Resume Basics Part 1 - Purpose, Format, Length, and Appearance

Resume Basics Part 1

Purpose, Format, Length, And Appearance

[00:00:00] Welcome to another edition of The Successful Encore Career being brought you by Central Ohio Area Agency on Aging, Nationwide Insurance, Innosource and our special episode sponsor The Resume Coach. I'm Brett Johnson, a longtime volunteer with Employment For Seniors. And with me as always is Executive Director Carol Ventresca.



[00:00:20] We're talking about resumes, resumes, resumes. They are the hardest thing for us to deal with in our job search. So we wanted to do something special for our listeners. We've created a series of podcasts. We're going to talk about why resumes are important in your job search. What should be included and not included on a resume? And talk about accomplishments statements which are so important in creating your resume. We have a special guest today Sharon Hamersley. Sharon is the principal coach for The Resume Coach where you help job seekers conduct 21st-century job searches. So Sharon, welcome.

[00:01:01] Thanks, Carol. Thanks, Brett. I'm so pleased to be on this program today and I certainly hope that the tips that I give our listeners are helpful to them in their job search.

[00:01:11] This is going to be a great program and I know you're going to give our listeners a lot of information. Let me also mention that Sharon has been a longtime supporter and volunteer for employment for seniors as well as the Career Transition Institute here in central Ohio. She also facilitates all of the employment for seniors career search workshop. So here's somebody we've got with us today who knows what she's talking about in terms of resumes. So today's podcast is going to include the purpose of a resume formatting resumes and the importance of the appearance of a resume and lots of important tips. So let's go ahead and get started, Sharon. As I said, resumes are the hardest thing for us to deal with. And I had a question today that I thought was very thought-provoking for me in terms of it's you know I sort of easily like to start talking about resumes and on and on and on. But the question is "Why do I have to do a resume?" if every employer asks me to do an online application. So why am I bothering?

[00:02:20] Well that's actually a great question Carol because yeah you're right. Employers do ask you to fill out an application. But guess what that application looks exactly like everybody else's application. So the purpose of a resume actually is to help you be you in the job search. So it's actually your primary marketing tool.

[00:02:52] And I like to think of it as what I call a help offered. And employers put out a help wanted.

[00:03:01] And what most people do is they throw a resume at a thoughtful applicant will take a good look at that help wanted ad and what they will do with their resume is they will craft a help offered and that is they will try to speak as best they can directly to the need that that employer has and how they are really the best candidate to fill that need for them. What are your unique qualifiers? What are your what is your value to that employer?

[00:03:44] So if you think of it as making putting you in unique or unique in you that's really the purpose of the resume.

[00:03:57] That's the one thing I think that particularly for our mature job seekers when we talk about resumes because they so often just have a list of tasks and if we talk to them about it being a marketing tool and sort of sound bites about them that's they start it start. You could kind of see the light bulb go off. They're starting to see how they can make this about them as opposed to just a general information.

[00:04:27] That's correct. And actually we're going to have a whole podcast that's going to be accomplishments and that is the meat of how you present these qualifications and how you create a unique picture of who you are and what you offer.

[00:04:43] Great. Good. OK. I think formats of resumes are difficult in the least and they've changed a lot as well too and I think it all can depend on what job you're applying for and such too. But it does break down to two or three types of formats.

[00:05:00] That is correct. The two formats that we talk about are the functional format. And what I'm going to call the combination format and I'll explain that in a minute. The functional resume is great for anybody who is seeking to go in a different direction and that's probably a lot of people in our audience they've done something for 15 20 maybe even more years but they're looking to move into a new field not necessarily what they've been doing but there are a lot of similarities in the skills and experiences that they bring to their intended new field. So a functional resume presents key skills and qualifications that have been gained throughout your work history. So let's say that you're looking to move to nonprofit function but you've been in sales. Now people might say well I don't see a connection there. There's a lot of connection there in that sales involves engaging people convincing them to support you. All kinds of different things and in a functional resume you break all of those skills out and present them from your past experience and show how that is going to make an impact for that new employer. And actually, Carol that brings up a point don't we have a podcast on transferable skills right?

