20 RESUME MISTAKES TO

WATCH OUT FOR

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

10 RESUME MISTAKES TO AVOID

BY JACK WALLEN

What is your resume? A hassle you must undergo to walk into an interview with any hope of getting hired?
Or is it a history of your professional life—ready to be shared with others to make lasting, career-forging
connections?

If you view your resume as nothing more than a hurdle, you probably don’t take it as seriously as you should.
But if you value it as a game-changer, you understand its importance. Unfortunately, those who are new to the
world of resumes (and even seasoned jobseekers) often make mistakes that can take them out of contention.
Here are 10 resume mistakes to watch out for.

1: LYING
It shouldn’t have to be said ... but surprisingly, it needs to be said. People falsify or “pad” their resumes all the
time. Thing is, it will come back to haunt you. It’s a small world that only gets smaller with every passing day.
Even the slightest exaggeration on your resume can catch up with you. Keep to the facts. Don’t stretch or
bend the truth. Don’t alter employment dates to keep from having gaps in your timeline. Don’t claim duties or
experiences you never had. Don’t. Don’t. Don’t.

2: STATING AN UNATTAINABLE GOAL

I’m just going to say this right now. Everyone knows you want to someday be the CEO of your own company.
Everyone knows you want to stare down from above and run the corporate machine. Even beyond the
unattainable goal, get rid of that objective that has littered resumes for decades. It’s worthless. Saying that your
goal is to climb the corporate ladder and be as wealthy as Bill Gates just piles on the bad. Scratch that section
altogether and you’ll have more room for what matters—experience and skills.

3: ADDING ACHIEVEMENTS THAT AREN’T

We get it. You were prom queen or you were voted most likely to succeed in business (without even trying)
by your peers in high school. But consider this: Are those achievements really achievements? The last thing
you need is to puff up your resume with awards that have no relevance for the career you’re chasing after.
If you were elected president of your school’s computer club four years running or you were awarded a
citizenship award for your volunteer work at a local community center ... then maybe we’re talking. Academic
achievements? Certainly. Just be judicious in choosing those highlights.

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

4: CITING PREVIOUS SALARIES

Please don’t include your previous salaries on your resume. There are so many reasons not to do this. Here’s
one simple, self-serving reason: It will give your prospective employer a springboard for determining your
new salary. Your goal should be to make more—so don’t give the interviewer the means to undercut your true
worth. Leave that information off so you can approach salary needs from a neutral point.

5: INCLUDING PERSONAL INFORMATION

There is no reason to include the fact that you’re married, have 2.5 kids, drive a minivan, attend X church, have
a man cave, coach your middle child’s soccer team, or think “khaki is a way of life.” All of that will eventually
come out in the wash as you begin your career in the IT or business world. On a resume, it has no place. If you
don’t agree, consider this. What happens if you go into an interview and the hiring manager happens to hate
soccer or khaki? You’ve immediately put yourself on the defensive side of things and have to work your way
around a preconceived notion.

6: LISTING YOUR AGE

It’s not illegal for interviewers to ask you your age. They can. They shouldn’t. But they can. Most often, it
won’t happen. If it does, however, I’d recommend that you terminate the interview. Regardless of whether an
interviewer plans on asking that question, you shouldn’t prompt them or give them reason to question your
value simply because you added your birthdate or age on that document. Leave it out.

7: PROVIDING REFERENCES
Don’t include references. Don’t even add “Available upon request.” You’re just wasting valuable real estate. If
interviewers need references, they’ll ask. Saying that your references are available upon request is like saying that
you promise to come to work if hired. It’s implied. Besides, the space on that single-page document is far too
important to be used up by worthless statements.

8: WRITING IN THIRD PERSON

Jack believes that being snarky or trying to impress by writing in third person makes you look cocky. Jack is
certain the vast majority of people hate it when others talk of themselves in this manner. In fact, Jack insists
that you never refer to yourself in third person unless you’re trying to make your co-workers laugh. Jack would
go so far as to not even write in first person. Why? I’m fairly certain it is understood every detail on your
resume is about you. Agree with Jack ... everyone is doing it.

