A resume bitch…
I get handed 5-10 resumes a day. I will throw them out if there are more than 5 spelling mistakes. “If u have a cvr letter in Txt type” it gets thrown out. It shows you’re immature and illiterate.
Employers know it’s a resume, you don’t have to title it RESUME in 38 font. It shows laziness that you just put it there to take up room on the page.
I’m kind of on the fence about multi-coloured paper, I have seen resumes in pastel green and pink papers, they were nicely done and stood out well, but I don’t know if they get taken seriously. When in doubt, just go with stock plain white.
I’m just speaking for the retail, hopsitality and food service,
to me, personally, I don’t care if you have tattoos, piercings. It’s who you are. You can be sleeved in tattoos and have 66 holes in your face alone. If you have a wicked resume, you start Monday.
It is a good idea to have an email address on your resume, it shows a little computer savy and another method of communication. porn_queenxoxo@… and 420allday@… will be thrown in the garbage. Hotmail is free, get your first initial dot last name and birth year@hotmail.com or gmail.com
I know you might not have a lot of experience and that fine, everyone gotta start somewhere, if you are stuck and need to lengthen your resume, include up to three references. volunteer experiences, even if it was gift wrapping for the cancer foundation at Christmas, it’s something. It shows you’re proactive and you have compassion. If you were working somewhere for less than one pay period, don’t include it on your resume.
Most importantly, be honest. If you say you are available all weekend, I will shift you on weekends. I do not want a phone call saying you can’t work Saturdays. If you rely on buses to get you to and from work, mention that. I don’t want you stranded in the middle of the night because you said you could work till close.
And employers, if you’re going to advertise a job, give the applicant the job you advertised. If you advertised that it was day shift, don’t put them on nights. If you say 30-40 hours a week give them 30-40 hours a week. Most people can’t afford to go too long without a decent pay check. Without our staff, we don’t have a job either. Stop treating your staff like slaves. —I’m sorry if i offended anyone, i just had to get that out.
This article appears in Jun 24-30, 2010.
I agree with most of this bitch, but here’s some more: Don’t include references. References are like your ace in the hole, don’t show them till absolutely necessary. Email should be left to Gmail alone; Hotmail doesn’t have the same “professional” feel to it.
If you include your interests on your resume, don’t include video games (unless you’re applying for a programming job). While there are people out there that don’t care, there’s still a large majority of employers that see gamers as an anti-social lot, so if you’re applying for retail or hospitality, you’ll get big marks against you for that.
And don’t use Times New Roman. It’s the height of laziness.
I’m just speaking for the retail, hopsitality and food service, to me, personally, I don’t care if you have tattoos, piercings. It’s who you are. You can be sleeved in tattoos and have 66 holes in your face alone. If you have a wicked resume, you start Monday.
What does a person’s ability to spell/have a sharp email have to do with “who they are”?
At least TNR is readable compared to other fonts.
Resumes are all about appearances, and a resume that lists a email address like this: Spermdumptser420@yahoo.com is usually overlooked for something that might read: MikeFakename1980@gmail.com.
It may not say who they are, but it certainly doesn’t help to have a professional email, especially given the plethora of free email accounts.
My Word has fonts other than TNR as default (both at home and at work). If I had a resume in TNR, that means I was being keen. (And TNR saves room if you have a lot of things to put on a 2-page resume.)
Hmmmmmm, would using 10pt Old English be considered creative? 🙂 j/k
I’m partial to Arial, or Book Antiqua. They’re readable.
I think Papyrus is great. Just not for resume. I also like Helvetica or Arial, but I find that Arial sometimes takes way too much space.
Need experience to get a job. Need a job to get experience.
Fuck, I don’t miss looking for a job and the bullshit that goes along with it. Employers getting your hopes up, taking forever to get back to you, asking for way too many qualifications (You need experience to be a dishwasher? Really?)
No wonder people leave and go out west.
Calibri fan over here!
In all honesty, dgaf, It’s only going to get worse here and in out west. As a nation, we’re over-educated for half the jobs that we’re doing. The guy at McDirty’s that makes my burger has a feckin’ university degree.
Century new gothic.
Calibri is the default at work for me, and Cambria at home. I am writing a PP presentation in Century Gothic though.
dgaf, I think the situation is pretty much the same out west, unless you are going to an oil industry or forestry. You need at least an undergraduate degree for anything nowadays, plus 3-5 years of experience. Don’t get me started on immigrant doctors who have a decade of experience overseas and driving cabs in this country.
yes, spelling nazis are all around, so we all had better watch the fuck out, oooh, i’m so scared.
