At this event, I was chatting with around 30 or so job seekers about the topic of resume “best practices” and asking them, many of whom are former hiring managers, to share their particular preferences in terms of what they liked (or didn’t like) to see on a candidate’s resume presentation.  What became instantly clear was that job hunters today can abandon any hope of ever putting together a resume that will universally please everyone.

While we all agreed on a few general guidelines, like guarding against typos and including all the keywords pertinent to one’s field, virtually everything else in terms of resume development — including format, length, tone, punctuation style and such — turned out to be highly subjective in nature, with very little consensus on these issues displayed around the room.  Some people really like short resumes.  Some like long, dense ones packed with information.  Some hiring managers enjoy reading about a person’s hobbies and outside interests.  Others feel such things are unprofessional.  Certain recruiters will tell you that you should explictly explain any gaps in your work history and the reasons you left each of your past organizations.  But ask the next so-called expert, and they’ll tell you this merely draws attention to these issues and positions you as a potential job hopper.

Perhaps most interesting of all was when I pulled up two samples of professionally-written resumes, one that a former client paid a service $150 to have written and another that cost an individual (gulp) $2,500 to have assembled!  Without telling the people at my event which one was which, the entire room voted for resume #1 (the cheap one) as the document they liked best.  So even if you outsource the development of your piece, it seems you can’t even really measure effectiveness from a “you get what you pay for” standpoint!

So what is one to do?  How do you know when your resume is “good enough” and it’s time to move on to all the other essential steps of the job hunting process?

The moment of truth I’ve learned to watch for doesn’t relate all that much to the feedback one gets from other people, but centers instead on the moment in time when a client reports — wait for it — that the resume they’ve put together pleases THEMSELVES!

To me, you, yourself, are the most important audience for your resume.  Since it’s seems bloody well impossible to achieve “universal acclaim” from those around you, and you’ll never know the specific personal preferences of the audience you’re targeting with your submissions, I’d suggest you focus on going to whatever amount of effort it takes to reach the point when YOU can say with confidence:

“You know what?  I’m pretty happy with this document — and feel it does a good job capturing my key career contributions, personal strengths, and professional capabilities.” 

Reach that moment in time and we’re in great shape — since you can then set the resume aside, lose the psychic baggage, and move on to the other parts of the process (e.g. lead generation) that are ultimately far more important to getting hired than the resume itself.

So despite what you may hear out there, don’t let somebody bully you into believing that there are a ton of black-and-white rules about what hiring managers and recruiters might — or might not — want to see in terms of a person’s resume presentation.  Just make sure you pass the agreed-upon basics (which I’ve described here) and then, from there, focus on developing a document that’s consistent with your own tastes and personality.  You’re going to be the most important audience you need to please, in the long run!

P.S.  Another frustrating-slash-comical example related to resume preparation?  One of my clients recently sat through a workshop related to getting hired at Boeing, where she was informed that it’s absolutely critical to make sure you have all the right keywords on your resume if you want to make it through the Boeing scanning system.  But just a few minutes later, the presenter said that if you have TOO many of the terms from the job advertisement listed on your piece, your resume will be flagged for suspected fraud and get booted out of the system!  What’s the magic line between having “too many” and “not enough” of the right keywords?  Unfortunately, the speaker wasn’t able to say.  How’s that for a catch-22?

Needless to say, this isn’t most people.  In the real world, especially of late, you’ll find tons of amazingly talented individuals who have various gaps in their employment history, whether through conscious choice or simply based on the turbulence of the economy.  Recently, I’ve worked with several such cases, including some fairly “extreme” examples where I’ve assisted clients who have been out of the workforce for over 10 years due to medical reasons, an unsustainable early retirement decision, or the choice to put their career on hold to raise children.

What these clients always want to know, of course, is how they should address this issue on their resume.  Should they mention the “gap” in their employment history or leave it out, hoping it won’t get noticed?  Should they try a functional (skills-based) format, as some experts suggest?  Or should they just tackle the issue head-on, explain the situation in detail, and hope that employers can see past it?