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

9: USING A LESS-THAN-PROFESSIONAL EMAIL ADDRESS

It doesn’t matter that you’ve used bromancewithbooze@gmail.com as your primary email address for years.
Leave it off your resume. If that’s the only email account you have, create a new one with a professional name
(as in, your name). Even if you use it only for resumes, do it. (Along the same lines, don’t use an AOL account
address—especially if you’re applying for a tech job!)

10: INCLUDING YOUR CURRENT BUSINESS CONTACT

INFORMATION
Do this and you might wind up receiving a call at your current place of employment by your prospective
employer. Never list the contact information of your current business. If the potential new employers want
to contact your current business, all they have to do is look up the name to get the details. The only phone
number you should include on your resume is your mobile number. Nothing more. And don’t forget, your
current employer might well be monitoring your phone calls and emails. Let that be your guide when you add
information to your resume.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Your resume should help potential employers navigate the waters of your professional past and present. Don’t
muddy those waters with unnecessary information that could send you to the slush pile. Keep it relevant, fresh,
and to the point, and you’ll increase the chances of getting to the next round of interviews.

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

10 THINGS THAT COULD RUIN YOUR

RESUME
BY TONI BOWERS
There is one goal for your resume: to show a potential employer why you are the best person for the job.
However, there are so many things that can get in the way of what should be a clear message. Here are 10 of
the most common mistakes made in resumes.

1. YOUR FOCUS IS WRONG

This may be one of the most difficult concepts for job hunters to grasp, but your resume is not something you
create for yourself. You create it, format it, and organize it so that it’s easy for a hiring manager to gauge your fit
with the job they’re offering. It’s important to tailor your resume to each job you apply to. I promise you, no
hiring manager is going to study your resume for specifics that would apply to the job at hand. Your resume has
to make them obvious.

For example, if you’re applying for a project manager position, highlight accomplishments that show your
expertise in project management. While the bulk of your work experience may be in tech support, it’s really not
applicable to the job at hand, so don’t concentrate on the day-to-day minutiae. Concentrate instead on those
instances where you demonstrated leadership, ingenuity, and organizational skills.

2. YOU HAVE TYPOS AND GRAMMAR ERRORS IN YOUR

RESUME
Hiring executives have a low threshold for resume bloopers. A TopResume survey last year found that spelling
and grammar mistakes top the list of “resume deal-breakers.” But sometimes even the most careful people can
miss a typo or two. Here are some tips for making sure you’re sending out pristine copies of your resume:

• Enlist detail-oriented family members, friends, or mentors to proofread your resume and provide honest
feedback.

• Take a timeout. Before submitting your resume, take a break and come back to it with a fresh set of eyes.
You might catch something you missed the first time.

• Print a copy. It’s easy to overlook typos or formatting mistakes when reading a resume on a monitor, so
print it out for review.

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

• Try a new perspective. Sometimes readers inadvertently skip over parts they have read previously. Review
your resume backward to help avoid this problem. You can “read” it from bottom to top or from the right
side of a line to the left. This takes away the mental expectation that sometimes tricks us into thinking a
word is spelled correctly or that causes us to overlook a missing or repeated word.

• Read it out loud. This can also help you find phrases that don’t make sense.

3. YOUR RESUME IS TOO LONG

There are various opinions on how long a resume should be. Resume experts commonly advise keeping it to
one page, but some say that a two-page resume is okay, particularly if you have 10 or more years of experience
related to your goal or you need space to list and prove your technical knowledge.

Either way, you should keep your resume lean yet meaningful. List only your selling points that are relevant to
the job at hand and let go of some details that have no bearing on your current goal.

4. YOUR RESUME IS NOT VERY READABLE

Never underestimate resume formatting. Consider that some hiring managers have to look through hundreds
of resumes for each job opening. Also consider that those employers will usually take, at most, only 35 seconds
to look at a one-page resume before deciding whether to keep it or discard it. You should design your resume
so that employers can read the document easily and process information quickly.

To judge the formatting of your resume, ask yourself these questions:

• Am I using too many fonts? It’s best to stick to one or two fonts. You can vary the size and add bold if
necessary to make headings stand out, but don’t go overboard. You don’t want your resume to look like a
ransom note built out of newspaper clippings.

