Resume Assistance is only one of the many ways in which Career Services can be helpful to you. Here are some other things you may be interested in:
q Full-Time Jobs & Internship posting on our website
q Internship Preparation Workshop
q Books and Videos related to exploration, career planning, job searching, graduate school, interviewing, Salary negotiation, & More
q Job Choices Magazines
q Resume feedback and advice
q Mock Interview Days
q Fall & Spring Semester Etiquette Dinners
q Getting into Graduate School Workshop
q Personality/career assessments to increase self-awareness and help narrow options
q Career Tip of the Week email
q Job/Internship Fair in February at Marquette
q Career Expo in September At Kohl Center
q One Credit Job Search Strategies Course (Ic405)
q ECLIP (internship at the state capitol)
q Last Minute Job Search Intensive Workshop
q Individual counseling sessions
The Career Services Office, located in the Student Resource Center (DeRicci 206) is open Monday through Friday from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m during the academic year and Monday through Thursday 7:30a.m. to 4:30p.m. and Friday 7:30a.m. to 12:30p.m. during the summer. Students are welcome to call the office (663-2281) to make an appointment to see a Career Counselor during these times. Evening appointments are available by request.
Writing a resume is just one step in the process of finding a job, internship or getting into graduate school. The Career Services staff can help you through individual appointments, workshops, videotaped mock interviews and instructional literature.
A resume is an advertisement of who you are in terms of your competencies, accomplishments, and future capabilities. Employers want to know your capabilities in order to predict future performance in their organization. Consider your resume a “Coming Attraction”. Employers spend, on average, 15-30 seconds reviewing your resume the first time they see it.
Keep your resume short. One to two pages are acceptable. Try to keep your resume to one page, if possible. If you have enough information to fill more than half of a second page however, don’t try to cram it all into one page.
First impressions are critical. At first glance the resume should appear professional and easy to scan. The layout of the resume should flow logically.
All resumes should include contact information, education, and experience.
Resumes should not include personal information such as marital status, age, birth date, health, children, religion, national origin, sexual preference, or race. A photograph should not be included with your resume.
Know your skills and for what purpose you are preparing your resume.
Know your audience. The focus of a resume should be a specific position for a specific employer and/or field. Think about what you have to offer an employer and make it the main focus or find an effective way to draw attention to it.
Remember: you have the final say on what your resume looks like. Most “rules” can be broken if you have a good reason.
You should maintain a one-inch margin all the way around the page.
Make sure that you have your name and a page number at the top or bottom of every page (except page one) including the reference page. This is important because the pages of your resume could get separated from each other.
The information closest to the top and left of the page stands out the most, so make sure you put the most important information there. It may require you to create appropriate headings such as “Relevant Experience” in order to get the most significant experience closest to the top of the resume.
Your headings should be appropriate and they should stand out on your resume. The headings help employers find the information they are looking for quickly. Leave enough white space on your resume to keep it from looking crowded; however, too much white space in one area can draw the reader’s eye away from important information. To prevent this problem, try to keep the information on your resume balanced on the page.
You should always resume paper. Typically, the corporate world prefers white, ivory, or light gray. Textured variations of these colors like parchment, marbled, and speckled are also acceptable. If you are in a less conservative field, you can be a little more daring and creative with your use of color, but keep your paper color light so that it can be photocopied easily. Paper should be 8 ½ x 11 in size.
The font you choose should look professional and be easy to read even when faxed or copied. Avoid fancy script styles since they are difficult to read and can be distracting. Commonly used fonts are Times Roman, Palatino, Garamond, and Helvetica. Try to stick to only one font style on your resume. Use all caps, bolding, small caps, italics and different sized fonts to draw attention, but use them sparingly and consistently.
Resume text should be written between 10 and 12 point font. Smaller fonts are too difficult to read. Larger fonts look loud and bulky. You may use fonts one or two sizes larger than your text for headings and several sizes larger for your name.
Resumes should always be printed single sided.
You should not staple multiple pages of a resume together. You should never mail your resume without a cover letter.
Emailing
If you are going to submit your resume via email, you should send it as an attachment in Microsoft Word. Use the body of the email as your cover letter.
A chronological resume lists your experiences under each heading in chronological order beginning with your most current experience. Especially in a chronological resume you may want to use special categories of experience (e.g. Relevant Experience) to assure that your most relevant experience is near the top.
A functional resume emphasizes your qualifications, skills, and accomplishments while downplaying your actual position and employer. The functional format is useful for someone with little actual work experience or experience related to their field of interest. The focus of the functional resume is on transferable skills.