It’s one of the trickiest issues we’re facing in the job market today, I believe, and you’ll find a fair amount of disagreement on how to tackle this issue out there, if you look around.  For starters, before I weigh in with my own thoughts, I’d recommend you peruse the following set of discussion threads on LinkedIn’s “Answers” page:

How do you address gaps in your work history?
What are your thoughts on employment gaps on resumes?
How to explain a 3-year resume sabbatical?
How do you fill the gaps on your resume?
What is the best way to explain a sabbatical on your resume and LinkedIn profile?
How would a hiring manager or recruiter view a job seeker who included caregiving duties for a relative on his/her resume?

Here are a few of my favorite snippets from the above discussions:

“I am a corporate recruiter and view thousands of resumes. There are no good ways to ‘hide’ employment gaps. Chronological resumes are the norm and functional resumes are like a neon sign telling me to look for employment gaps. If they are there,…I will find them.”

“If I saw an unexplained five-year gap in a resume, I’d probably assume it was time spent in prison.”

“Tell the truth! Be honest about what you’ve done and who you are. The company that can appreciate and respect that is the right place to be! To convey anything else would lead to them eventually finding out the ‘truth’ and the perception may be that you were not honest during the interview process. Not a great way to start off a new relationship!”

“Here’s how I handled my own sabbatical on my resume: May 2005 to December 2008: Spent two-and-a-half years discovering Australia. And myself.”

“I certainly believe that in the current job market, a gap should be pretty understandable — but I don’t think it’s prudent to assume generosity of spirit if you’re a job seeker.  Maybe the person reading the resume is incredibly sympathetic and compassionate.  Or maybe not.  Therefore, I think it behooves job seekers to mitigate that kind of gap.  Perhaps it was a personal sabbatical.  Maybe the candidate took time off to study for a certification, like a PMP.  Or, like some people suggest, volunteering can certainly serve a useful role here, esp. if one is actually using one’s professional skills and keeping them sharp.”

“I think the biggest reason we hear about ‘gaps’ being a problem is that we’ve been socially conditioned to believe that employment gaps are a bad thing.  Sure a gap may raise some questions, and the questions should be asked, however diminishing someone’s qualifications just because of a gap can be counterproductive.”

“It’s not gaps that are the concern.  Clearly you were doing something.  It’s just a question of what?”

Again, as you can see, there are many different points of view on the subject.  The general consensus, however, seems to be that job applicants SHOULD mention and explain any significant gaps in their work history as part of their resume presentation.  This being said, I still think a huge assumption (and lots of wishful thinking) is in play with many of these comments.  Many people seem to automatically assume that the individuals facing this issue have been devoting these career breaks to productive professional activities like taking classes, sharpening their skills, working in relevant volunteer roles, and the like.  This isn’t always the case.  If somebody stays home to raise a young family or gets sidelined due to a personal or family illness, there isn’t going to be much “grist for the mill” in terms of explaining the gap from a value-added standpoint.

So ultimately, every situation is slightly different, and there may not be a one-size-fits-all solution to this challenging issue.  If you look for one, you’ll likely be disappointed.  But in the spirit of the presidential elections we’re going through, let me at least offer up a “5-point plan” that I think gives some good general guidelines that most people can follow if faced with this situation:

1.  As the masses suggest, bite the bullet and include a specific entry/explanation for any gaps in your work history that have happened within the last 10 years; anything earlier than that probably isn’t worth mentioning and can be safely ignored

2.  For those gaps you decide to call out, give a concise and reasonable explanation for why you were out of the workforce during the time in question, stretching this description as much as possible to include any quasi-professional activities (e.g. self-study, schooling, consulting, volunteer work) you may have engaged in during this period

3.  If you’re dealing with a CURRENT gap, in the sense that you’re between jobs right this moment, get on the ball (per the last quoted comment above) and start filling your days with all sorts of professional development, networking, and educational activities that will demonstrate to employers you’re taking active steps to keep your skills sharp — not sitting around eating bon-bons

4.  Make sure to always include a “current” job on your LinkedIn profile, as well, even if you’re unemployed, since many employers and recruiters screen candidates using such criteria.  See the post I wrote here a while back on how best to approach this aspect of things.

