Ask The Young Professional

 Formatting your resume, focusing on the….

Academic Profile

It simply lists select classes that showcase and apply the area you’re applying for. It can be a time sensitive section as well, meaning you might keep it at first but may become irrelevant over the years. Here’s an example of my Academic Profile:

I’m sorry that’s it’s a small picture, but the words aren’t what’s important its the format.

If anyone has any different layouts they want to share or tips please share!

Continuing on going into detail with formatting a resume and it’s different sections.

Education

This section is pretty simple. List your school, major/minors, GPA, and graduation date. Now this is one of those sections that could be retired one day. It might be nice to keep your school and degree but as college becomes years and years behind it probably isn’t necessary to keep your  GPA, graduation date and things of that nature. This is a personal preference. 

When creating this section you also want to think about the layout on the page. It will take up a lot of room and to be honest look kind of ugly if you just make a straight down list like this…

Or straight across like this….

School    Major    Minor    GPA    Graduation

My preferred method and one I’ve commonly seen is…

In the past I wrote a long entry about formatting resumes. I have decided to split up the advice into a quick tip advice. I will go into detail a little bit more and will hopefully be easier to read just based on the length alone. 

So here is the first Quick Tip - Resume advice piece…

Resumes have many different format options. And there is such a thing as a good and a bad resume, just based on format alone. Format goes a long way, ask someone from Human Resources.

Here’s a little advice on one section of your resume.

Objective

This section is where you can write a concise sentence (maybe 2) on what you are looking for and apply to what you are applying for. This means that you might need to make multiple versions if you are applying to vary different positions.

A typical example to format this would be:

To obtain a position in the field of ________ to build upon/to utilize my ______ and ______ skills/interests.

The key here is to direct. You want to be honest and to the point. Think of your Language Arts teacher back in middle school. She always stressed the importance of the first sentence of your introduction paragraph. This Objective sentence is your introductory paragraph’s first sentence. It could decide if the employer wants to continue reading your resume or not. 

I’m leaving Tumblr to bring my blog to Word Press. Word Press has a more professional look I’m going for and it has great formatting tools to help me build my own unique site. It also helps me reach a bigger audience. 

I hope you continue to follow me there!

Read.

As you might be able to tell by now, I love LinkedIn and the articles I find there. I’ve shared many of them with you. I find it helpful to read other people’s experience and suggestions. It gives me new insight and inspiration. It is also helpful to stay up to date with what is happening in your field. I’ve also posted before about signing up for newsletters. A lot of people start their day by reading the daily e-mailed newsletter to get a brief and quick update on happenings.

Find something the suits you! Maybe you like a particular newspaper or magazine, follow an influential business man/woman, you can even start by following companies on twitter! 

Abraham Lincoln

Talk to someone from Human Resources.

You’re probably thinking that obviously you know to do that because you want to get hired… and they’re the ones that do the hiring. But I’m talking about more than getting an interview. I’m talking about talking to someone from HR to gather information to prepare yourself for future interviews.

Think about it… HR  hires the people… shouldn’t they have the best advice on what to wear, how to format your resume, what you should and shouldn’t ask in an interview… They know the answer to every question you could possibly have about interviewing and applying! 

fastcompany:

Ready, Set, Pause

How’s your Tuesday? If it’s like ours, you’re busy- rushing to a meeting, wondering where to start on the big project that you probably should have started yesterday- stressed.

First, breath. Then check out this technique that just might help you make it through to hump day. 

[Image:Flickr user phill.d]

I’ve been updating my resume recently and thought it might be a helpful topic to cover if anyone is looking for improvement tips.

First thing that I found helpful when creating my own resume was understanding that the purpose of a resume is to have an easy flowing representation of yourself so a possible employer can quickly see if you’re worth their time. “Worth their time” sounds brutal but it’s the truth. You don’t know how many resumes are getting sent it and you need to stand out. If someone can look at your resume at a quick glance and decide they want to keep your resume for further investigation, then you’ve done your job right.