[00:06:38] Absolutely. I was just thinking that too and this also goes to the question of a resume needs some thought put into it and functional resumes really need thought put into it. You can't just throw it together you have to have some direction maybe some help. It's hard to do it by yourself and you have to have a really good command of your skills and the functional areas that you can claim to be in your bailiwick so that you can put together a good functional resume. Yes, that's true and definitely, we do have a great podcast on transferable skills. Excellent.

[00:07:19] So then the second format and this is one that you are more commonly see out there is something that I call the combination resume and that actually has many elements of what we call used to call the chronological resume. That's the one that started with objective experience and it looked very similar. What when you look at this resume format really focuses in on what you offer the employer. It is actually really is a marketing document. So in in in this format, you start with a short summary and what you really need to include in that summary is look at what the employers asking for and make sure you include those keywords. Okay. A keyword is simply something that you see repeatedly in employer ads for the type of physician that you're looking for. So make sure that when you create your what I call basic resume that you include those keywords you can always tweak when you're actually submitting your application. So you always want to start out with a summary and you want to include those keywords. Then you do want to present your work history and then education volunteer activities those types of things but it always starts with a summary and then the second key piece is your employment history.

[00:08:52] Sharon if somebody asks you Well which type should I have a functional or a combination? There are times when my feeling is that I'm a job seeker meaning both.

[00:09:04] I think that's true for a functional resume. What I tell people that I work with is that that resume needs to always go to a living breathing human being and the company that you want to work for because it doesn't really work very well in the standard web application format. But yeah I think that there are distinct advantages to having both. And the more you work on this the better you'll know yourself and the more confident you'll be on the road when you get to that interview stage.

[00:09:35] That's really true and I think that's one of the messages that we want to have in all of our different podcasts for this development of resumes is doing these steps putting a little bit of effort into the resume is not only going to make you a better job seeker it's going to make you a much better interviewee. You're going to really be able to talk to an employer about what you can do. Could you be a good firm understanding by having developed a good resume but let me also just step back one more second regarding both formats. Is it safe to say that if you're doing a resume you have to have at least the combination and the functional is a potential second? That would be the most obvious path to take. I think it's great. Yes. OK. Well, the next big question I always hear from clients even before they put the first word on paper is well how long does it have to be.

[00:10:29] And that is a really good and somewhat tricky question because the answer is it did defend this solo you get so many resumes will be two pages long you may have heard the statement out there or your resume could never be more than one page long. Well, you could try to cram all of your information on one page but that's probably not a good strategy. So a two-page resume is for a job seeker who is currently looking for a position that's at or above what they're currently working at or their most recent position. And this is especially true if you have. I would say any more than 10 years of experience because sure straight out of college you might have that one page resume but for most job seekers to try to cram enough information into a single page either means that you're going to miss a lot of stuff or the font is going to be so small that nobody can read it right. So that it can.

[00:11:40] Can I ask too? Is it still common thought that when an employer is reading a resume, number one, they don't go through the whole thing first? They're going to give you seven seconds. So if everything on this, on the resume, the most important part is the first third of the first-page summary section. Also even in the second round of reading it, they may not get to the second page. So what regardless of one page or two. The most important stuff is still that first page.

[00:12:12] The most important stuff is always page 1. And in fact that top of the fold as we call it the top third of the page right that that absolutely has to pretty much hit an employer between the eyes or they're not going to move on. So yeah the one page resume your new college grads. But also if you are really at a stage in your life where you want to take a pretty big step back and you don't want the level of responsibility that you've had and basically you're just looking for work that's fulfilling but it doesn't take up your entire day. You can carefully pare your resume back to one page and just present key elements of your experience that again relate to the type of work that you want to do which may just be maybe you've been a pretty high-level sales manager. Now you'd just like to spend 15 20 hours a week answering customer call or something like that. There's a lot of experience there. But the employer doesn't want to see somebody that they would think would be overqualified. So you need to just present the most key elements of that experience and then you know you could explain to the employer in your cover letter which we actually are going to talk about at the moment but you can explain to them that it is you've made the decision to step back and therefore you're looking for a position at this level of responsibility.

