New Ideas For Your Resume

August 13, 2012

Interview with Beth Brown, co-author of the book The Damn Good Resume Guide, Fifth Edition: A Crash Course in Resume Writing

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Mike Carruthers:
Your resume is most often what determines whether or not an employer calls you in for an interview. And it needs to tell a different story than it used to.

Beth Brown:
It’s really shifted from that see look at me I’m a well-rounded person. And it’s much more I’ve got what you need, we should talk.
 

Beth Brown, co-author of the book The Damn Good Resume Guide, says when you write your resume…

You don’t want to tell anything but the truth and you want to make sure everything on there is something that you can stand behind. And that each statement on there is kind of a doorway to a story that you can expand upon in an interview.

A lot of the things people put on their resume probably shouldn’t be there.

People used to put hobbies and interests and extracurricular activities. People also used to put a long objective seeking a challenging position in which I use my skills and abilities to support the company and blah, blah, blah. You see that less and less.

When you sit down to write or revise your resume Beth has some advice.

So even if most of what you’ve done has been filing but you’ve done a little bit of project management and that’s what you want next then highlight your project management skills and experience and downplay the filing. Think of the resume as more a picture of your future and less of a description of your past.