Writing Your Resume: Formatting

This is the stage where your resume becomes more like a puzzle than a document. You have to take all of the things you wrote in the first step and put them in the right place.

First, take your lists and begin to bullet each item. This will make it easy for you to read them, sort them, and move them around the document. There will be a lot of cutting and pasting at this stage, so take a moment to say a quick prayer of thanksgivng for having a computer to help with the chore.

Done praying? Good.

Once your items are bulleted, start to organize them according to categories we set up earlier. In case you didn't read that entry (Writing Your Resume: What's In), they are: experience, work history, skills, education, affiliations and distinctions.

Don’t worry about length yet. You’ll edit later. Some things will fit into the categories that we will leave out (Writing You Resume: What's Out), but don’t delete them yet, just put them into categories. You may see things differently later and want to include them elsewhere.

Keeping it easy to read

Now look at your bulleted sentences. How do they read? Are they short and easy to understand or are they long winded with lots of extraneous information? Begin looking for where you might translate your work into buzzwords that are easily recognized as useful traits by prospective employers. Did you work as part of a team? Did you multi-task? Were you responsible for setting and attaining daily goals? By putting in phrases that an employer can quickly appreciate, you increase the chances that they will pull your resume aside for further review.

Next try writing your sentences so that they indicate responsibility and activity. Here are some examples:

Old: I assisted the marketing manager as she developed marketing plans for the company.
New: Developed company marketing plans in a team environment

Old: I was responsible for calling candidates and scheduling interviews.
New: Pre-screened applicants and arranged interview schedules.

Old: Worked cash register and sold clothes.
New: Employed suggestive selling strategies and ensured customer service at register to improve overall daily sales figures.

Old: I answered phones, updated the database, and filed for a law office
New: Ensured initial customer service experience. Maintained database using Access software. Maintained organized environment to allow staff attorneys to focus on client needs.

The kid that learned grammar in elementary school is revolting at the use of incomplete sentences right about now. It's okay. I know these aren’t full sentences. That’s done on purpose. Long flowing sentences are great for novels, but not for resumes. They ad words that aren’t necessary, and take up valuable space on your short document.

Next your cynical inner child begins pointing and laughing at the rest of you. "This is all just rhetorical B.S." it says to your tired and confused brain. Well tell cynical inner child to keep it's infantile opinions to itself because now that you are getting your B.S. or B.A. or whatever degree you have so justly earned, you should know that there is an art to phrasing. What you've just written tell an employer why your experiences have value. You can look at working the register as just a way of sticking money in a till, or you can see it as the last chance to make a sale and provide a lasting positive impression on the customer. If you see it as the former, you probably aren’t the candidate an employer wants anyway. If you see it as the latter, you have promise.