First, you must convince the employer to see you. Normally, this is done by sending in a resume to an address listed in a newspaper, or it may be that you have given it to an employment agency to forward for you. However you handle it, the resume must generate interest in you. It must sell you.
Now, as a rule, the shorter the resume the better. Most of my colleagues in the recruiting field follow a basic principle: if the resume is more than one page, put it aside. Bear in mind, of course, that you can include a lot on one page if you know what you are doing.
You should start by recognizing that some things about you are simply unimportant, lake, for example, the fact that you were president of your Home Economics club in high school, or that you were once given a special Boy Scout medal for flying an airplane. Employers are rarely interested in such trivia, no matter how significant it is to you.
Then there is the point that some information can actually hurt you. I had one candidate-client I was advising who insisted on including in his resume that he was a Presbyterian Deacon. This would be fine if the potential employer was a Presbyterian as well, but that possibility is so remote, it can't seriously be considered.
What my client Med to recognize is that some employers are bigoted and might not bring you in for an interview because you are a member of the "wrong" religion. As a rule, then, avoid putting anything in your resume that can be used against you and prejudice your chances of landing the job. The resume should not violate these principles.
It should be obvious that the resume has some very serious flaws. Take, for example, that Mr. Blake used "Ed" in the heading rather than Edward. This is much too informal and could easily lead to the impression that the candidate is frivolous or flippant. Job hunting is a serious business and the resume should reflect that seriousness. Most employers I deal with would automatically reject a resume that begins with a nickname.
In the education section, our hapless composer has made several errors. First, if you have a college degree, there is no reason to include any other schooling unless it demonstrates professional skill or training. If your highest formal education ended with high school, then you should omit the elementary school you attended. Including all but the most significant educational experiences makes the writer look foolish. It's as though he or she is desperate to impress the reader so he or she tries to include everything.
Second, we know he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree and that he majored in English. But all of that doesn't mean much to the prospective employer. It doesn't tell him how English major qualifies him for business life. Most people would probably assume many wrong things, such as, that he studied Shakespeare to the exclusion of business writing, or that all he knows is poetry or theatre. It would be much better to specify course work related to business or management such as report writing, communication, psychology, advertising, etc. As it stands, the resume tells us little about his training.
Finally, in this section the writer has made the mistake of including his college grade-point, or quality-point, average. In this case, the average is quite high, indicating a low "A" or high "B." One might assume that a high average in college would be a plus, but, many executives would be put off by this because it constitutes a threat.
As strange as this may seem, an extremely bright or accomplished person scares most employers at first, because this makes them feel less intelligent or talented. It might be a source of pride for the candidate, but can represent a serious threat to his or her chances of being interviewed. It makes sense to simply omit any reference to grades. You can always bring this up if necessary.
In the experience section, the writer has made additional mistakes. For one thing, it makes him look like he has jumped from job to job. Close inspection indicates, of course, that this isn't the case; Mr. Blake worked at part time jobs while going to school.
Such jobs are rarely stable and are frequently subject to the vagaries of school pressures and economics. But the busy person doing the resume screening might eliminate the candidate for this reason alone. So it is best to include only those serious, full time jobs you have had.