5.  Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, if you’ve had some serious breaks in your career history, I’d recommend you manage your expectations and assume that these gaps (however unfairly) are going to be a significant roadblock in terms of generating much interest via resume-driven job applications.  So definitely keep sending out your materials to appropriate want ads, here and there, but hedge your bets by following an interview-generation strategy that relies much more heavily on networking and relationship-building.  While your resume will portray your background in a very one-dimensional light, other human beings will be able to evaluate the “whole you” and advocate your talents directly to people they know, diminishing the gap issue to a greater degree.

Not a foolproof formula, by any means, but hopefully at least gives you some general guideposts to follow if you’re faced with this tricky situation!

“Is it something on my resume that’s preventing me from getting more interviews?  Does that one phrase on my LinkedIn profile throw people off?  Did that one casual remark I made in my last interview cost me the offer?“  This is the kind of worried self-talk that most job hunters, in my experience, deal with constantly.

Along the same lines, a great many people worry whether their age (if they’re in the 40+ range) might be the chief boogeyman behind their lack of success — and whether they should therefore follow the frequently-dispensed advice to “dumb down” their resume and trim out everything but the last 10-15 years of experience.  It’s a tempting notion, when you’ve been searching for months without much in the way of results.  You may feel you’ve got nothing really to lose.

I’ve written about the realities of age discrimination multiple times in my blog, over the years, if you want to read some of my own advice here on the matter.  In particular, I stand by the observations I give in this article about the important of separating “experience” discrimination from “age” discrimination.

Today, however, I want to bring another voice into the discussion.  I want to reprint (with his permission) a recent article by Matt Bud, veteran executive recruiter and Chairman of the Financial Executives Networking Group (FENG) consisting of over 40,000 senior finance professionals across the globe.  Matt is one of my favorite all-time collaborators and as usual, he gets right to the point and shares his thoughts on the matter at hand.  Here’s what he has to say about the notion of “hiding” experience on a resume.  And while the tone of the article is obviously aimed at his audience of financial executives, I think you’ll find that the lessons apply equally to professionals/executives in almost any occupational niche.

Who is your customer, what is your product?
by Matt Bud, Chairman of the Financial Executives Networking Group

If I had to put my finger on the one issue that confuses senior financial professionals it is the subject above.  Who is the customer for your services, and what is your product?

In recent weeks I have chatted with or had email exchanges with members who were going through outplacement.  The bad advice they have gotten has included only showing their most recent 10-15 years on their resume, to dumbing down their titles, and, of course, leaving off their graduation dates.  Please know I am very much opposed to any of these approaches.

The assumption with only showing your most recent 10-15 years is that you can somehow fool a resume reviewer into interviewing you.  May I suggest that just as you can tell a bogus item on someone’s expense report from 50 feet away, or a padded budget from the same distance, in much the same way someone who reads resumes for a living can spot an inconsistency in your credentials without really trying very hard.

Friends, it really isn’t all that hard to know you didn’t start in your first job out of college as a Controller or Chief Financial Officer.  The other technique is saying “prior to 1985 I worked at the following 4 companies,” but not give the years you worked there.  All foolishness if you think about it.  It begs the question of how old you are, and the reader is always going to guess higher.

Be assured, no one has time to read between the lines and no one is going to call you for a clarification.

But, let’s just suppose you actually do get an interview because you “fooled” the resume reviewer.  Please explain how you are going to overcome having duped them into interviewing you?  Do you think they will have a warm glow of admiration for you for having beat the system, or do you think they will be a little angry?  I’m going to guess angry.

