Measuring the Listing of Experience on a Resume


When writing your own resume

For those who write their own resumes instead of paying a service to have one written for them, the goal is always to create a document that is as complete and professional as it would be if a professional resume writing service had written it; and in so doing self preparers [sic] have been known to embellish areas in an otherwise well-written resume in an effort to impress potential employers, but instead, end up defeating the intended purpose.

One of the embellishing mistakes made most often is that of the individual’s professional experience; so if you are one who prefer to write your own resume, make sure to consider the following questions before you begin writing:

  • What is your career objective?
  • Are you changing careers?
  • Are you looking for professional growth?
  • What experience do you have that will help in meeting your professional goals?

To get started in developing your resume, list all of your previous experience in chronological order, starting with your latest job on a piece of paper, in order of dates of employment, job title, full company name and location of your employment. At this point you can take a look at what you have written down and then consider (calculate?) just how much experience you have acquired based on the dates you’ve written down.

Good “best practices” rule

It has become more commonplace to change jobs more frequently and, as a result, folks are not able to build their careers in one place or with one employer; and as such, it is possible that someone with ten years of professional experience following college has had over three jobs.

Although this lack of continuity in employers does not seem that important to include on a resume, it certainly becomes significant to an individual with over 30 years of experience. It is for this reason that you should set limits on what you include and what you exclude from your well-written resume in the professional experience section.

Ideally, a well-written resume should not exceed two pages; and depending on the type of jobs you have held, as well as your responsibilities in those jobs, two pages don’t seem to account for a lot of space. So a good “best practices” rule to adopt when listing your experiences is not to exceed your most recent five jobs, despite the period over which you held them.

Always keep the length of your resume in mind when you’re deciding on the number of jobs you will list; and if your last five jobs and accompanying responsibilities will exceed one page, then consider paring down the experience to three of your most recent positions.

Avoiding embellishment

You could also consider the time you spent at each organization for which you have worked and– list up to the last ten to fifteen years of experience, if that appears a more suitable fit to the resume document.

In other words, it is not necessary to list every job you’ve ever had in order to showcase your qualifications and years of experience; but if you have a long professional career, just focus on the last three to five jobs and use the profile or summary at the beginning of the resume to highlight the number of years you have spent working, or the number of years you have spent in a certain industry acquiring specific skills.

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When listing your experiences, it is important that you do so in chronological order without skipping any of the jobs you have held; and while you may feel that certain jobs are not particularly complimenting to your current career objective, you should not avoid listing them on your resume.

Work on highlighting the responsibilities that are transferable across various industries in stead of omitting particular jobs or employers which might result in gaps being created in your employment history.

Resume quality over listing quantity

It is important to understand that leaving any unexplained gaps in your work history will raise questions by your potential employer; so don’t create gaps on your resume by listing your experience out of order or skipping jobs you have had.

Finally, make sure that your cover letter accounts for any additional qualifications you would like to bring to the attention of a potential employer that you didn’t include on the resume.

Your well-written resume should be concise, well written, and designed to sell you as the best candidate for any job you pursue. Just remember: It’s quality over quantity that actually counts.

Managing the Job Experience Deficiency Factor


The resume: important, complex

Resumes are thought of – by some people – as a collection of their education, skills and professional experience typed on a sheet of 11 x 8 paper; and many employers accept resumes in the place of job applications for certain available positions that need filling within their organizations.

But because of the importance placed on these documents by employers and others, it is important that you have a well-written resume when searching for a job, because contrary to what some people think, your resume is much more than information typed on a sheet of 11 x 8 paper.

As you probably already know, creating a resume is not an easy task, even if you are a professional with years of experience and multiple skills – specialized and otherwise. However, structuring a resume when you are looking to completely change careers, or when you are fresh out of school, is much more difficult because you do not have any experience – or very little – to highlight and therefore cannot present an adequate employment chronology to a potential employer. However, if you are pursuing a career change, and nothing from your past professional experience qualifies you for the new job you are seeking, you can highlight those qualifications that can be transitioned across multiple industries.

For example, if you managed people, no matter the type of business, you should highlight this skill under your experience. Rather than omitting, or not highlighting, your professional experience – even if it is not directly related to the job you are seeking – you should consider writing a professional profile, or summary at the start of your resume.

Skills and education emphasized

The summary will allow you to address your career change by highlighting your skills, as well as to convey how they relate to your career objective. This is also a situation where it is okay to reference any volunteer or community service work in which you have participated if such reference can be helpful in promoting your qualifications for the job. Keep in mind that many employers place emphasis more on accomplishments and quality of work than on the number of years an applicant may have been in a given position.

about resumes, cover letters and interviews

So if you are fresh out of school, and lack the necessary experience of full time job or professional, don’t let that be the cause of you being discouraged when creating your resume.

Instead you must focus on highlighting any skills you have acquired, as well as inherent and your education; but you should avoid using a professional profile or summary; but rather, list your career objective, and start the resume by listing your education. Make sure also to mention any awards or honors you received while in school.

Following your education, list all the skills that will qualify you for the job you are seeking; and make sure to mention any courses you’ve taken, such as project management or business communication which you can apply at work; and while you should avoid listing any experience, you can certainly title the section “Pre-professional Experience” and divide it into categories applicable to your career objective. In other words, don’t say “I spent a summer working at The Gap.” Use a sub-heading of “Customer Relations” and list any responsibilities where you have provided customer service.

Your winning resume

Tap into any community service, volunteer, or school club positions you have held in order to highlight your abilities and showcase that you are the best candidate for that job; and don’t be afraid of not having the right experience, or not having any professional experience to include in a resume.

Focus on what you can do and what you do have, rather than what you don’t have the experience in doing, and you will have a winning, adequately structured and well-written resume.

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