Review and Revise

Being a student at a state university has some perks, especially when they entail providing resources to further your career before it even starts. One of the most important tools in applying for a job in today’s world is have a great resume. In this the next few years as more students graduate from college than ever before it will be harder than ever to secure a good job, but an amazing resume is one step in the right direction. In fact, many companies will immediately throw out resumes that are not professional enough or have errors and that will eliminate you from the job search.

Although I have always considered myself to be great at writing and formatting resumes and cover letters, I decided to attend the Career Development Center’s Resume Review event. As it turns out, I was pretty good at it but still lacked in a few areas. First off, I used a format for my resume that is looked at as outdated in today’s standards, something that an older person would submit. As a student fresh out of college we talked about some different template styles that I could use that look more modern. I was however correct in including all of my contact information and career experience to the best of my ability. Unfortunately, in only had a paper copy with me so we could only talk about different formats not see them in person.

I did however lack in the area of skills. All of the skills I listed were basic thing such as “team player”, “Microsoft Office Suite”, “Social Abilities”, and a few other vague phrases. I was informed that these are not really skills, but qualities that students fresh out of college are expected to have. These skills are nothing special and most likely shared by multiple job candidates. As a result, we discussed more specific, interesting skills and abilities I could fill that space with.

Another interesting part we discussed is the amount of references I used. The resume I used was an actual resume I submitted to my current employer years ago and it listed 7 references total. Four were from people currently employed by the company, one was a close personal friend, and two were connections from and outside competitive company. I was informed that this was too many references to include and at most there should be four. Also, it is better to not put any friends as references as it is expected their views of you will be biased. And although nothing was really wrong with it, it was suggested not to put people from competing companies because an employer can look at it as “if you’re such a good candidate why didn’t this company hire you?”

All in all, this was a great opportunity to fine tune my resume and make sure I included everything I needed to. This will be a big help in the future as I begin to get out into the real world and leave the safety of college.