Your entire future could be changed by your resume. Take great care in preparing it. Remember that a resume is basically a sales message designed to interest prospective employers in your background and job qualifications. Write it in the third person and make it clear, to the point, and easy to understand.
Keep your resume to one or, at most, two pages. Have it typed professionally and printed on & x 11-inch white bond paper. Make sure it contains no spelling, punctuation, grammatical, or typographical errors.
Put your name, address, and business and home telephone numbers at the top. Write the word “Resume” either above or below this information.
There is mixed feeling among personnel professionals about including a job objective on a resume. If you are interested in only one type of job, by all means include it. However, if you are interested in more than one type of job, it may be better to omit it.
Describe your most recent job first and work backward in time. Choose active verbs and emphasize your accomplishments. Mention any awards, performance records, or innovations for which you were responsible.
If you have been in the work force for several years, omit summer jobs unless they indicate exceptional merit. such as an internship with a highly regarded organization. If you have reached a professional or executive level, omit any manual or clerical jobs you may have held in the past. Don’t explain any long absences from the work force on your resume: you can do that in an interview. Never give details about why you left a job.
If your work record is spotty, you may use a functional form for your resume, placing emphasis on your accomplishments rather than on how long you worked. In this case, list your jobs in order of importance rather than chronologically.
After your job listing, give your important educational qualifications: high school, if that is as far as you went, or college and graduate school, including any honors. Unless you are a recent graduate with little experience, keep this section brief.
At the end of the resume, you may add any personal data you wish to make known, such as marital status, number of children, honors, affiliations with professional associations, foreign languages spoken, or skills not reflected in your job record.