Writing a Resume

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Writing a Resume

• By Jady Klyve
• Employment Advisor
• Student Graduate Employment Services, Mohawk
  College

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Preparing to Write a Resume

• Start with a Self Assessment!
• We all know ourselves, but well enough to talk
  out loud about our skills, our abilities, our
  strengths, and our goals?

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Self Assessment

• You need to think about who you are
• Where youve been
• What youve learned so far
• And, where you want to go

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Self Assessment

• You can probably tell me about your technical
  skills those you are learning in your diploma
  program
• What can you tell me about your personal
  management skills, or your transferable skills?
• These are very important to an employer

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Self Assessment

• Personal or Self Management Skills
• These are the skills that allow you to keep and
  progress within the job. They include those
  skills that develop from self discipline, those
  that define your character

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Self Assessment

• Sample Personal Management Skills / Qualities
• Warm, reliable, honest, optimistic, positive,
  supportive, ethical, empathetic, sincere,
  sensitive, punctual, responsible, enthusiastic,
  accountable, good humoured, polite, trustworthy

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Self Assessment

• Transferable Skills
• These skills are developed in jobs or life
  activities that show how you think, attack
  problems, interact with people how you deal
  with things

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Self Assessment

• Sample Transferable Skills
• Analyzing, evaluating, organizing, verifying,
  communicating, negotiating, persuading,
  presenting, summarizing, translating, delegating,
  motivating, co-ordinating, deciding, initiating,
  supervising, creating, designing

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Self Assessment

• Work / Knowledge Skills
• These are specific skills learned in the
  classroom or through on-the-job training
• Often, if you dont use them, you lose them
  (like high school French!)

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Self Assessment

• Sample Work / Knowledge Skills
• Accounting practices, drafting, CAD, payroll,
  Spanish, WHMIS, field testing, transcribing,
  counseling, proofreading, illustrating, LAN
  management, word processing, repairing, CPR

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Self Assessment

• Make 3 lists of your skills and abilities
• Later, well pair these skills with tasks youve
  been responsible for.

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Your Resume

• The purpose of a resume is to get an interview!
• There are 2 aspects to a resume
• What you actually say about yourself
• how it looks on paper (or disk)

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Types of Resumes

• Three basic types of resumes
• Chronological
• Functional
• Combination (of the above two)

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Types of Resumes

• Chronological Style
• List all your education and then your experience
  beginning with the most recent accomplishment and
  work backward in time.
• When to leave out information? When its more
  than 10 years old, obsolete and/or no longer
  relevant to your goals

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Types of Resumes

• Advantages of a Chronological Resume
• Easiest to put together
• Simple, easy-to-follow format
• Recruiters are comfortable with it
• Highlights linear progress (school to work, one
  job to the next)

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Types of Resumes

• Disadvantages of Chronological Style
• Shows employment gaps, or too many jobs, or jobs
  in an unrelated field
• Hard to emphasize particular skill groups or
  achievements
• Harder to tailor your resume to a particular job

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Types of Resumes

• Functional or field-based Style
• This style omits reference to dates or particular
  employers
• Used when dates/facts would detract from your
  qualifications and/or abilities
• The focus is on your transferable skills and
  abilities
• This is not a very popular style with employers
  in Canada, but is used in the USA

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Types of Resumes

• Combination Style
• Like the name implies, this type combines
  elements of the chronological and the functional
  resumes
• This is very effective for highlighting or
  emphasizing particular aspects of your resume
• Especially effective when changing fields

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Your Resume

• Contents
• There is no one way to write a resume
• What you choose to put in your resume will, and
  should, differ from anyone elses resume

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Your Resume

• Who you are, where you have been, what you have
  learned, and where you want to go from here,
  makes you different from anyone else!
• So why should your resume be the same as anyone
  elses?

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Your Resume

• The contents of a resume can be divided
• into a few general sections
• Header
• Profile
• Education
• Experience
• Skills and Abilities

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Your Header

• Joan Smith
• 123 Chilvers Crescent
• Hamilton, Ontario L8T 4S8
• 905 / 520-2404
• Jsmith01_at_sympatico.ca

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Your Header

• Design a header that projects your personality
• Make sure it is easy to read
• Use this header as if it were letterhead at the
  top of your cover letter, your resume, your
  reference page, and your thank you letter
• NOTE Make sure your email address is a
  professional one! Idiotscreamer_at_hotmail.com is
  not appropriate! Create a new hotmail account
  just for your job search.

