Define a resume properly

A resume appears to be a document created by a person to illustrate her or his skills, accomplishments, and background. People can use these papers for various reasons. However, the most common reason stays applying for a job.

It actually summarizes the job seeker’s education and work experience. It’s one of the major documents reviewed by recruiters along with a cover letter.

One shouldn’t confuse it with a curriculum vitae, which is a more detailed and longer document utilized for employment purposes in Great Britain as well as other European countries. Namely, a resume is a shorter paper.

The history of a resume

Well, it wasn’t difficult to define a resume. Now, let’s trace its history. The term comes from French origin. Its original meaning is a summary.

It’s believed that it was Leonardo da Vinci who became the pioneer of using this document for the purpose of finding a job. However, his paper was written as an ordinary letter. He reportedly did it in 1481–1482 in an attempt to reach out to Ludovico Sforza, his potential employer.

For the next 500 years, it served a description of a person, including her/his past employment and abilities. At the beginning of the 20th century, this document was used to list height, weight, religion, and marital status. In the 1950s, these papers finally evolved into what they are today.

A Suitable format

As a rule, this one- or two-page application highlights only those qualifications and experiences the job seeker actually has. Resumes differ in length and style but have one thing in common – they provide accurate contact details of the candidate. According to recent studies, two-page applications give more chances to get hired.

That’s primarily a marketing tool the content of which needs to be tailored to fit each position. The applicant is expected to optimize a paper for every post she/he’s applying for and utilize corresponding keywords.

The simplicity or complexity of various formats of this paper generates a variety of outcomes for the industry and for the occupation. Applications utilized by artists, medical specialists, professors as well as other experts can be relatively longer.

Major application types

Resume types include the following:

  • A reverse chronological document: It’s widely used by professionals. In the main body of this document, the applicant lists her/his experiences from the most recent experiences to the latest ones. The main idea here’s to build solid credibility via extensive experience. You’d better avoid this resume type if you have gaps in your career summary.
  • A functional resume: It lists skills and experiences sorted by job function or skill area. This resume type mainly focuses on skills specific to the type of job sought by the applicant. It put an emphasis on certain professional capabilities and makes use of experience summaries as its key tool of communicating professional competency. It’s good for those with modest experience but a varied work record intending to change their career.

Online applications

Computer technology has totally outclassed old-school paper-based applications and now you can hardly find it. Modern recruiters prefer dealing with electronic documents because they are more versatile and suitable.

It has certainly changed the way it’s read, written, and processed. Modern recruiters prefer seeking candidates by means of search engines and this drastically increases the importance of keywords. Many recruiters make use of special software to manage, filter and scan huge volumes of resumes.

A great number of recruiters prefer getting applications in a certain format. For example, some employers accept only Microsoft Word documents. Others welcome PDF, HTML or ASCII documents.

Online resumes have undoubtedly made a revolution in hiring by bringing the significant cost saving in contrast with conventional hiring methods. Now recruiters no longer need to deal with large piles of paper. As a result, they process them much faster.