Nine Resume Killers

Business Insider lists nine resume killers as follows:

• Hobbies -- No one cares and they are a waste of time and space.
• Objective -- It's obvious what your objective it - to get the job you're applying for.
• Personal pronouns (I, me, my) -- It's understood the resume is about you.
• Irrelevant experience -- Just adds clutter.
• Images -- Tacky and distracting.
• Professional contact information -- Do not use your current office number or email.
• Buzzwords -- Turn-off for hiring managers.
• Present tense for a past job -- Only use this for current job.
• Unnecessary words -- Wastes valuable space.

Here's my take on these:

• Hobbies -- For the most part, I agree. No one wants to see "video games" listed when you're applying for a business position. However, if your hobbies help in some way, I'd include them. For instance, if you're applying for a marketing job at a video game maker, the fact that you're rated in the top 100 in the world on their main game is a selling point.
• Objective -- I hate objectives and completely ignore them as a hiring manger. As such they are simply space wasters -- and it's usually prime space they waste (at the top).
• Personal pronouns (I, me, my) -- Of course. This is resume writing 101 and when someone uses personal pronouns it screams "amateur!"
• Irrelevant experience -- I would summarize it if it's needed to otherwise cover work gaps.
• Images -- Unless 1) you're a creative of some type (like a graphic designer) or 2) in an industry where it is expected (newscaster, model).
• Professional contact information -- Don't we all have our own private cell numbers and email addresses by now?
• Buzzwords -- Again, it screams "amateur!"
• Present tense for a past job -- Do you know how to write or not? Doing this says "no".
• Unnecessary words -- You need to be short and sweet.

A good list overall. What do you think of it?

Comments

[Travis]

Buzzwords is a tough one to have a blanket "no" on. As a job seeker it's tough if you're applying via an online or electronic system because so many of these now use a keyword algorithm and auto-reject if it doesn't match up and meet the specified criteria.

Of course a warm contact inside to help with the application is always preferred there are times this doesn't happen. Additionally there are also times where you still have to put it through the online system and hope that someone can manually check and pull it if it doesn't go through.

[Mrs. Picky Pincher]

I hate hate hate objectives. I looked at so many resumes and I was astonished at the sheer amount of people who put "personal goals" and "objectives" on there. I just want to see people's experiences--I usually don't even care about where they went to school or their GPA. Work experience is the most valuable way to get a job in my field.

[Benjamin Davis]

I agree with all of it. I would add you should keep it very small. One page works best.

[DIY$]

I've reviewed a lot of resumes lately and many still need to figure out the basics like avoiding typos and sticking to one page.