separate list, prioritizing each item according to how relevant it seems to your target job and how impressive it will be to a potential employer. The ones at the top of the list are what you should emphasize on your resume.

Choose a format

Every resume has the same basic information:

• Your name, address, and phone number (fax number and email address, too, if you have them)

• Information about your education, skills, and experience

One of the two most common resume formats, chronological and functional, should help you arrange this information in a way that emphasizes your strengths and downplays your weaknesses.

Chronological. This is the classic resume format, listing education and positions held in reverse chronological order (with the most recent first). The sections of a chronological resume usually include:

• Name and contact information

• Objective statement (optional)

• Work history

• Education/awards received

A chronological resume emphasizes continuity of employment and career progression, so it's a good format for people who want to stay in a field in which they have solid experience. It clearly demonstrates the relevance of your past experience to the position for which you're applying.

Functional. This format emphasizes what you did rather than when or where you did it. Usually, the body of the resume identifies skills relating to the job objective, then lists specific achievements illustrating how abundantly you have that skill.

Say your objective is to be a "Groomer at a pet salon." Perhaps you've never worked in a pet salon, but you've always had pets, you have experience volunteering at the Humane Society, and you've worked in retail. You could divide the "relevant experience" section into "Animal skills" and "People skills" (both crucial for dealing with pets and their owners).

Typical components of the functional resume (in roughly this order) are:

• Name and contact information

• Objective statement (optional)

• Relevant experience (divided by the skills you want to emphasize)

• Work history (very brief: just the name of the place, your title, and the dates)

• Education/awards received

This very flexible format is good if you're changing careers, entering the workforce, or have gaps in your work history.

Other. If applicable, tailor the format to your profession. If you're a web designer, format your resume as a web page with links to your other work, then write or email prospective employers a letter with the URL. If you're an animator, artist, writer, or performer, send a disk, portfolio, or tape of your best work with your resume and a brief yet winning cover note.

Draft the resume

Now it's time to write. With the thought you've put into what you have and what you want, the process shouldn't be quite so overwhelming.

Make an outline. For each job you want to include, list your job title, the name and location of the company, and the dates you worked. If you're writing a chronological resume, you'll flesh each of these entries out with details about your triumphs on that job. If you're using a functional format, keep the job history basic.

For a functional resume, identify two or more areas of skills and experience you want to highlight, and make them into headings: for instance, "Personnel Experience," "Operations Experience," or "Computer Networking Skills." You'll group your relevant achievements in these categories.

Name accomplishments, not duties. Describe what you did using active, varied verbs: not "Went to trade shows" or (worse) "Was sent to trade shows," but "Represented company at trade shows."

Include details that make it sound like you get things done. Rather than saying "Was in charge of scheduling travel for sales department," say "Coordinated all travel for a field sales force of 23. Built vendor relationships, reducing departmental travel costs 28% over one year with no reduction in quality of service."

Be concise. Unless you're an astrophysicist applying to head NASA, your resume should be no longer than a page. If you make prospective employers slog through irrelevant details or inflated language, you'll lose them. Keep your sentences short, clear, and few in number, and cut every unnecessary word you can find. It may take several rounds of editing to get to one page, but what's left will be gold.

Tell the truth. This seems obvious, but resist any urge to distort or expand upon your qualifications. Besides being unethical, it can be grounds for termination if you get the job. Further, a positive, intelligent presentation of your real abilities inevitably yields a better resume--one you can discuss with pride and knowledge in an interview.

Format and finalize the resume

There are two good reasons to make your resume perfectly neat and error-free: Visual clutter annoys the reader (very bad), and mistakes make you look careless (even worse).

Keep it simple. A clean, well-organized page helps the reader absorb what's on it; subconsciously, he or she will think you are likewise clean and well organized. Flashy, chaotic formatting can lead your reader to think of you as loud, disorganized, and self-centered. So unless you're a graphic designer, try to follow these guidelines:

• Choose one or two readable fonts, like Times or Arial.

• Make the type big enough to read (10 to 12 points in running text is a good range).

• Center your name and address, but make other lines flush left, and don't justify them (meaning the right side stays "ragged" and not flush to the margin). Keep the margins at least 3/4 inch (2 centimeters) on all sides, and keep some line space between sections on the page. White space is restful to the eye.

• Use effects like bold, italic, and all caps sparingly, and only to highlight what's really important: your name, section headers, and so forth.

• Don't insert unnecessary graphics.

• Print or copy the resume onto heavy white or cream-colored bond paper (20- to 60-pound), and mail it in a matching envelope.

Be consistent. Make sure your choices for indents, spacing, font size, special characters (like bullets), and bold/italic are consistent. You can vary the look for different levels of text (headings, running text, bullet points), but pieces of the same kind should look the same and have the same punctuation.

Proofread. Now's the time to be a perfectionist. An error in your phone number means you won't get the call. One typo can land your resume in Dream Company's recycling bin. After using your computer's spelling and grammar checkers, print out the finished document. Let it sit overnight, then read it carefully for errors in words, numbers, spacing, and formatting. Fix them, then give it to at least two friends who are good spellers. Spell checking is not enough!

When you're done, your resume should look substantive, interesting, discerning, smart, and direct. Kind of like you.

Customize the resume (optional)

Are you a marketer who could also do sales but would really like to get into design? Are you entering the workforce with several ideas of what you'd like to do and where? If you want to look for more than one kind of job, you can adapt your resume to fit each objective.

What to change? Sometimes changing the wording of your job objective will do the trick. More often, it involves changing what you emphasize throughout the resume. In some cases, you may need to switch formats. For instance, if you're a Ph.D. candidate in anthropology who wants to be either an anthropology professor or a movie producer, you'll need a c.v. for your academic prospects and a functional resume for your film aspirations.

Note: If you've changed anything on your resume, proofread it again before you send it out. If you save a version in a text-only format to send via email, proof it, too. Strange characters tend to creep into files saved in a new format.

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