Making a resume

[David J.]

Hey everyone!

Been busy these days with IRL things, plus gaming isn't very important to me right now but maybe in the future it will come back to me. Anyway, I know a lot of people here make the big bucks, and are out in the real world. I realize that I don't have a good resume and I am currently working on one. I am wondering the best thing to do things? I have it in this order, and comments below:

Education:
I have two degrees I have started, and I may never finish, at least not anytime soon and one I am working on now. How should I list it because I have the name of the school, and how many credits and when attended so far. I didn't list concentration

College Internships:
Should I even have, or just remove, as they have nothing to do with education I am doing now, or intend to finish? Plus they were years ago.

Work experience:
I have it chronological order, but I am going to change it to reverse-chronological order. Should I include my military service in here, or set up its own field?

Military Training:
OK, should I even have this? Or since I have my military job in work experience, just edit the date already listed to reflect for when I left for basic? So far, the field is just basic training and my job training, and I have one or two minor trainings that were one/two day trainings not mentioned - should they be included? Thinking that I should make it one general military field "Military Training and Experience" in reverse-chronological order? I will list discharge when I separate or whatever.

Computer Skills:
I work a lot with MS Office programs, and some military programs - include the military program ones too?

References:
Available upon request.

Just wondering if this is a good start?

[Iron Lizard]

I desperately need to write a resume. I would love to hear about this one.

[drunkex]

weren't you making a resume when I first joined, or am I thinking of someone else?

[David J.]

One good site is ONET (http://www.onetonline.org/) however, for my job in the service, its not very accurate and only lists a very small portion of my job, even smaller at my base.

I made a few changes and have this:

Education
College Internships
Work Experience
Military Training & Experience
Computer Skills
References

I need to review some documentation for EPR's to sum up duties for military and find a way to list rank possibly, and wonder if I should list military computer programs that I work with/utilize.

[sheath]

The last time I was counseled on resume writing was only a few years ago. They said the more information the merrier, but you need to cater your resume to the job description. If you are applying for a variety of job types you need multiple resumes. Less important than your actual experience, education and training is that you use most or all of the terms that are also in the job postings.

I would de-emphasize your higher education, putting it close to the end and prioritizing how many course hours and your GPA (if it is 3.0 or above). Don't worry about listing the individual schools, the job application may or may not ask for that.

I would treat college internships and jobs as the same, the important thing is to show that you have been consistently employed and working and that experience is relevant to the current position in some way. For the military experience I want to say that you should emphasize that above your work experience, but you could probably search google to see what the advice is on that.

Everything I have always been told is that formatting is one of the most important. For a text only resume submitted online I would recommend something like the below. Have a fancier one prepared for formal presentation though.

David J · xxx-xxx-xxxx · davidj@something.net

Objective: Obtain a position that will allow me to use and build on my skills (modify to suit job).

Experience: (examples from one of my old resumes, make sure everything is bulleted and aligned properly)

Job History:
Dirtbag Corporation 1, City State Dates
Job Title
· Relevant experience with key words 1
· More key words
· Etc.

Education: X Credit Hours in general studies with a x GPA

Achievements:

[David J.]

I have everything aligned pretty decently, just missing a few things - like some tasks and duties from my job. I could get some from Onet, but I'd rather get them from my evaluations to accurately reflect, and also the dates for this training that can go under training.

And I may have... I decided to try again because a friend is trying to do one back in NY so yeah why not.

[dennycraine]

What I have been using and recommending the past few years. Good results thus far.
Summary - experience overview. one or two sentences explaining what i do.
Professional Experience - each job, most recent first.
Company Date
Title and brief sentence about the company- ex - Systems and Network Engineer with COMPANY NAME – operator of ONLINE MEDIA whose combined reach attracts over 28 million unique users per month.
Skills - im thinking about removing this... i was never a fan
Education - Sheath has a good way to put it in for your situation
Obligatory references and certifications statements

Maybe put Military service above education with some time reference and rank.... but if that is a major area in your work experience than i might think to leave it out.

best advice though - the most important and relevant information to the job you are applying for should be as close to the top as possible, otherwise it probably will never be seen.

