This is a guest post by Eva Wislow.
First impressions count. Always. And in this case, your resume is giving the first impression about you as an asset. If the first impression isn’t good, that means that your resume is not good enough.
Presenting a professional resume can often be the only chance to get noticed by recruiters or employers. Let me tell you an interesting fact. The average recruiter spends an average of 8 to 10 seconds before skipping to the next application.
If your resume isn’t good enough, your application will get tossed in the “Trash” e-mail folder or if you sent a letter, it will be tossed in a dumpster. Let’s learn a little bit more about the main resume types.
Two Types of Resumes
Chronological
Definition according to Careerminer, this resume format is one of the most popular and most preferred by people. During your chronological resume, you will list your employment history starting with the most recent jobs and continue with older ones.
This method is very often used when formatting a resume. Companies that place more value on the job experience compared to your skills will take into consideration your resume more often.
In order to figure out whether this format is suited for you or not, check out this tips:
- Good for persons who stay in the same field of work
- If your past job titles are suited with the employer’s requirements
- If you have a stable work history over your overall career.
If you fit one or more of these characteristics, then you should probably create a professional chronological resume.
Functional Resume
According to the same target, a functional resume speaks more about your achievements, your skills, and leaves the job titles and work history at the end. By using this format, you can display your much needed skills and professional experiences. On top of that, individuals who choose to use this format can also reduce the importance of some older work history.
Here’s how you figure out if you belong to this category:
- If you are a fresh graduate or you want to make a career change
- If you have huge gaps in your jobs history
- If you are re-joining the marketplace after some longer absence.
- If you are not specialized just in one thing, but more like a bunch of skills.
- If you believe that your skills and achievements will make a good impression and get you hired.
Again, if you belong to this category, a functional resume will work best for you.
Bear in mind that this is only the display. It’s what you show in both kinesthetic sense (because an application needs to look organized), and in the actual message sense.
If you’re having trouble with how you should organize it, what you should include, and what not to include, I’d suggest you to visit Careers Booster, a professional HR service that will assist you with that. Sometimes, hiring professionals can turn out to be a very profitable investment.
If you need some help designing a professional CV, try outsourcing the task using VisualCV. This service helps you take care of the visual aspects of your resume, helps you create online portfolios and personal landing pages.
Either way you’re presenting your resume, you should first see what you can do best in order to improve it. We have prepared few beneficial tips and tricks which you can use when you are building your resume.
How to Improve Your Resume?
In order for a resume to look good and professional, it must contain all the important elements. Here are some of them.
- Career Profile – This is usually a brief summary of your skills. It’s basically your way of saying I’m good at this and that. This is what employers look at first in order to make their first impression, so make it look good.
- Other Relevant Skills – The current marketplace evolves at fast rates. It’s important to note that skills are extremely appreciated by employers.
- Jobs History & Work Experience – This is the list which contains all of your past jobs. If you possibly can, try to include information such as the company’s title, your position’s title, the responsibilities you had, and the dates in which you performed the jobs.
- Education – Include everything you’ve ever studied. All of your certificates must be mentioned, and all of your volunteering projects included. It’s for the best to have a big list of education degrees.
- Personal Contact Information – This is one of the most neglected aspects of most of the employees’ resumes. They often forget to put it down. Your contact information should include your e-mail address, phone number, and mailing address.
Conclusion
Having a professional resume can change a lot for you. You can increase your chances of job approvals by simply putting some time and effort in creating a visually attracting and good content resume.
Use the above mentioned tips and start aiming higher. When you have an awesome resume to show, you know that you did your best while applying for that job. If they reject you, then that’s for your own best.
About the Guest Post Author: Eva Wislow is a career coach from Pittsburgh. She loves helping others achieve their most ambitious career goals. Eva finds her inspiration in traveling and yoga.
Connect with her on Twitter.
