If you are you having trouble keeping your resume to two pages, cut common space wasting things.
Are you using puffery? Puffery means that you exaggerating, giving opinions, making unsupported statements, or creating an inflated image of yourself. You are puffing. You are revealing pride and arrogance. Some examples of puffery are the words “outstanding,” “high-powered,” “dynamic,” and “overachiever.” These words turn people off. Experienced resume readers just skip these words to find the skills and education you have. Some resume readers never read past the puffery. Cut the puffery.
Focus on hard skills in your resume. Hard skills are the things you can do. Soft skills are your personality.
Include hard skills in your resume. Cut the soft skills from your resume. Save soft skills for your interview.
Cut hobbies from you resume. The purpose of your resume is to get you an interview. Your skills and education will get you an interview.
Most people who read your resume do not care about your hobbies.
Cut references from your resume. Until interviewers are giving you an offer, they usually do not check your references.
However, interviewers may enter your references into their database of contacts. Your references could become your competitors.
Cut the statement “References available upon request” from your resume. The statement serves no purpose and, including lines spaces, adds three lines to your resume.
Cut income from your resume. Giving your income on your resume takes space and may give interviewers a reason not to contact you. Advertisers often leave product prices out of ads. They create a reason for consumers to go the store. Advertisers and their clients want consumers to go the store to learn the price.
Streamline information. Put your street address, city, state, and zip code on one life. Put your email address and your phone number on one line. Put your college, degree, GPA, year graduated, and major on one line.
Reduce the font for your name to 14 pixels.
Reduce the details about earlier employment. What you did 20 years ago is less important than what you are doing now. The interviewer may barely glance at your first job out of college. Put the details of your accomplishments in your current job.
Journalists use the inverted pyramid to organize a story. The inverted pyramid creates an image of how to structure text. Journalists put the most important information at the top of an article. They give more details to the most important information. They give few details to the unimportant parts of the story. They put less important information at the bottom of the story. Use the inverted pyramid for your resume.
Cut the summary from your resume. Your resume is a summary of your experience. A paragraph titled “Summary” at the top of your resume is a dangerous wall between your contact information and the details of your experience. The interviewer may never read past the “Summary” paragraph to see your terrific accomplishments. If you need to shorten your resume, cut the “Summary” paragraph.
If you are having trouble keeping your resume to two pages, you might try these suggestions. I have seen people use these suggestions to shorten their resume and to get job interviews and jobs.
