Written Representative of Yourself

Dear All,

Recently, I had the luxury of doing filing since none of my colleagues like it. The only way I can describe their attitude about the subject of filing is, put it in a pile and stick it in a folder when it becomes a hazard. It a demeaning activity but when done properly it is a life and space saver. Hence the necessity of a bookkeeper. Yes, I am doing bookkeeping. I didn't even know what I was doing was in fact a part of bookkeeping - I just thought it was common sense filing.

An area to file was resumes. Now, all over the internet are tips and advice of how to write a good resume, let's all ignore how to write an impressive. Let's just stick with  a decent one. As I looked through all the resumes - at least 50 - not a single one was mistake-free. This was the moment I realised why they kept stressing the Don'ts.

Common mistakes were:

1. Do not put 'CV' or 'Resume' at the top, front cover of the page.  A resume has a completely different layout to anything eg letter, story, application form, we know it's a resume. Putting it at the top only suggests that you don't know what you were writing or assuming that we are stupid.
2. If it's bullet points then keep to bullet points all the way and make sure the bullet point and text are all in line. Concise!
3. Don't complicate things and just stick to one font (use bold, underline or font size to separate sections). More than one font type not done properly can be a disaster.
4. Provide relevant information. If you tell me your entire history, first of all I haven't a clue what position you are applying for as I don't have your cover letter plus I wouldn't want to meet you in person - I know everything about you.

You've all seen these at some point. And I know what you are thinking, "I don't make those mistakes". Give it to your friends and see if they spot any. It's hard to spot your own mistake because you have seen your resume so many times that you are immune (?) to it so get an outsider to check for you.

P.S. I saw a resume which had a contents page but called it Index page (I wanted to shred it). Cover page said, "Curriculum Vitae of XXX" then an Index page, 6 pages long size 14. THIS IS NOT A RESUME. IT IS A REPORT OF YOUR EMPLIYMENT HISTORY! Where's your Introduction, Reflective Summary and Conclusion???