[00:13:48] And you know that a lot of clients will say things like "Oh, I'm not going to dumb down my resume." Going to a one-page resume isn't dumbing it down. It's just that you are focusing on the job. Yeah and if the job is a much lower position than what you have had before that's okay if that's what you're looking for that will fulfill you in your next employment opportunity. So what you're trying to do is more focus in on just the absolute information that that employer needs not the breadth and scope of your previous positions.

[00:14:24] That's correct. I wouldn't call it dumbing down. I would actually call it "distilling down."

[00:14:29] There you go. That's good. That's good. Thank you. So how important is the appearance of the resume you're creating?

[00:14:36] I would say that if a person is actually presenting a resume and it's an important interview it's your number one make or break factor.

[00:14:51] If your resume does not look neat if it has typos or any number of things you know it's just that's a turnoff. You know you're not going to get very far with that. So I tried to just make a couple of suggestions about appearance your typeface. It has to be large enough to read. So it's it's it's just. But it can't be fancy. I've occasionally come across resumes where people have the whole resume is written in script and going this is hard to read or all caps are all caps you can't tell what starts and stops.

[00:15:33] Yeah right. Or you know lots of boldy and underlining and this and that. No, it has to be you want you. You do need to maybe build some stuff. You might occasionally need to use some underlining some metallics. But all of that has to be very good gestures.

[00:15:52] So. So then the second part of this and this kind of goes back into well how long should my resume be that whole white space issue. It's kind of like Goldilocks we know when it's too hot or too cold too. You know if everything's crammed in. Yeah. It's it's not legible.

[00:16:14] If you have a lot of white space suddenly it looks a little skinny there like maybe you're not really qualified for that position. Right. So you need to get that balance. What I usually recommend is something along the lines of standard margin's which is I think one inch and you may have to play with those a little bit to get everything to fit right on the page.

[00:16:39] But generally speaking standard margins whatever Word or Google Docs set up as a standard distance between lines is good. Don't try to cram stuff in but don't also space it out a lot. Now here's another thing that I get a lot of questions about. Should I use graphics or do I need borders? And my question my answer to the person who's asking about graphics is are you a graphic designer.

[00:17:10] Because if you're a graphic designer you better use graphics for everybody else. Graphics are really not necessary or recommended because actually when you put in that graphic that's great real estate that could be conveying some other information that you need. The same is true with borders. Borders look really nice they take up real estate.

[00:17:36] So right now sometimes people also ask me a little bit about color on resumes and I see a little bit of color might be OK. You know just to highlight a section may be at the top or something like that. But again you know nothing that's going to distract from the actual content of your resume.

[00:17:59] What you're trying to present, and going back to the notion of being a graphic artist if you're not a graphic artist and you can't do color well it's better to not do any. Exactly. That's right.

[00:18:12] And then speaking of color you're going to need some paper for hard copies eventually. And what you clearly don't want to do is paint purple bright green or yellow. Any of those things that I think that's a myth that has existed out there for a long time. Because when you send in a paper copy of your resume and the good old days. Somebody got the bright idea that if yours was hot pink maybe it would stand out in that stack. Exactly. That really doesn't work. So what you really need to do is you know you need to go to your local office supplies store and you need to find the little rack of resume paper and it will be white or off-white or cream or one of those colors and it will have a heavier texture than what we would normally do but just plain white paper is absolutely fine. Yes. So I would say you're going to need to take hard copies to interviews. And I also sometimes get the question especially for job fairs and that type of thing. Well OK so I have a two-page resume should be front back or staple my preferences actually stapled. But the one thing that you have to be very sure about is that your contact information is on that second exactly so great.

[00:19:41] Sharon these are wonderful tips thank you so much for getting us started on developing resumes.