Page 180 - Complete Idiot's Guide to The Perfect Resume

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Part 2 ➤ Six Steps to a Perfect Resume

The Last Word

Your destination is within sight; you don’t even need binoculars to see the resume shore
anymore! A few more sections might appear on your resume, such as professional affilia-
tions, community service, computer skills, and personal interests. Let’s talk about them.

Volunteerism That Pays Off

What you do in your unpaid time may say as much about
what kind of person you are than what you do for
employment. If you feel that your volunteerism makes
a statement about your dedication, character, or social
awareness, or in any way enhances your qualifications for
Job-Hunt Hint your next job, a section called Community Service, Civic
Leadership, or Volunteerism is the place to list it.
Dates are optional under the
Volunteerism section. If you list
them, you should present your Professional Schmoozer
volunteer work in reverse
Professional associations to which you currently belong or
chronology (your most recent
have once belonged can be listed either alphabetically or
work first). If you don’t use
in order of relevance to your profession under a section
dates, list your community service
called Professional Affiliations. If you currently hold or
according to impact (the most
have held an office, that should also be noted.
relevant first).
Getting Published
Articles, books, chapters in books, and research papers
that you have authored or coauthored belong in a section
called Publications. Usually, dates accompany this infor-
mation, requiring presentation in reverse chronology (the
most current date first).

Career Casualty
Standing Up for Your Award
Don’t exaggerate your achieve-
In the Awards section, list honors, awards, and grants you
ments when it comes to listing
have received that support your job objective. You can
team awards. If you try to take
arrange this list according to date received (if you give the
entire credit for the award, it
date) or by relevance to your next job (if you don’t pro-
could backfire if it is discovered,
vide the date).
because you’d look like a cheat.
The solution: Be up front in your
listing and state that it was a Flaunting Your Computer Skills
team award. By doing so, you’ll
also get credit for being a team If you have computer skills that are important to your
player. next job, you can highlight them under a special section
called Computer Skills. Your list might include hardware,
software, languages, systems, and networks with which
you have experience.

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