[David J.]

I have time reference with my military service - as I list the assignment I am at which is most recent, then technical training, and lastly, basic training. I have all dates but I need to add an extra training that I don't have the date off hand (certificate is at work)

Just need job responsibilities to add for my military job, I can easily list those now, but I'd rather get them from performance reports and evaluations to be more accurate.

Other than that I am all set, just have to add objective/summary at the top but I'll add that later since I am not looking for a job now - just making a resume now because I am bored and I don't have one yet and no job in mind. And then finish order.

[SpaceFlea]

I haven't written a resume in 5 years, but I'll give you an Idea of what mine included.

Objective:
This is where you tell the job owner exactly what you are looking for in a position. For example (this is what I put) - Pursuing a professional position in the field of computer science focused on application programming and design.

Education:
Starting with the most recent university back to high school. For my graduating university I put my degrees BS computer science and BS mathematics as well as my GPA. For my initial university I just put the degree of study at that time. And for high school I just wrote my honors such as receiving an academic letter and national honors society.

Work Experience:
As with education, you always list this from most recent to least recent. If you are coming out of college with no professional experience then you'd be well off to list all jobs held of significant term - i.e. any job within the last 5 or so years you had that lasted at least six months. If you already have professional experience in the career for which you are applying, then it is best to only present that. When listing your jobs, mention where and for how long and what position you held, and list a few of your responsibilities. For instance I was an instructor at a karate dojo and wrote a few statement such as this, "Project a figure of authority for the students to respect and look up to." With your military training you could certainly add a few lines about instilling authority, honor and respect.

Activities:
This is where I listed extra curricular school activities from high school/college such as non-steady volunteer work. If you help with things like habitat for humanity or any other major volunteer group, that will look very good here.

Skills:
This is where you would list all of your job related skills. I wrote all of the programing languages I had learned through high school and college and my level of experience with each one since I was after an IT job. I also wrote that I had two years of study in German. Any secondary languages look very good, even if they don't apply to the job at hand because they show a dedication and a broader cultural understanding which makes you seem a more rounded individual.

References:
Available upon request. Just as you have it.


EDIT: I forgot to mention that you should make certain your full name is centered at the top of the page and in a larger font size than the rest of the resume, but not too large, just a couple sizes larger will suffice. And use a standard font like Arial or Times.

[profholt82]

The templates laid out above look good, but just make sure you keep it at a decent length. 2 pages is the absolute limit, and if you can make it sound good and format well at 1 page, that is ideal. Use a legible font and 11 or 12 size. You want it to look classy and professional, but a different font isn't a bad idea because you want it to stand out from the others.

[SpaceFlea]

Definitely, and make certain, if you do go onto a second page, that you use at least half of the page. If you are under a quarter of the page then try to shorten some things up and get it down to one, if you are over a quarter, then try to add a few more things to get it up to a half. The absolute worst thing you can do page-wise with a resume is just have a couple lines dribble onto another page. It will look sloppy. And if you do use multiple pages, you should bind them with a paper clip instead of a staple. It is more professional. And, if you are sending hard copies to perspective employers, don't put it in a fancy folder that requires effort to open. Some places will literally just throw it away without even trying to open it because they don't have time to mess with that. It's sad but true.

[David J.]

Alright, I have the following:

Objective
Education and College Internships
Work Experience
Military Experience and Training
Computer Skills (this is with military programs - how can I properly fit it under military experience and training? or what should I call it)
Reference.

I'm not looking for a certain job right now, what should I put in the objective?

[sheath]

Something to the effect of a challenging position that that allows you to grow is the standard statement. Think about whether you are more task oriented or people oriented and cater the statement to what kinds of positions you think you would excel at.

[David J.]

Good thinking. Now I wonder how I can list the programs I have experience with. Hmm.