As my grandmother would say: “I am who I am.”  So, who are you?  What is the product?

The product in a word is “been there and done that.”  The truth is that at this point in your career you have a wealth of experience that you bring to the party.  This is your value to any company that will engage your services.  No need for training on the job.  You already know how to do the job.  May I ask you how you select a surgeon?  Do you want one who is “over qualified?”  Or, do you want one who is learning on the job? (I hope you appreciate that I only ask easy questions.)

So if this is the product, who is the customer?  Well, it generally isn’t large corporations.  Large corporations typically do not hire senior level executives.  Very simply, they grow their own.  Sure, once in a while they bring in someone from the outside.  In addition to the fact that these poor folks rarely succeed, many of the talented folks who now report to them have had their career paths blocked and leave the company.  Hopefully you are beginning to see the logic I’m suggesting, and why it isn’t often done.

Middle market and smaller firms hire senior level executives because they are approaching a crisis.  Jerry Mills, Founder & Chief Executive Officer of B2B CFO, refers to this issue in his book: “The Danger Zone, Lost in the Growth Transition.” (Please visit our website for more information his firm: http://www.thefeng.org/sponsors/B2BCFO.php)

As I have often said, if it was an easy problem, they would have asked someone else to solve it.  Because it was complex and a crisis, they called me.

Even small companies these days have big company type problems.  What better way to solve them than to hire someone from a large company who can bring structure, discipline and proven solutions to our firm?

Your seniority and wealth of experience having solved the same problems your potential employer is facing is WHY you will get hired.

Just because you can do an entry level job at a large corporation, and just because age discrimination is illegal, they still aren’t going to hire you.  And trust me, you wouldn’t want the job anyway. If you want to “look for love in all the wrong places,” that’s up to you.

If you focus on your real market, you will find a more rewarding solution to your career goals.

Regards, Matt

This reality was confirmed further by the fact that no fewer than 10 clients of mine sent me an article last week, while I was out of town, discussing the latest study on resume effectiveness.  This article really seemed to hit a nerve with many people, as it claimed that psychologists have now pegged the “yes, interview” or “no, don’t interview” decision for any given candidate to be based on a mere six seconds of resume scanning.  They then discuss which elements of one’s resume are most important, based on colorful heat maps that show the tracked eye moments of 30 recruiting professionals who were asked to review two sample resumes.

Here’s an article outlining the full study, in case you missed it:

Business Insider Article: How Recruiters See Your Resume

On one hand, I’m glad that various organizations are starting to apply some scientific rigor to the job-seeking process, since it’s a field that hasn’t received all that much attention by researchers to date — and is one that millions of Americans have a lot riding on. On the other hand, as some of the folks who commented on the article pointed out here, you could literally drive a truck through the scientific validity of the study.  Unless they’re holding out on the full details of the experiment, some of the conclusions reached seemed completely speculative as to why recruiters appeared to prefer the resume on the right versus the one on the left.  While the empirical results may be accurate, there didn’t seem to be much basis for concluding “causation” of any kind, at least based on the information presented.

But let’s not judge too harshly.  Just because this study wasn’t held to impeccable double-blind standards doesn’t mean it doesn’t contain some important and useful nuggets of truth.  So what are the real takeaways from an article like this?  What useful tips might an earnest job hunter derive from this study on how resumes are reviewed?

As always, I’d welcome your opinions on the subject, but the biggest “aha” I took away from things was related to the following conclusion shared in the article:

“In the short time that they spend with your resume, the study showed recruiters will look at your name, current title and company, current position start and end dates, previous title and company, previous position start and end dates, and education.”

Well, it seems that a growing percentage of employers are starting to think this way.  They’re getting so frustrated with the built-in limitations of resume-driven recruiting that they’re shifting their strategy to allow candidates to show off their skills in more creative and tangible ways.

For starters, as uber-blogger Seth Godin recently wrote about here in a snappy little article, “Few people are interested in your resume any more.  Plenty are interested in what you’ve done.  Are you leaving behind an easily found trail of accomplishment?”

