What To Omit And What To Include In Your Resume
Resumes may sometimes contain too much or too little information. A resume’s main purpose is to become an effective marketing tool or advertisement of yourself so that you would be able to effectively sell yourself to potential employers. Including your personal information is important. However, there are times that we tend to write down information that are not really relevant or needed in our resumes.
Personal information such as your name, your past employers, the schools you have attended and your relevant work experiences should all be written and presented well in your document. Never put your nickname or your “other” names in your resume unless you had your name legally changed. Also, the names of your past employers should be properly spelled out and you should never forget or hide their names for this error can completely mess up your work history. With regards to your education, include all the necessary information and correct spelling of the schools and/or university that you had attended to. If you are a college undergraduate, be sure to indicate this in your resume because if you don’t, that would again mislead your employer to automatically think that you are a graduate under the course that you had indicated.
Personal information like your hobbies, date of birth, marital status or nationality can be or should be omitted in your resume. This is also true for your religious affiliations, spoken languages and cultural background for they can be possible targets of discrimination. We all know that employers are not allowed to ask discriminatory questions towards their candidates but then again, even if you are qualified, these information could play a big part on their decision whether you may or may not get the position you are aiming for.
Deciding on which information to include in your resume is sort of like gambling. Sometimes, the information that you are not supposed to include are much needed information for certain positions that you might be applying for. For example: if you are aiming for a managerial position and you have extensive experience in being the leader or founder of a local religious group, you can gamble and include this information because this can improve your credentials for the fact that this specific qualification is very much aligned to your targeted position which is management of people.
Before including these kind of information in your resume, sit down and think about it for a while. Ask yourself if the information you would include make you more qualified for the position you are applying for or would it just eat up space on your resume. Bottom line is, it all comes down to personal preference. Discrimination and personal biases of employers are always present and can never be omitted. What’s important is that you should always have a positive outlook in all your decisions. If you get the interview and win the job, then good for you. If you don’t, then just try to find a new one. Like the old saying goes, “When one door closes, another one opens.”