Obviously you need to have the credentials to get the job but format goes a long way. This is even if you’re just starting out and you might not have a lot of experience to list.

These are the basic sections I’ve used and have been recommended to me:

• Personal Information
• Objective
• Education
• Academic Profile
• Selected Works
• Management Qualifications
• Job History
• Technical Skills
• Awards and Achievements
• References
• Interests

I’l try and provide a quick description of what each of these sections would contain…

Personal Information

This isn’t really a section as it is a headline. At the top of your resume you should include your name, address, phone number and e-mail. And make sure you choose a professional e-mail address, not one like beachbabe0231. You also want to make sure your name stands out the most… usually meaning bold and a lager size.

Objective

This section is where you can write a concise sentence (maybe 2) on what you are looking for. A typical example to format this would be:

To obtain a position in the field of ________ to build upon/to utilize my ______ and ______ skills/interests.

Education

This is pretty simple. List your school, major/minors, GPA, and graduation date. Now this is one of those sections that could be retired one day. It might be nice to keep your school and degree but as college becomes years and years behind it probably isn’t necessary to keep your  GPA, graduation date and things of that nature. This is a preference. 

Academic Profile

This is also a time sensitive section. It simply lists select classes that showcase apply to your work area.

Selected Works

If you’re in a field where you’d like to showcase your works this is an opportunity to list some projects. For example, I have a demo reel for some of the short films I created, so here I listed these projects here. I included the title of my shorts, my position, the date they were created and a short description.

Management Qualifications and Job History

I have put these two together because I would never suggest using them on the same resume. I would choose one or the other. Management Qualifications is a great chance to combine work and club/organization positions. For example, I combined my top two jobs related to my field and combined those with the leadership positions I had in my clubs and organizations. Job History is exactly what it sounds like, a list of the jobs you’ve had. It is important for both to list company/organization’s name, your position and the amount of time you were there (example: January 2010 - April 2012).

Technical Skills

This is a quick and easy way to list out all the technical skills you have with different programs and equipment relating to the field you’re applying to. You can also list non-technical skills (such as communication  time management, etc.) and certifications here as well. If you do I would reconsider your word choice for the title of this section… maybe Skills and Certifications… its up to you.

Awards and Achievements

Here you can simply list of no more than the top 5 awards and achievements you have been honored with. I say the top 5 because you don’t want over load. At the same time I don’t think 6 is going to make or break you if it’s a strong option. Make sure to list the title and the date on to which you were awarded or held the achievement. 

References

You may want to include a few names, numbers and e-mails of people that you think would speak highly of you. Most of the time employers ask that your references are not the same as your past employer. I’ve included past advisers  bosses from a job I did not list or are no longer with the company. Do make sure you ask permission to put these people on your resume before they get an unexpected phone call. This is not only to be polite and respectful but also so they don’t get caught off guard. You want them to be prepared with something great to say about you, not to have their first words be “Uhhhh….”

Interests

Interests can be a great addition to a resume that might need a little help to fill the page. It can also be a great conversation starter between you and a potential employer. They might see something they have in common with you and remember you for it later.

Hopefully this all makes sense and is useful for you. The overall format is up to your personal style. Graphic designers usually create something jazzy to stand out with their creative design, but most are simple black and white. Key things to think about is how you are going to separate your sections. Also choose your use of bold and italicize carefully. You don’t want your resume to look like a dalmatian with dramatic spots, but rather use it to draw the views eye where you want it. Also, another key piece of advice I was given was to put your strongest and most recent pieces on the top. For example, if you have help multiple positions in a club you might want to list your most important ones first even if the dates aren’t in chromatic order. Or maybe you want to list the multiple position you’ve help at your job starting at the top with your most recent, leading down to where you started. These choices can be important because it can be the difference from getting that second look over, or being put back into the big pile of other resumes.

Put your strongest presentation first, get past that first quick glance. Then they can later take the time to familiarize themselves with the your impressive details.