On a similar note, the Wall Street Journal published an article the other day (which you’ll find here) entitled “No More Resumes, Say Some Firms” where author Rachel Emma Silverman highlights a number of organizations that have come up with innovative new ways to evaluate potential hires.  Some use on-line questionnaires to get people to actively demonstrate their enthusiasm and expertise, versus just passively sending in a piece of paper.  Other firms have come up with unusual internships and participatory events that allow them to ferret out the most likely recruits.  And another company, still, apparently “posted a series of challenges on its website aimed at gauging candidates’ thought processes. (One challenge: Estimate how many pennies lined side by side would span the Golden Gate Bridge.)  It also asked candidates to submit a video demonstrating their love of gaming and the firm’s products.”

All told, this will be an interesting phenomenon to watch.  Could the end of the resume era truly be upon us—or will this time-tested hiring tool continue to maintain its dominance, as companies realize that these more creative hiring methods often 1) take a TON more time to implement than scanning a stack of resumes and 2) open them up to claims of (and legal action around) discrimination and favoritism?  Not everybody has access to video equipment, after all, just as certain essay and puzzle questions could easily be accused of being laced with cultural bias.

Regardless of how things play out, however, I think the message is clear.  The smartest thing a career-minded professional can do right now is hedge their bets by having BOTH a killer resume in hand, as well as an impressive body of work samples to show off to employers, when circumstances warrant.  So if you haven’t started to do so, and your work is able to be “captured” in any concrete way, it’s high time you started piecing together a portfolio, of sorts, for yourself.  So think hard.  Do you have any work samples, reports, and documents that illustrate your brilliance?  PowerPoint presentations or business plans?  Writing samples?  Code samples?  White papers or published articles?  Curricula or training tools you’ve designed?  Videos of you in action?  Websites you’ve worked on or that showcase the fruits of your labor?

There’s no question that “showing versus telling” is a powerful marketing tool, when the time comes, and there are now so many cool (and free) tools for compiling/displaying content (e.g. Slideshare.net, WordPress.com, Carbonemade.com, Behance.net, Google Docs, etc.) there’s no excuse for not starting at least a rudimentary effort in this direction.

And yet, as liberating as the “body of work” concept might sound to people who’ve tired of the normal hiring routine, here are the uncomfortable little questions nobody ever seems to ask:

1) What if somebody’s work doesn’t actually lend itself to the creation of a “body of work” portfolio or some form of tangible proof?

2) What if somebody has done remarkable things, but is unable to share them due to ethics, confidentiality restrictions, non-disclosure, or non-compete agreements?

3) What if somebody is capable of achieving great things, but simply hasn’t been in an environment that supported their efforts or allowed them to get things accomplished?

At any rate, it will be interesting to watch where this trend goes, since I’ve seen a number of recent postings and discussions focused on this topic.  Your thoughts?

This was an interesting one.  Given the vast range of opinions floating around the employment world about resumes, and the fact that most job hunters seem endlessly insecure about them, I wanted to survey the masses and see what the most common gripe was about resumes today — perhaps offering some insight as to what my readers should emphasize (or avoid) in their OWN materials.

Here’s the question I threw out there:

“Aside from typos, what is the biggest mistake most people make on their resumes?”

The five response choices were:

1) Too long; too much information provided
2) Too short; not enough details provided
3) Unfocused; unclear what they want to do
4) Unattractive; hard to read format
5) Too much fluff; light on actual results

A total of 252 people cast their vote on this particular topic, and while you’ll see a small graphic of the results below, you can click here to access the full set of results.

The Analysis?  Let’s start with the obvious.  Length.  Trailing dead last, by a long shot, was the notion that resumes on average tend to be TOO SHORT and don’t offer enough detail.  Only 14 out of 252 respondents chose this option, in fact.  On the flip side, 59 folks said the exact opposite — that most resumes were NOT SHORT ENOUGH and droned on with way more information than was necessary.  So if you’re wondering whether you need to add an extra page or two to your resume, and pack in a lot more detail, I’d suggest you play the odds — and go the other direction, instead, whittling your document down to an even shorter, more focused presentation.

