HOW TO WRITE A RESUME

Your resume is an important document, which a potential interviewer will use to make their first assessment of you. The information and template below will help you produce a resume that is easy to read and packed with facts.

Contact details
Add your contact details at the top of the page. Include name, address, phone number, mobile and email. Make sure your name and contact details are on each page just in case the pages get separated after being printed out in hard copy. Only use professional-sounding email addresses. An email address like drunk-n-drunker@ may give the wrong impression.

Birth date and marital status
You are not obliged to include either your birth date or marital status – it’s up to you.

Lay out
There are many layout styles; our advice is to keep it simple. Pick a font style that is easy to read – not too flowery or ornate. Bold for headings are easy to read. Use dot points if you want, but just the one type. The content of the resume is the most important thing.

Summarising your strengths
You can do this two ways, either list your “Key Strengths” in dot points or include a section under a heading like “Career Profile”.

Key Strengths
Use dot points to highlight your key strengths. The aim of the section is to give the person reading your resume a quick snapshot of what you have to offer. For example:

• High level computer skills including Excel, Word and Powerpoint. • Five years experience in customer service, both face to face and phone based.

Be specific about what you write, for example "Excellent communication skills" is vague, where as “Excellent written and verbal communication skills acquired through 9 yeas in customer service positions” is factual.

Career Overview and Career Objective
Including a career overview, career profile or career summary is an optional piece of information. If you choose to include an overview, it should provide the reader with a quick preview of what’s in your resume (one paragraph).

A career objective is making a statement of what you want; again, this is optional information. If you are going to including an objective, make it meaningful. For example "to utilise my skills in a professional environment for the mutual benefit of myself and employer" versus “whilst currently working in customer service, my goal is to move into general management”.

Employment history
Outline your career history in reverse chronological order, ie. your most recent job first. For each entry, follow the structure of employer, job title, employment start and end dates and your duties/responsibilities.

A lot of people tend to only include on-going or permanent jobs and leave out the short term or casual jobs, for example seasonal harvest work. Showing continuity of employment might be important to the interviewer so try and fill any gaps. For example:

Jan 2006 – May 2007
Various casual labouring/admin/retail based jobs in the XXX area including...

Jan 2006 – May 2007
Various casual labouring/admin/retail based jobs in the XXX area including…, I also under took study for the XXX course/certificate (or completed the XXX course/certificate).

Jan 2006 – May 2007
Overseas travel.

Jan 2006 – May 2007
Maternity/paternity duties.

Description of employer
Giving a short description of your employer might be necessary if their name is unknown or doesn’t necessarily describe their business, for example:

The Heritage Lottery Fund – a UK based charity which funds heritage projects to non-profit organisations.

Responsibilities and My Duties
When you get to the part of listing what you actually did in your previous jobs, you can chose to lead with either “My responsibilities were” or “My duties included…”. Some people make the mistake of believing the more responsibilities listed the better and some people include the bare minimum – it’s your choice, but keep in mind you are trying to express to the reader the full scope of your job.

Achievements
This is an optional piece of information where you can list the things that you did that you think are particularity noteworthy. For example, staff awards or special commendations. It is important to note that meeting a target is not an achievement - it's doing what you are paid to do, however greatly exceeding a target would be an achievement.

Education and Training
This section can cover university, TAFE, industry courses, in-house courses and any other professional training. Start with your highest qualification first and then list in reverse date order (most recent first).

Professional Memberships
Include only those relevant to your career as well as an indication of how active you are in the organisation.

Referees and References
Your resume should include at least two employment referees. A referee is a person who will be contacted by the interviewer, to provide information regarding your previous employment. Referees are generally your former employers/supervisors; however they can also include co-workers. If you are self-employed, your referees could be your clients or suppliers. A personal referee is a person who will vouch for you in a personal, not professional, capacity. If you are a school leaver with no work history, your can list a former teacher/career advisor as a referee.

On your resume list the referee’s name, company, title and phone numbers.

You should confirm with your referees that they are willing to be included on your resume.

A reference is an open letter written by a former employer/supervisor describing your time in their employ. You may choose to add a sentence: "Written references available upon request" if you wish.

Other tips

• Most interviewers prefer resumes submitted electronically, so create your resume in a common program such as MS Word.

• When formatting your resume, ensure there is plenty of white space. Don't place too much information on one page or use graphics and flowery or small fonts that are difficult to read, as they distract from the content.

• Spell check your resume! Remember, it is the first impression the interviewer will have of you. If possible, get someone to proof read your resume to check for any spelling, grammar, layout or typing errors.

• If you are submitting a job application via email, include your resume as an attachment and not embedded (pasted) into the email. Pasting text into an email sometimes distorts the text, making it difficult to read.

• If you are submitting you resume in hard-copy, select quality plain white A4 paper, check the print quality and only print on one side of the paper.

• Unless otherwise stated, you do not need to attach copies of certificates relating to educational and/or professional qualifications (including recent academic transcripts) or any references from previous employers. Instead, you should bring these to your job interview.

Sample Resume:

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RESUME OF JOHN CITIZEN

Name: John Mark Citizen

Address: 1 Gumnut St, Parkes NSW 2870

Tel: 0419 000 000 or 5555 5555 (ah)

DOB: 14 March 1971

KEY STRENGTHS

• Excellent customer service skills gained through five years experience in auto sales
• High level computer skills including Excel, Word and Powerpoint

EMPLOYMENT HISTORY

dd/mm/yy to present Company name Position Duties include: • ???? • ????

dd/mm/yy to dd/mm/yy Company name Position Duties included: • ???? • ????

EDUCATION AND QUALIFICATIONS

2003 Certificate II in Automotive Sales, TAFE 1991 Forklift licence 1989 NSW C Class Driver’s Licence 1988 HSC, Parkes High School

REFEREES

John Bloggs Director, LCK Auto Sales Ph: (02) 4444 4444

Bruce Smith Service Manager, Central West Auto Sales Ph: (02) 3333 3333