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Your Profile

• Personal Profile
• A section by any other name would still describe
  what kind of person you are.
• Its a brief summary of what you will bring to
  the position highlighting your strengths in
  short, powerful statements.
• Think of it this way, if you had 30 seconds to
  convince an employer to give you the job, what
  would you say?

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Sample Profile

• Personal Profile
• A motivated, professional recreationist known for
  creativity and innovation. An effective coach
  with well developed communication skills, solid
  presentation skills and sound judgement. Skilled
  in effective customer service. Possess a
  positive attitude, patience, and a cheerful
  disposition.

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Sample Profile

• Qualification Highlights
• A business professional with cross-functional
  experience in accounting, inventory control and
  office administration. Highly ethical
  negotiator, problem-solver and communicator. Use
  initiative constructively. A team player with
  imagination and motivation.

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Sample Profile

• HIGHLIGHTS
• Dedicated and Professional
• Outgoing, Motivated, Innovative
• Effective Communicator and Problem Solver
• Skilled, Knowledgeable and Experienced

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Personal Profile

• You can include statements about your work ethic,
  motivation, drive, innovation, etc.
• Should tell the reader about the package they
  will get if they hire you!

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Your Resume

• The order you choose for the rest of your
  information depends on the job you are applying
  for.
• If your experience is more relevant than your
  education for a particular job, put your
  experience first.
• Get your strongest points on page 1.

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Sample Educational Activity

• EDUCATION
• Enterprise Business Diploma, Honours, 2002
• Mohawk College of Applied Arts and Technology
• Special Areas of interest Web Design, Marketing
• Standard First Aid Certificate, Current
• St. Johns Ambulance

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Your Education Section

• Begin with your most recent educational endeavour
  and work backward
• Once you have completed post-secondary schooling,
  omit your high school information
• In stating educational achievements, dont use
  the start date only the completion or
  graduation date

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Your Education Section

• Include all of your education, courses and formal
  training (unless they are really outdated and you
  have forgotten what you learned) or they would
  detract from a positive presentation
• Including marks or the names of courses or areas
  of interest is optional, but shouldnt be used
  unless you are a recent graduate

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Recording your Experience

• Consider word choice carefully. In a resume you
  need to sound positive and confident, neither too
  aggressive, but not too modest.
• Whatever your final word choices are, they should
  accurately describe you your skills, talents
  and experience

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Recording your Experience

• Examples of descriptive phrases to use to
  indicate your level of ability
• able to talented in gifted at expert with
  adroit management of adept with proficient in
  skillful with efficient in competent
  with/at capable of practiced in experienced
  with knowledgeable of

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Recording your Experience

• Be honest about stating your level of knowledge
  or skill in different areas
• No one is excellent at everything!
• Remember, Communication is a huge area and
  includes things like listening, negotiating,
  instructing, presenting, supporting, writing
  reports or letters, coaching, and so on. Break
  your statements down into smaller pieces

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Your Employment Experience

• EXPERIENCE
• Designer, Part Time (1997 present)
• Standard Printing Inc., Burlington, Ontario
• Developed strong conceptual skills working from
  identified customer goals
• Demonstrated creativity and innovation in
  designing brochures, flyers and posters
• Capable of operating Dynamic Free Press and
  standard copiers effectively
• Practiced ability to work well in a team
  environment

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Your Resume

• The employer reading your resume wants to know
  what your skills and abilities are
• Instead of simply listing tasks, list the skills
  you used to do that task successfully, and then
  add the task as an example
• Pairing the skill together with an example of how
  you developed it or successfully demonstrated it,
  creates a picture of you in action in the mind of
  the reader
• Thats much more powerful than simply listing a
  task and hoping the reader will assume your skill
  and success

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Recording your Experience

• EMPLOYMENT EXPERIENCE
• Meritor Automotive Incorporated, Burlington, ON
• Assembly Line Worker (Summer 2001)
• Developed patience and an ability to maintain a
  positive attitude while completing repetitious
  tasks
• Demonstrated strong co-ordination and
  concentration skills working with automated
  machinery
• Heightened awareness of safety procedures in the
  workplace

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Recording your Experience

• When using a Combination Style resume, instead of
  listing your skills tasks related to each job,
  create Skill Area headings and list your skills
  and examples under each area
• This highlights your skills separate from the
  place where you acquired them
• Particularly effective if you are changing fields
  or have unusual or unpaid learning environments
  like homemaking, volunteer, or striped collar
  work