• Am I overdoing the emphasis thing? As I said in the previous point, you can create emphasis by using
bold, italics, underlining, etc. However, you don’t want to mix methods or overuse them. You would not, for
example, want to CAPITALIZE, italicize, and underline pieces of text. It’s overkill and hard on the eyes.

• Is there too much text on the page? There’s nothing more intimidating to a reviewer than blocks of
dense text on a resume. Here are some things to keep in mind: Set your margins at about 1-inch all around;
use bulleted points to break up paragraphs of text that list your accomplishments; and make sure your
sections are distinct. Don’t be afraid of white space! If you have to choose between crammed-in text and an
extra resume page, go with the latter.

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

You can see below how much more readable the list of accomplishments is when put into bullets separated by
white space.

5. YOUR NAME APPEARS ONLY IN THE DOCUMENT HEADER

Your name should appear prominently at the top of your resume body text. If it only appears in the header, it
may not get read by the scanning software and your resume could get lost in the shuffle.

6. YOUR RESUME DOESN’T INCLUDE KEYWORDS

It’s an unfortunate fact of life that many organizations use scanning software when vetting resumes. This is
often done as the preliminary step in weeding out any candidates whose qualifications and experience don’t
match the job being filled. So be very sure that you pepper your resume with relevant keywords. That is to say,
don’t use one in every sentence and don’t use keywords that you don’t have experience with just for the sake of
sneaking in under the radar. Sooner or later you’ll have to own up. The job description is the best starting place
for finding relevant keywords.

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

7. YOU LIST YOUR EXPERIENCE INSTEAD OF YOUR

ACCOMPLISHMENTS
First of all, never use expressions such as “Duties included” or “Responsibilities included.” These lists outline
only what was in your job role; they don’t say whether you did them well or not. And they don’t show how you
stood out from the other people in your company who were doing the same things.

To help rewrite your responsibilities as accomplishments, try asking yourself:

• What special things did I do to set myself apart?

• How did I do the job better or differently than anyone else?

• What did I do to make it my own?

• What were some problems or challenges that I faced?

• How did I solve or overcome those problems?

• What were the results of my efforts?

• How did the company benefit from my performance? For example, did it make or save money or save time?

8. YOU USE VAGUE VERBS AND SUBJECTIVE ADJECTIVES

Avoid, at all costs, those abstract verb phrases like “Assisted with...” or “Handled...” or “Managed....” Those
phrases can mean almost anything. Every time you’re tempted with one of those phrases, ask yourself How?
How did you assist with something? What exactly did you do? Also, try using more dynamic words like
“constructed,” “coordinated,” “determined,” “established,” and “executed.”

By the same token, it’s easy to say you “skillfully completed” some task or that you have “extraordinary people
skills.” But unless you can back those statements up with concrete evidence, it’s just you saying something good
about yourself. So explain why your task completion was skillful. Did it come in under budget and within time
constraints? What evidence do you have of your great people skills? Did you get recognized for this in some
way? Were you assigned more end users than other staffers? Any detail you can offer in explanation will help.

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 20 RESUME MISTAKES TO WATCH OUT FOR

9. YOUR RESUME IS LIKE ALL THE OTHERS

Of course you shouldn’t try to make yourself stand out by formatting your entire resume in a cursive font. But
there are ways to make your resume a bit more sophisticated or engaging then the competition’s. Toward this
goal consider:

• Including a link to your online portfolio. Online portfolios can be anything from a blog or a website to a
dedicated solution (something that’s just a portfolio, without any of the extra stuff). Make it something
that loads fast, is visually professional, and showcases your accomplishments, mission statement, career
progression, and leadership aptitude. Before you put the link in your resume, ask yourself how well the site
answers questions any potential employers might have about you.

• Adding a QR code that directs potential employers to carefully selected, customized web pages for more
information about you. It’s a tech-savvy way to illustrate your strengths.

10. YOU EXAGGERATE (OR FABRICATE) YOUR EDUCATION

AND EXPERIENCE
Decision makers routinely conduct background checks and online research to verify a resume. And sometimes
what they find out can embarrass you down the line. According to a 2018 CareerBuilder survey, 75% of HR
managers say they’ve found lies on resumes. At the very least, don’t claim education that you don’t have—but
you should also be careful about exaggerating your experience. It could take only a few targeted questions in an
interview to reveal your deception.

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