Length issue aside, however, there are even more people out there who are apparently fed up with the “fluff” on resumes and believe people pack their pieces with too many vague generalities, instead of measurable substance to back up their candidacy.  I’d definitely agree with this.  In fact, adding scads of “quantifiable results” is one of my five cardinal rules for effective resume-writing.  But here’s the part nobody (especially professional resume writers) acknowledges: not everybody actually has “WOW” accomplishments to report!

With all due respect to the citizens of Lake Wobegone, in other words, many working adults are average or below-average in terms of the results they’ve produced.  Or perhaps more kindly, we could acknowledge that everybody is CAPABLE of great things, but haven’t necessarily been in an environment that allowed them to shine, blossom, and produce meaningful results.  For example, a sales rep who gets laid off after six months isn’t going to have much of a shot at building an impressive pipeline of results.  Or the CEO whose board is hopelessly deadlocked.  Or the administrative assistant whose boss doesn’t let him or her take any initiative and do anything other than answer phones and get coffee.  These people aren’t going to knock anybody’s socks off with accomplishments on their resume.  They just haven’t been given the chance to accumulate any, at least recently.

So while one should, of course, do their best to unearth ANY impressive contributions they’ve made at organizations, and include these stories on their resume, if relevant, it’s just not always possible in the real world.  And in my opinion, listing “lukewarm” achievements (e.g. saved $200 a year on copy paper, sold $23,000 in advertising, made damn good coffee…) is worse than putting NO achievements at all.  Again, maybe the “purists” don’t agree with me on this, but after 20 years of helping people write these documents, I’ll stand by a statement I blogged about a while back: there are no great resumes anymore; only great candidates.

Lastly, in terms of response choice #4 about resume format, a tiny fraction of people (15%) selected that one as the most egregious mistake one could make with their presentation — which makes perfect sense to me.  In my opinion, it’s a sign of progress.  In the wild west days of the nineties, people were having all sorts of quirky fun with resume formats (“Cool! I printed my resume on pink paper, using Jester font!”), whereas these days, serious job hunters have pretty much gotten the “format” issue out of their system.  Companies are largely stripping resumes down to plain text, without caring much about cosmetic considerations, and candidates, by and large, have figured out that they really don’t have to get creative when there are thousands of perfectly decent resume samples on the Internet to choose from — or they can simply pick one of the several ubiquitous resume templates built into Microsoft Word.

So there you have it.  That’s my analysis of this latest poll, which pretty boils down to “Don’t worry too much about format (unless you’re doing something crazy) and worry, instead, about whether you’re packing your resume with TOO much information — or puffing it up with hollow cliches and empty adjectives, instead of meaty accomplishments.”

Interested in some additional analysis of this poll?  Make sure you don’t miss the string of over 25 specific comments that readers submitted about the survey, while completing it.  Again, just click here to access the poll results, then scroll down to the bottom of the page to dive into the sea of opinions people expressed on the subject.

As for the coming month?  You’ll find my latest LinkedIn poll question here, asking: “What do you think the best method is for combating age discrimination, if you’re an older worker?”

Okay, now stop.  You’re blocking out the sun.

As I’ve pointed out for many years, including in this recent article here, every resume-writer on the planet has an opinion (usually an annoyingly strident one) about what approach works best in terms of the resume process these days.  Some swear you should keep your document short, perhaps just to a single page.  Others argue that “long copy sells” and the more information you pack in, the better.  Some think you should include hobbies.  Others don’t.  And some swear that you’ll never get hired again if you don’t trim off everything but the most recent 10 years of your experience, even though the hiring manager is going to realize you’re not 31 years old the moment you walk in the door for an interview!