Serif fonts are best used if you’re going to read a hard copy of something — sans serif, even though popular, are best left to electronic text.
As well, if you’re using a mac, make sure your font is compatible with PC versions of the word processing program you’re using if you’re going to email it. I know a lot of jobs are applied for online these days through email, so it’s helpful to make sure that, if you’re using a mac, your resume shows up on a PC screen the way you intended it to. That also means making sure your file can be opened up. I had a problem with an assignment I sent a prof from my mac once so now I either save my file in a PDF (you can do that from a mac :P) or an rtf file or just a doc file instead of a docx file.
Just my two cents 🙂
and if you really want a neat font, try the andarian flort. can’t find any better in the galaxy, i’ll bet.
Some of the resumes that pass through our office look like something an elementary school student created, with odd logos on them, spelling and grammar errors, and horrible punctuation. Also “hungguy@hotmail.com” isn’t proper for a resume.
also, if the ad asks that you submit your resume to a specific e-mail address please don’t a) look up the address of a senior executive and send it directly to them, b) pop in to introduce yourself and ask to speak to someone about the opportunity, c) call me or another senior in the organization. This is considered disrespectful and disruptive. Not a great first impression.
Why don’t you guys just fuck off and be happy that you aren’t the ones applying for the jobs?
I hear there’s lots of jobs for window replacers in T.O. Up and down Yonge St. Best be “Heading On Down The Road”.
“Why don’t you guys just fuck off and be happy that you aren’t the ones applying for the jobs?”
And your point is what exactly?
Human error is going to be present in anything that human makes, including a resume. so a few spelling and grammar mistakes are totally forgiveable, but at least make an effort.
**Cut and paste form an actual resume that was emailed to me***
‘Whats up?! my name is ______ i want to appaly for the job that was posted on ur website. i have exerence in lot of jobs and i am a kind person.”
The resume goes on to list, in no particular order, three separate Tim Hortons locations and neither of them for more than 3 months. and the persons likes movies and tv shows. but doesn’t list which ones. She/he is an “avid listener of all types of music”
Some red seal chefs I have worked with have some of the worst grammar and spelling I have ever seen. don’t give me the ‘chefs don’t need to write.” excuse. the chef was a little kid in junior high when he/she was supposed to have already learned this.
Tip for those applying to food service jobs: Don’t show up with your resume during peak restaurant hours (lunchtime, sppertime, etc). Your resume will be thrown out because it shows that you know nothing about the industry you’re applying to.
Most restaurants have plenty of downtime in the afternoons when the manager/supervisor would be more than happy to come out and talk to you.
oh Nevermind, Good point.
how many lunch rushes have i been in the middle of and heard, ‘is there a manager here?’ the best time to look for any food service, retail job is tuesday afternoon.
not on a weekend, usually staffed, ususally not a busy day and they are done with the cleanup, and paperwork, from the weekend. monday is usualy dig out day. dig out the mess of the weekend and the managers are busy.
A resume is suppose to have a basic font and lack the creativity.. Employers do not care to see a creative resume they expect to see a resume with qualifications for the job. A font is not going to get you an interview and if it does, I would question the intelligence of the hiring manager and the place of employment. The person writting this rant comes across as an individual given her/ his first taste of authority more then likely at the local Wendy’s. I have gotten many interviews and jobs after realising I had a few grammatical and spelling errors on my resume. A good hiring manager, or HR, is going to look past a few mistakes and base a hiring decision on either the interview or initial meeting with the candidate. The exception: A job as an english teacher or teacher in general… Journalist are amoung the worse spellers in the world.. Thats why they have people who check their work.
I agree with PK: use a serif font. It’s easier to read especially for people who may have an impairment. There is nothing wrong with TNR.
I’ve done a lot of hiring as well – and spelling matters to me. Sure, one typo, maybe not, but more than that… shows a real lack in effort. You want the job but you aren’t even going to check your work? If you don’t want it badly enough to make it correct, then try elsewhere. Straightforward and not too fancy – and not too wordy either! I get cover pages that are crammed with stuff, blah, blah, blah – and in a really fake tone – I just skim it and continue on. 3 or 4 really solid paragraphs with all the highlights – then maybe I’ll take the time to actually look at the resume.
my rules. keep it short and snappy, spell properly, keep your hobbies to yourself…i don’t care if you like to knit unless it is related to the job