Page 139 - Complete Idiot's Guide to The Perfect Resume

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Chapter 8 ➤ Step Three: Been There, Done That

Bonus Check
If you’re running short on space, be creative in how you present your work history infor-
mation. Check out the sample resumes in Appendix B, “Portfolio of Sample Resumes,”
and throughout the chapters in this book to find clever techniques that save a line here
and there.

Grass Underfoot
Dianne Woo was concerned that a potential employer would view
her as stagnant because she’d worked at General Electric for so
many years. To avoid creating such a negative image, she sepa-
rated her job titles under the company heading and inserted
achievements for each one, as you can see in her resume. Doing
Job-Hunt Hint
so made it obvious the grass hasn’t been growing under her feet!
When listing your promotions
If you have many years at the same organization, emphasize your
at one place of employment,
promotions by placing bullet-point achievement statements under
organize the dates of your job
each job title. Doing so will give your Work History a sense of
titles so the reader understands
dynamism and diversity, thereby countering the image of being a
at a glance that they are a subset
stuck-in-the-mud that sometimes comes from exceptional
of the overall dates at the com-
longevity at one company.
pany. In Dianne’s resume, her
overall dates are flush left, and
Straight Up her job-title dates are on the
right, making it obvious that her
Barry Rizkallah presented his comprehensive career at Chevron in
job-title dates are detailing her
a concise list in the Work History section of his functional resume.
overall time at the company.
At a glance, the reader could see that Barry was an accomplished
marketing professional—why else would he have been promoted
through such a healthy tenure?

Bonus Check

If your potential employer isn’t likely to recognize a company you list in your Work
History, you may want to give some explanation as to what industry it is in or what prod-
uct it sells. You can do that by writing a short overview statement immediately beside or
under the company name.

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