But remember one thing, as you bob around in the cauldron of all these competing opinions: resume-writers are not your target audience.  They are merely advisors.  The good ones don’t claim to have a perfect formula or the exact right answers, but will instead guide you through the series of tough decisions and judgment calls necessary to craft a presentation that will ideally resonate with the majority of the people you’re targeting — as well as do justice to your own personal preferences, personality, and comfort level.

This being said, it’s always great when some actual hiring managers and recruiters weigh in on the subject of resumes and what they like to see, since these folks ARE your target audience and their input counts for a lot.  So on this note, I thought I’d pass along a short video I came across the other day, where two top recruiters at Microsoft answer a series of questions about what they look for on a resume when screening applicants.  Here’s the link:

Your Resume Questions Answered! (Microsoft Jobs Blog)

The video is only about eight minutes long, but for those who opt not to sit through it, here’s what I’d offer up as the key takeaways:

1)  There is no perfect resume formula and no two recruiters (even at Microsoft) screen resumes the exact same way

2)  Content trumps format; we’re well past the days where “cosmetic” considerations like font choice and layout were extremely important

3)  You shouldn’t throw in everything but the kitchen sink; focus on showcasing only what’s relevant to the job at hand

4)  Yes, you should include lots of appropriate keywords, but ONLY if you can back them with up with actual knowledge/experience

5)  If you’re have an on-line portfolio or website/blog with samples of your work product, include it, since it might catch a recruiter’s eye

Hope you enjoyed the video link and kudos to Microsoft for giving us a rare glimpse, from behind the scenes, of what their recruiters really look for when screening applicants!

If you have a moment, click below to read the question that was posted, as well as the 34 responses that were submitted by other members of the LinkedIn system:

LinkedIn Thread: Does a Resume Need to Be Limited to One Page?

The point of my sharing this?  I just wanted to make sure that you noticed, even in this simple little exchange, that a massive cacophony of opinions exists out there about what goes into writing an effective resume presentation in today’s world.  Here we have over 30 credentialed professionals weighing in on the matter — including business owners, HR professionals, executive decision-makers, recruiters, and resume-writers — and among this audience, you’ll find almost zero agreement on the answer to the question posed!

Here are a few selected excerpts of the opinions shared:

“Yes.  Folks have a very limited attention span and will not read more than one page.”
“No.  Don’t be bound by the one-page rule. It came into existence when people stayed in one job for a lifetime.”
“Yes.  One page is ideal. Never longer than 2 pages.”
“No.  It’s absurd to expect an adult with any significant amount of experience to fit it onto one page.”
Yes.  It’s to create interest in an interview.”
“No.  That is an old wives tale. Recruiters need to know/see the entire picture.”
“No.  In my years of working with literally hundreds of some of the top hiring managers out there, not one of them wanted a one page resume.”

There were even some enterprising folks who found a way to complicate the matter further, offering advice that transcends the initial yes-or-no framework of the question:

“Depends where you are and what industry you are in.”
“Send a 1-page version and bring a 2-pager to the interview.”
“It should not run more than a page and a half.”
“While the 1 pager is no longer the hard and fast rule, your Plan B and survival job resumes should still be single pagers.”

So again, if you’re among the huge crowd of transitioning professionals agonizing over issues like this, and you’re trying to come up with the “exact right answer” in terms of how to showcase your qualifications on paper, it’s time to accept the reality: there isn’t one.

Whether one is talking about resume length, font choice, how far to go back in experience, whether to include hobbies or not, or one of a million other minor cosmetic decisions people wrestle with in terms of these presentations, you’re not going to find much consistency or consensus – even among the experts.

My advice?  Stick to the five basic guidelines I covered earlier (getting help with these, if needed), make the choices and decisions that seem right to you, based on your industry niche and personal preferences, and then move on to more productive activities.  If you get hung up on the “packaging” step of the process, it will cost you!

These fear-based marketing attempts are usually designed to justify fees that range from $300-500, on the low end, to over $5,000 (I’m not kidding!) for certain companies that brand themselves as executive resume specialists.