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Recording your Experience

• For example, lets say youve had 5 retail sales
  jobs but you are looking for an accounting
  position
• What skills are important in the accounting job
  (accuracy, attention to detail, mathematical and
  analytical ability, attention to task, ability to
  work independently, good written communication
  skills, problem solving
• Do you have those skills? Did you use them in
  the sales jobs? Probably!
• Demonstrated accuracy and attention to detail
  maintaining inventory and just-in-time order
  records
• Developed strong analytical and problem solving
  strategies creating effective and flexible staff
  schedules

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Recording your Experience

• Customer Service
• Developed strong organization and marketing
  skills, planning a volunteer parent appreciation
  program at a local Public School resulting in
  improved parent/ school relations
• Demonstrated positive oral and written
  communication abilities developing Our
  Customers Come First manual for small local
  business
• Strengthened qualitative measurement ability
  constructing effective question-based survey

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Your Resume

• No matter what kind of job youve had, you
  learned something, or developed something, or
  strengthened something
• Include your paid and unpaid work
• If youve been at home with children, think about
  the skills youve developed there

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Personal Activities

• Including personal activities is optional
• Some employers really like to see what your
  interests and hobbies are
• Some employers dont think such things should be
  included in a professional resume
• Since you dont know which employer will read
  your resume, you may as well go with your own
  preference
• If you are comfortable sharing that info, include
  itif you arent, dont!
• It is wise to include any interests you have that
  relate to the job you are applying for

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Your Resume

• The Second Page
• If your resume goes on to two pages, be sure that
  Your Name and Page 2 is at the top of the page
• One page is fine for a recent graduate without a
  lot of related experience
• If you just cant get your resume on 2 pages,
  look at using a different style regroup your
  information
• Use the exact same margins, fonts and formatting
  throughout your resume
• If you used a line in your header, use one on the
  second page too

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Your Resume

• Proof reading! Have at least 2 people review
  your resume and cover letter for typing mistakes,
  spelling or grammatical errors. This is a
  formal, business document and its accuracy
  reflects well on you. Its an example of your
  work.

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Your References

• References should not be included in the body of
  your resume, generally
• Set up 3 or 4 references on a separate page with
  the same full header as the first page of your
  resume
• Format the page to match your resume
• Balance the information on the page to be well
  spaced and attractive

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Your References

• Decide who would be your best references people
  who can speak to your skills and abilities from
  first hand observation
• Ask each person for permission, and get their
  correct contact information, the most convenient
  way to reach them, and the best times to reach
  them
• If you dont have at least 3 work references, you
  can add a character reference -- someone who has
  known you for a few years and can vouch for your
  character or personal management skills
• If they are difficult to contact, perhaps they
  will write a Letter of Reference for you instead

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Your References

• Let your referees know how you are applying for
  jobs
• If you are sending out broadcast letters
  resumes to several companies at one time, your
  referees should be aware of that
• If you are including your references with your
  resume, check that your references are
  comfortable with that
• When you include your references, you are giving
  out their personal contact information

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Sample References Format

• Colleen Aiken, Supervisor
• Preston Home Care Services
• 939 Skyline Drive
• Hamilton, Ontario L9A 8B8
• 905 / 571-2345
• (Best contacted late afternoons)
• Thomas Simpson, Coordinator
• YWCA Summper Program
• 1784 Brant Street
• Burlington, Ontario N8T 4G5
• 905 / 673-3544
• (Best contacted between 800 and 1000 a.m.)

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Final Notes

• Employers are looking for the skills and
  abilities you can bring to their workplace, not
  just a restating of your old job description
• Listing your tasks means you are letting the
  reader assume what your skills might be

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Final Notes

• Please note that a potential employer has no
  legal right to request information about age,
  sex, race, religion, marital status, health,
  physical appearance, or personal habits
• Dont include such information in your resume

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Final Notes

• People will offer many different opinions about
  how you should construct your resume
• Where you are coming from and where you want to
  go, make your background and how you present
  yourself unique
• Use your own judgement and be open minded about
  constructive criticism
• Remember you want to highlight details that
  demonstrate your capabilities

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Writing a Resume

• By Jady Klyve
• Employment Advisor
• Student Graduate Employment Services, Mohawk
  College