Your name should be in bold type and preferably larger than the rest of the type on the page. Give your formal first and last name. You may include your middle name or initial if you like. If you are commonly known by your middle name, it is appropriate to write the initial of your first name followed by your middle and last name (e.g. J. Roger Smith).
Address
List your complete address. Include and label both your current and permanent addresses, if applicable. This will make it easier for employers to contact you during breaks and after graduation. Avoid abbreviations; although, you may use United States Postal Service standard abbreviations for states (e.g. IA, IL, WI, CO, MN).
Telephone Numbers
Always list your telephone number and be sure to include the area code. Most companies prefer the convenience of contacting applicants by phone. If you have an answering machine, make sure you have an appropriate message for greeting employers.
E-mail Addresses
Include your e-mail address in the heading if you are able to check it on a daily basis during your job search.
URL Addresses
Include a URL address on your resume if you have a well-maintained professional resume site. This can be particularly important for those seeking careers in web design or related fields.
The objective consists of one to two sentences highlighting the type of position for which you are searching. Objectives can also be labeled Job Target, Job Objective, Career Objective and Position Desired. The objective is an optional part of your resume. An objective is especially useful to have on a resume that you may be handing out without a cover letter such as at a career fair. However, a mailed resume should never be sent without a cover letter and does not need an objective. The objective should be clearly stated in the cover letter.
Degree
It is most appropriate to spell out the name of your degree; however, you may abbreviate common degrees such as B. A. (Bachelor of Arts) and B. S. (Bachelor of Science). If you are receiving a less common degree, such as a Master of Arts in Education (MA.E) you must spell it out.
Date
Seniors should indicate the month and year of their graduation. Underclass students should indicate the anticipated month and year (e.g. Anticipated May 2000). Underclass students may also opt to list themselves as a “Candidate for Bachelor of . . .” in the degree section and then list only the month and year of graduation.
Major/Minor
Majors and minors should be listed after your degree (Bachelor of Arts, Psychology). Minors should be listed below your major.
Grade Point Average (G.P.A.)
Include your GPA if it is at least a 3.0. You may wish to highlight a GPA above 3.5 with bold or italics. You may also want to indicate on what scale your GPA is calculated (e.g. 3.5/4.0). You may list either your Major GPA or your overall GPA, but do not list both.
Honors/Awards
Identify and list all academically related and/or relevant honors or awards. You may also want to include in this section other college honors such as appointments to special committees, sports achievements, and leadership awards.
Course Highlights
List only those courses that significantly add to your resume. Course highlights are especially important if you do not have a lot of experience in your academic field. Otherwise, you should utilize the space for more important information. List the most important courses at the top and to the left, where they will be seen first.
Special Categories
Depending upon your major and types of experience, other special categories may be appropriate to your resume such as senior thesis, foreign language, international travel, study abroad, computer skills, and certifications.
Your experience should be organized so that your most relevant experience is highlighted first. You may highlight experience gained through an internship, work-study position, volunteer work, or part-time employment. Experience under each heading should be in chronological order.
You do not have to include everything – you’re writing a resume, not an autobiography.
Title
Always use your most impressive title. If you were an intern for a company but your title at the company was Special Project Coordinator, use this title rather than Intern. However, do not make up titles for your resume. Fabricating titles is just like fabricating any other information on your resume – unethical and risky.
Company Information
Company information is normally listed after your title in a resume. However, if the names of the companies or organizations are more impressive than your title, you may want to list the company first.
Include only the name of the company and its city and state. Use the full name of the company rather than acronyms, particularly if it is a local company or organization (e.g. M.A.H.P. – Metro Area Housing Program). Acronyms are acceptable only if the company is nationally known by its acronym (e.g. IBM).
Dates
Dates should be consistently formatted throughout your resume. Do not use abbreviations for months. Appropriate formats for dates include listing beginning and ending year (e.g. 2000-2002), the season and the year (Summer 2000), indicating academic years (Academic Years 2001 - 2004), or just a single month and a year (March 2003). If you are listing a current position, indicate beginning year and then “present” to show that you are currently holding that position (e.g. 2001- present).
Dates are important and should always be included on your resume; however, they are not the most important information. You may want to italicize dates to set them apart from the more important information.
