Really basic resume question

"Just submit a resume" usually means no cover letter.

I use the following layout:

Name
Contact Info

Objective: One-liner about how I'm awesome and looking for an awesome job.

Eductation

Jobs (reverse chronological order) organized as follows:

Company name
Job title
Responsibilities + major accomplishments
(If there's more than one job title at a company, each title will have a subsection with responsibilities and accomplishments)

General skills
For me, this is a listing of technologies and programming languages I've worked with and how many years of experience I have with them, as well as miscellaneous skills such as foreign languages and knowledge of common office software (like, um, Microsoft Office).

The following format works well with ice cream joints:

Centered on top of page:
Name
Address
City, State Zip
Phone
Email
Date of Birth
A Blank Line
An actual line across the page
A Blank Line
Education
Middle School *Graduation Year
Junior High *Graduation Year
High School *GPA
A Blank Line
Awards
Award Name, when received
*details
repeat
repeat
A Blank Line
Extracurricular Activities
*Activity, years participated
repeat
repeat
repeat
repeat
A Blank Line
Work/Volunteering Experience
*Position, when employed
Details
repeat
repeat
repeat
repeat
repeat
A Blank Line
References Available upon request

It should look nice and crisp...good font...nice use of the bold tool...lots of alignment

haha okay i know how typos work and all, but I'm still imagining the HI DERE resume that says

Eductation
Hartvard Unitvertstity

I should not make fun: I once typo/misspelled the name of the journalism school at my college -- a journalism school that famously fails any work with a typo/misspelling in it -- and had a graduate of said school point it out during an interview for a job that included proofreading among its duties.

Tailor it to what your applying for, i.e. emphasize anything and everything that relates to education/teaching. Give unrelated jobs as little space as you can while still accounting for the time spent. I'd include a cover letter and references for that type of thing. You can keep the letter short and sweet since they don't require one.

Yeah I don't bother with any detail on jobs more than 10 years gone. Even though I was in govt work for 7 years for example, it was so long ago and so irrelevant to what I now do I just list the dept I worked for and years there and thats it.

Focus is key. You shd have a general CV but then tweak it to suit each job, play up the relevant skills, play down irrelevant ones. Keep it all to one or 2 pages if at all possible, never more than 2. Dont use fancy silly fonts or coloured paper ever. Avoid gimmicks.

I really hope to god I never have to make one. If I do, then it'll be extremely short as I have only had one job in my life EVAH.

do i still need the section that says i know how to use microsoft office and other basic computer programs or will people just assume that since i graduated from college and am in grad school?

i still need to try and limit this to one page, right?

tbh i don't know that answers to either of those questions. you're in library science right? b/c i've been told that w/ academic jobs it's less important to limit it to one page (and obv. CVs and all that are much longer of course), so if you're applying to an academic library it might be okay? i'm not totally sure tho.

and noting ms office etc. on the resume might be a good thing if the job to which you're applying use a scanner to look for certain keywords. even tho it should be a given that pretty much any job that uses a computer requires a basic knowledge of ms office.

i don't know how common automatic word-scanning really is, tho

The rule round here wrt academic Resumes is you only get to go over a page if you can put in publications and grants sections

I still include the IT skills at the bottom of mine. It only takes a line to say Expert in MS Office, SAS, Autocad, Matlab, Ansys.

I point out a high level of proficiency in /advanced user of whatever packages seem relevant - many people can use them, but if you can point out that you're actually GOOD at them rather than just knowing what they are, so much the better.

Recently I have felt like putting Excel is my bitch on resumes but that probably would go down to well.

i took it out, i'm just applying for a summer internship and all the programs i'm "expert" in are pretty basic ... when i'm applying for "real" jobs i'll have to have a portfolio probably so i'll be able to include everything

Aye, but seriously, you'd be amazed at the amount of people who are not so good at pretty basic programs, so being "expert" at them is something you might want to highlight? Supposed it depends what the internship's in, right enough. mind you, if you can format a resume so that it's legible, you'd be one step ahead of convincing me you could use Office compared to some of the dross I've had to wade through in the past.

Since I don't have much actual work experience in the industry I'm looking to move into, I wanted to add a couple of volunteer positions I have and a blog (relevant to the industry) to my resume. I added a section under my jobs called "Other Relevant Experience and Skills" and just put a bullet point for each item I wanted to add, instead of making a full listing formatted like my previous jobs for each one (which would take up too much space and push me to two pages). Does this seem reasonable?

Makes sense to me.

Obviously it doesn't allow for much detailed description for each item but I haven't been doing any of the things I added for very long so I don't think they really deserve a lot of resume space at this point.

I should not make fun: I once typo/misspelled the name of the journalism school at my college -- a journalism school that famously fails any work with a typo/misspelling in it -- and had a graduate of said school point it out during an interview for a job that included proofreading among its duties.

― nabisco, Thursday, June 28, 2007 12:29 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark

OUCH (at least u got this timeless anecdote for yr trouble)

Ok, so is that idiotic blurb near the top that supposedly describes yourself in awkward english (e.g. "a energetic go getter who is hardworking...) expected? I deleted the one that was on mine, and frankly, I don't know how much I want to work for someone who expects it, but nevertheless...

I met with a career counselor a month or so ago and she said that a short one is helpful, but she also said to go a step further and just flat out list your selling points/attributes in a bulleted list. She said a lot of companies feed resumes into a program that scans them looking for keywords and a bullet list up top can help you with that.

Dystopia marches onward. https://t.co/HRCkmdZWhT

— Doug Henwood (@DougHenwood) June 24, 2019