It’s résumé I présumé
It turns out the punctuation of the term résumé is by no means settled law. All three popular options: resume, resumé and résumé are in the dictionary, so it doesn’t really matter much. Coming mostly from a PR/journalism background, however, I defer to the Associated Press styles guide on matters such as these and go for résumé. If you read the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, or most newspapers in America, you will find it with all of the original French accent marks.
Also, on this Web site (AP punctuation of Web site btw) , I couldn’t very well ignore accent marks with the sub-title “setting your career rhythm” and a guy waving a baton on the first page.
As for whether you use the French accents on your own résumé, don’t even use the word at all. Just put your name at the top of the document.
For the cover letter you have three options, write around it, use the accents, which I would recommend, or if you can find out what that particular employer does, just do that.
Adding value to yourself
Your resume demonstrates the value that you bring to employers. Regardless of how slick, professional, or intriguing it seems, if the employer is not buying what you are selling, the resume may not be effective. We see value as having four main components:
1. your skills and talents
2. the needs of the employer
3. your ability to apply your skills to the employers needs
4. your ability to communicate all of the above.
You philosophy majors may note that the above is based on Aristotle’s principles of rhetoric, which is deliberate, because your resume is essentially an argument, not necessarily for hiring you, but for getting you in the door. It is, essentially what marketeers call your “value proposition.” Let’s look briefly on on each peg of your argument.
1. Skills and abilities. This is the most basic, component, the one most people think of when they think of the resume, do you have the stuff. If you are keeping score – this maps to Aristotle’s logos component: does the resume make sense?
2. Employer’s needs. Unless you have talked to the employer, all you really have to go on is what is in the job description, so you should be sure minimally that you resume maps to to that. Beyond that, you can research job descriptions in Department of Labor resources such as O*Net or the Occupational Outlook Handbook. These will give you very detailed descriptions of the tasks required for most major occupations, and the skills and abilities necessary to perform them, from creative thinking requirements to finger movements. I see this as analogous to Aristotle’s pathos concept: Is your experience important to the employer?
3. Your ability to deliver. Even when there is match between what you are offering and the employers needs. The resume must still show that you are the right person — that you have the right level of experience, that you will show up on time, that you are actually committed to taking the job, and keeping it. You communicate through a variety of aspects on the resume, everything from accuracy and continuity of your history to your hobbies. This relates to Aristotle’s ethos: Are you credible?
4. Can you communicate all of the above. And finally, if you truly are the right person for the job, how do you make sure that the employer knows that. If you can just get in the door, you probably can sell with your charm, but the resume has got to get you there. The cover letter gives you another opportunity to communicate, but the resume has to back you up. This is the part where style, design, clarity, and all that good stuff come into play. Looking back to Aristotle, early accounts showed that he only had three principles of persuasion, ethos, pathos, and logos, and the latter was sometimes presented as lexis. Other scholars have pointed out the distinction between “what you say,” logos and “how you say it,” lexis, we use the latter distinction here.
ResuMaestro’s completeness principle is that all four of the above components are essential for a winning resume.
ResuMaestro’s strategic principle is that if you are deficient or lacking on any of the above, you compensate through the others. If your work history is spotty, you play up some of the other components of your experience. Earlier we implied that a hot looking resume won’t do you much good if your experience doesn’t match the job. But, to take an extreme example, let’s say that you are confident that you can do the work if only given the chance, all you have is style to go on, and all we can do is hope that a hot resume — maybe supplemented by a good cover letter and some personal contacts — will get you in the door.
One side benefit of looking at your resume as a compendium of the value you bring to the market, is that it becomes a kind of inventory of what you have, and a good guide to helping you decide what to add. So even if you are not right now looking for a job, building your resume is a first step to building your career.
In What Color is your Parachute, Richard Bolles tells career planners to start by writing the obituary they would like to appear upon their death. That is a bit extreme, but certainly writing the resume you want to have in five or ten years could be help you visualize and realize your career track. Of course don’t use that version unless you actually get the jobs or education that you put on there.
What comes first, education or employment?
Whether you list your education or employment first is a strategic more than a stylistic decision. If you have a standard, finish-school- or-training-and-then-get-a-job type career, then your default might be to put the education first, because it makes sense chronologically. But people go in and out of school and jobs so much these days, that model seldom applies.
One client was seeking to enter a search marketing profession with limited experience but a relatively recent business degree from a well-respected university. For her, putting the education first was a no-brainer. If, on the other hand, she had had fresh, relevant job experience but had received a college degree in an unrelated discipline ten years ago, we might have done otherwise, but it is really a very personal, very strategic decision, influenced heavily by the strength of the credential and the job you are seeking.
Objective opinion
Many resumé templates begin with having you state your objective right upfront, but that may not always the best thing to do. If you have a very specific objective and won’t consider anything else, then sure, go for it. Or if you have a very unique combination of skills that you want to leverage, that works too. A resume I did for an electrician who wanted to was seeking managerial postion, for example, stated the the objective:
A responsible position that draws on the operations management, supervision, problem solving, and technical expertise developed from 31 years of experience as a master electrician. Special skills include working with the public, managing workgroups, meeting deadlines, and high attention to detail.
She is now a finalist for a job that meets that objective almost to the letter. As a rule though, I would say save the objective statement for your cover letter. That way you can customize for each job you seek and may not have to revise your resume for every job application.
How Long?
Conventional wisdom has it that a resume should be one page and although brief is good, I think it is dangerous to try it force anything. The resume should be as long as it needs to be to convey your value. There was a story of a ancient innkeeper named Procrustes whose beds were only one size. If a guest was too tall for the bed, he would chop their legs; if they were too short he would stretch them. Don’t do the same to your resume, it seldom works out.
Of course if you are an academic, where resumes are more likely called Curriculum Vitae (someday someone will come up with an English word for resume) then longer is better — which, if you have ever had to buy sheets for a college student, explains is why beds in college dorms tend to be longer.
Standard definition
If you want a good standard definition, Wikipedia covers the bases, spelling out some of the different kinds and purposes of resumes. Here’s the start of the Wikipedia entry:
“A résumé (pronounced /ˈrɛzʊmeɪ/ REZ-oo-may or /rɛzʊˈmeɪ/; French: [ʁezyme]; sometimes spelled resumé or resume) is a marketing tool used by individuals to secure a new job, a promotion, or an increase in salary.[1] A typical résumé contains a summary of relevant job experience and education . The résumé is typically the first item that a potential employer encounters regarding the job seeker and is typically used to screen applicants, often followed by an interview, when seeking employment. The résumé is comparable to a curriculum vitae in many countries, although in Canada and United States it is substantially different….”
But rather than trying to predict at the outset which type is best for you, you might be just as well served by just listing everything you have done, and letting the format evolve from there.
A personal brochure
Bill Safire’s book Good Advice (More than 2000 Quotations to Help you Live Your life) quotes financial columnist Jane Bryant Quinn describing a resume as personal brochure about you. Having spent more than 20 years in advertising and public relations agencies, I can attest both to the accuracy of that description, and to the effort it takes to represent something clearly, concisely and in a way that makes the reader wanting to learn more about you. The nice thing about the resume format is that you don’t have to worry about glitz and glitter as you might in a brochure. The bad thing is that nothing is harder than writing about yourself in a way that helps you sell yourself — and if you don’t happen to be in a job in which communications is an end product, it is even more of a challenge.
ResuMaestro Résumé Service 