Tasks/Accomplishments
Use concise statements beginning with bullets and action verbs to describe what you did in each of your positions. Unless you are presently in a position, list each statement in past tense. Be as descriptive as possible and put your most significant tasks or accomplishments first. Use numbers and statistics where possible to help quantify your accomplishments (e.g. Managed $60,000 budget). Do not use periods at the end of statements; they are not complete sentences.
Organization
You should list the full name of the organization and be minimally descriptive (e.g. Cor ad Cor, Service and Faith related organization.) Do not use acronyms.
Leadership
Because leadership skills are often important to employers, you may wish to list your leadership positions in bold. If you have not held any leadership positions, you may just list the organization or you may write “member.”
Dates
Be sure to include the dates of your membership and any particular leadership positions you held. You should keep the same format for these dates that you used in the rest of your resume.
Your references should be a separate page of your resume document. .
For each reference, you should include their name, title, institution/organization/company, address, and phone number with area code. You should also include their e-mail address, if they check their e-mail regularly. You should list your best and most applicable references first.
Choosing good professional references is an important part of the resume process. You should choose people who know you well, can compare you to your peers, and who have direct knowledge of your skills and abilities. Good choices are faculty advisors, organization advisors, and former or current supervisors. Someone in your field of interest who has supervised your work is the best choice. Make sure that you ask individuals if they are willing to serve as a reference before you put them on your resume. Make sure you provide them with a copy of your resume when it is completed.
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expressed
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fashioned
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received
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toured
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unearthed
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worked
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A cover letter should accompany every resume that you send out. It should be concisely written and no longer than one page. The purpose of a cover letter is to grab the reader’s attention and to generate interest in you as an applicant. It should point the reader to your resume.
You may create letterhead similar to the heading of your resume that will include your current and permanent address. Otherwise, you should indicate at the very top of your page the address at which you can currently be reached (i.e. If you are home on break, use your permanent address.). Make sure that you include the current date under your address.
First, make sure you include the name of the contact person and an appropriate title (i.e. Mr., Ms., Dr.). If you are unsure of the gender of the contact person, (e.g. Chris, Pat) don’t use a title. Secondly, list the person’s job title under their name. If no name and/or title is given, call the company and ask who will be in charge of hiring for that particular position. Avoid using “To whom it may concern”. Always address your letters to a specific person. Thirdly, list the name of the company, organization or institution and a complete address.
State your purpose for writing the letter in the first paragraph. Use this paragraph to indicate why you are writing and who you are. If you were referred by someone or have a contact, include that person’s name in the first paragraph. Make sure if you are applying for a particular position that you indicate where you found information about the position.
The next one or two paragraphs should be written to create a bridge between what you perceive the employer’s needs to be and your qualifications. If the position announcement includes a job description or list of desired qualifications, make sure you address these in this section of your cover letter.
This section should not simply repeat the information already contained in your resume but be used to compliment and point the reader toward it. This is the space designed to accentuate the details that you could not include in your resume and tailors it to a particular position. Also, don’t be afraid to show your enthusiasm. If this position is your first choice, let them know it. For a cover letter concerning an internship, it is appropriate to include what you hope to gain from the internship and a statement about your goals.
The final paragraph of your cover letter should indicate your intent to contact the employer. Do not leave follow-up contact to the employer. Take action yourself! Make sure that you give all the details necessary to facilitate any future contact.
Your complimentary close should be professionally appropriate. Suggested closings include “sincerely,” “respectfully,” and “cordially.”
After the closing, return four times to create a three-line space for your signature. On the fourth line, type your name just as you will sign the letter.
Sign the letter as neatly as possible. Finally, double space under your name and type the notation “Enclosure.”
It is important to follow-up any personal contact, particularly an interview, with a thank-you letter. Not only is it a common courtesy, but also it places your name in front of the employer one more time. A thank-you letter shows strong follow-through, professionalism, and attention to detail. For a personal touch, you can even hand write your letter. Thank-you letters should be sent within 24 hours of an informational meeting or interview, even those that occur over the phone.
Thank-you letters are formatted very similarly to the cover letter. You may use the same format for the opening and the denouement. The only part of a thank-you letter that will be different is the body.
The first paragraph of a thank-you letter should thank the employer for the informational meeting or interview. If you were interviewing for a specific position, you should mention the title of the position.
The second paragraph should restate your interest in the position. It should also briefly review your qualifications for the position, particularly in the areas which were specifically addressed in the interview or meeting. If you are no longer interested in the position and wish to withdraw your application, you should state this in this paragraph.
The closing paragraph should thank the employer again. You should also let the employer know that they are free to contact you if they need further information. Provide the information necessary for them to contact you.