Your resume is the most important part of the job application process. A resume is necessary to apply for any “real job” (meaning a job other than telemarketing or flipping burgers, careers in which a resume is really not necessary for). If your resume fails to impress, you won’t get a chance to redeem yourself in the eyes of your prospective employer. Your resume quickly goes into the tall stack of failed applicants (aka the garbage can), giving you no opportunity for an interview, much less to be hired. Viewing sample resumes, and creating sample resumes before the final draft, will help you avoid this unpleasant scenario.
Viewing sample resumes will give you many advantages when the time comes to create your own resume. The sample resumes will give you some idea of the accepted format for a resume. Sample resumes will also give you ideas on what to include in your own resume, and how to phrase it. Sample resumes are probably your most valuable tool when you are trying to make your own resume.
Here is a basic format for sample resumes.
Name: (Should be centered at the top, in larger text than the rest; it is also usually bolded.)
Phone number
Address
Objective: (State desired job position here)
Qualifications: (List things that are most relevant. It works well to list them in bullet points.)
Job Experience: (List most recent job first and work in reverse chronological order. Include job descriptions. List at least three jobs, more if desired, but ONLY if they are relevant — no one cares if you were a paperboy when you were 13 years old.)
Education: (list awards, certifications, degrees, honors, what your degree was in, or what degree you are working towards, institutions attended, dates of graduation, etc.)
- Try to keep your sample resumes and final resume down to one page. Employers don’t like to spend lots of time reading resumes. Include only the most important and relevant information.
- It’s important to organize your resume into categories, like those found in sample resumes, but the category names you choose don’t have to be the same as those listed above. If you prefer, you can change the “Qualifications” category to a “Profile” category. You can condense the “Job Experience” category to just “Experience,” which you may want to do if you have experience that wasn’t part of a job, such as volunteer work.
You may even want to create your own sample resumes before you submit your final resume to a potential employer. You can show the sample resumes to anyone whose judgment you respect, and ask for suggestions and criticism about the sample resumes — what they like about your sample resumes, and what they don’t. Getting feedback on your sample resumes will help you to create a better, more polished finished product. Any writing work is made better by reviewing and improving with input from several perspectives.
Your resume should highlight your strengths, and the format should be constructed so as to set those off to your best advantage. If you view several sample resumes, you can get an idea of what resume structure you prefer, and be better prepared to begin your own resume through the construction of sample resumes, which can then be proofread and criticized by others. We hope that following this process will help you to create a successful resume, and ultimately, a successful career for yourself.
By Riannon Cutler