At the end of the day, however, I don’t believe that writing an effective resume is all that complicated of a process.  Sure, it might be worth outsourcing to a professional if you’re not particularly skilled in writing or word processing, or if you’re struggling to overcome the objectivity barrier, but I have found no evidence (after 18 years in the field) that there is any one killer formula that will instantly double or triple your success rate — unless you’re starting with a “train wreck” to begin with and somehow can’t manage to scrape something halfway-decent together through your own efforts.

Common sense supports this contention, as well, when you stop and consider that the vast majority of hiring today (70-80% by most estimates) is relationship-based, not resume-based.  When a friend of yours puts in a good word for you with an employer, in other words, you might still need to pass your resume along as a formality — but it’s going to be the personal endorsement that lands you the position, not the “brochure” you submitted.  This statistic alone suggests that those people who exalt the resume as the single most critical make-or-break issue of a modern job search are a bit out of step with how things really work out there.  Sure, resumes are important and you need to have one, but let’s not get carried away.  Remember, too, that the rise of social media technology (e.g. LinkedIn) is rapidly eroding the role of traditional resumes in the process, as well.

So again, there are definitely times when hiring somebody to write or edit your resume is a smart idea, just like you might hire somebody to fix your plumbing, detail your car, or do your taxes.  But be wary of firms that make the process sound more mystical or complicated than it really is.  Ultimately, I maintain that there are only five key guidelines that a resume needs to pass in order to be highly effective.  You’ll find these five guidelines outlined here, in a recent article I contributed to Puget Sound Business Journal.  In summary, they are:

1)  Your resume needs to look good
2)  Your resume needs to be error-free
3)  Your resume needs to have a clear focus
4)  Your resume needs to include the right buzzwords
5)  Your resume needs to showcase your top accomplishments

Beyond these five guidelines, which I’m confident 95% or more of all recruiters and hiring managers would agree with me on, everything else pretty much becomes a judgment call — and you’ll find that even the experts start dividing up into a bunch of splintered factions, arguing over things like which fonts on resumes work best, whether to include outside interests, whether to trim early-career jobs off the work history, and the like.  There’s just no real consensus on these issues, despite what some people may try to tell you.  For every hiring manager that thinks including hobbies on a resume is tacky and unprofessional, you’ll find another one who loves to see what a person does “in their downtime” and who finds it valuable to get a better overall sense of the candidate, as a person.

Ultimately, most resume decisions come down to judgment calls and your own personal preference in terms of what you choose to share about yourself.  But if you at least make sure you don’t violate any of the “five commandments” above, your resume is going to be in pretty decent shape.  Is it going to be exceptional?  Are people going to open your file and say “Wow, now THERE’S a great resume?”  Not likely.  But fear not, because as I pointed out in my earlier article (the one linked in the first paragraph) I don’t think such thing as a “great resume” really even exists anymore.  There are great candidates, with great credentials, but my sense is that we’ve now moved past the days when cosmetic resume factors count for all that much.  There are just too many millions of these documents floating around now, following roughly the same approach, for readers to get all that terribly excited about the format alone.  In general, they’re going to be looking for substance (e.g. relevant credentials, stable work history, compatible industry experience) more than sizzle.  So unless you really think you’re a candidate to try something really unconventional and wacky (see examples here via Google Images) sticking to the safe, boring, proven guidelines makes the most sense.

Personally, I’d say that I come across a truly show-stopping “great” resume about as often as I come across a “great” website that stands out from the crowd and takes my breath away.  Not very often.  So if I were you, I’d settle for putting together a “very good” piece, with or without outside help, then concentrate your efforts on running a “great” marketing and networking campaign for yourself — something that IS possible and that will tend to have a much better impact on your overall success rate, in the long run!

Click here to read his amusing observations about the subject.  And for what it’s worth, I agree with every single one of his observations and suggest every job hunter take his advice to heart!