How Many Versions Of Your Resume Do You Need?

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A lot of times, job seekers will contact me with help on their career document, then start rattling off a whole list of COMPLETELY different functions that they want to cover in the resume.

One recent client was hoping to try and cover human resources, event planning, and communications all in one document.

Unfortunately, in today’s brave new world of applications, one size does not fit all.

But does that mean everyone needs to be constantly chasing after a moving target, always changing the document to meet each job posting?

Nope. You have to rethink your strategy completely and start seeing your resume as a themed asset.

Here’s why…

As we go through our careers, our background evolves into probably at least three or more different thematic areas.

In my lifetime, I’ve been a meeting planner, television producer, tourism manager, educator, and resume writer, to name a few.

Can I pull all of these areas under one roof/one resume?

Not a chance. No one could possibly digest it all – there is too much stuff “muddying” the waters if, say, I were to apply to be a faculty member in a post-secondary school.

The trick to hitting those moving target is to get grounded first.

Take a deep breath and think about what area you are actually going to have the highest degree of job search success. Then focus your efforts on that area.

I would suggest one, two, but no more than three major areas. Then create a separate document for EACH of those themes.

Create a section header entitled “RELEVANT HISTORY” then list the job records most relevant to the position to which you are applying first, then summarize (if necessary) any non-relevant ones to avoid distracting the reader. That way, you can account for any holes that open up in your work experience caused by moving non-relevant history into an “Additional Background” header.

What you are saying to the potential employer is this:

“Here’s the information that is RELEVANT to what you are hiring for… and oh, by the way, you’ll probably notice there are some holes in the work history, so down here, here’s some additional background that summarizes those non-relevant jobs. Want more info? Just ask me.”

Keeping your document themed is critical to keeping your sanity and your job search in check. You need to be focused and centered on your core areas that will yield the highest level of job search success.

Why?

Because if you get spread out too thin, you’ll be too far and too wide in your job search efforts, and never get the vertical depth required to find employment success.

You’ve heard of the “shotgun approach” to job seeking? When you are so scattered you end up running around all the time and not experiencing any traction, then you’ve slipped into that mode. Not a good place to be.

Employers can smell desperation, and if they sense a lot of shape-shifting in your resume to try and make yourself more than what you really are to “fit” into a particular job mold, they will drop you like a hot potato.

They are more interested in the highly qualified candidates than the “sorta” qualified ones.

Instead, BE THE MOLD. Think thematic approaches in your document on your core strengths, experience, and expertise. Be centered on what you feel is your best “bet” (to borrow a poker euphemism) in finding a job.

Then create a separate thematic resume in that area. This allows you to concentrate your experience, keywords, relevant involvement and professional development in that theme.

The end result is you get a specific version of your resume in the proverbial can that is about 90% of the way there.

Then, when you find a job posting that matches your target career goal, you’ll definitely need to do some tweaking to make sure your resume terminology matches the position announcement.

That ensures your keyword “hit” ratio is as optimized as possible before you submit your resume as an application.

But you won’t have to reinvent the wheel and start all over to create a new document.

Job seekers simply cannot be constantly morphing documents into something that someone else wants.

You need to be grounded in what it is you offer in a specific field, then tweak the resume to match and make sure the terms mirror one another.

You’ll have better control over your job search, yield better results, and not have the feeling that you are constantly chasing ghosts.

Photo Credit: Shutterstock

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3 Comments

1. 

   Sandra Gregston

   February 3, 2013 at 3:03 PM

   For a person that does NOT have gaps in work history, this is easy. Put all jobs down in one chronological resume. For me, that does not work. I have gaps in my work history from 2007 to 2011. While I was earning my undergrad degree and my MBA at that time, I was still not finding working and managers know that MANY people do work and go to college at the same time. I use a functional resume. Due to my limited management experience and my broad work experience as a rank-and-file employee (Factor worker, assembly line, packing, retail, tutoring, receptionist, UPS worker) I limit my resume to 12 years (back to 2001). If I put each job I ever had, there would be too many temp jobs with assignments that lasted 3 months and my factor work is irrelevant. I don’t want a factory job, so I leave it off.

   Human Resources is very hard to break into. I’ve been trying to get into HR for the last 4 years. And I can’t get a PHR cert unless I already have HR experience. It is a catch 22, and the world has many catch 22s in them.

   I have four resumes. I leave my MBA off on jobs that do not require anything over a 2 year degree. I have a Food Handlers Certificate, and I put that on jobs that I apply to that are in the restaurant industry. If I had a series 63 or 7, I’d make a finance resume too.

   Reply
2. 

   Kerry Thompson

   February 3, 2013 at 1:20 PM

   My answer would be, as many as it takes. But a better answer is to have as you say a few flavors that directionally magnify your talents and then as the need arises,”Tweek” them to the specific opening. Many employers now use “Word search” engines to screen the candidates. If those “key words are there then you get to the top of the pile.I have four flavors that I tweek and the needs arises.

   Reply
3. 

   Susana C. Thompson

   February 3, 2013 at 11:31 AM

   I think recruters are looking specific area and experience. That means to me, young people, they just graduated from Associate Degree and Bachellors degree,no history of work. Polite the request with expirence but in reallity they do not care about that. It is easy to them to pick easy what the employeer wants too. Still I can not belive that I have been working in diferent positions, I came out, that I do not know, how to do the job. Just like I born yesterday.

   Desfourtunally these is the reality for people like me, medium age.

   Employers hire recrutters to do the dirty job.

   Finally I got it! With all my respect, I belive still out there are good profesional recruters, but are few of them. Sincerely Susana C. Thompson

   Reply