One page (résumé) isn’t always better than two!

Dear Sam: I currently have a résumé that is two pages long. I recently applied for a position which had a lot of details listed to provide information regarding the duties and responsibilities. In order to respond to them, I found my cover letter filled an entire page. Many of my friends have told me a cover letter should never be more than three short paragraphs at most, and a résumé should be one page. Their reasoning is that a hiring manager wouldn't have the time to look at a lot of information, and may in fact toss a lengthy résumé and cover letter. Is it best to be short with both a cover letter and résumé, and if so, what is a good option to show all the skills and abilities a company is looking for? Thanks. – Dan

Dear Dan: The old school of thought was that a résumé had to be only one page or it wouldn't get the time of day. This is not the case today and at times a two or even three page résumé suits a candidate more appropriately. Your friends are right about part of this however, and that is that a hiring manager is unlikely to scan more than one page of your résumé during their initial review. For that reason, you have to prioritize the information contained within your résumé. Therefore anything that really enhances your candidacy for a position does need to be listed on page one. Hence the reason that qualifications summaries are an essential component of effective résumés. Qualifications summaries allow candidates to provide a snapshot of their career in order to convey their most notable skills and experiences on page one of their résumé. Once the hiring manager has established interest in you as a candidate, they will take the time to review the supporting information on your résumé albeit on page two or page three.

As to the cover letter, I find a very effective way to write a cover letter is to incorporate bullet points. This breaks up the "heaviness" of a lengthy letter and highlights the most important pieces of information for the hiring manager. If you have a lot of experiences and skills that you feel are essential to communicate in your cover letter try this strategy. Open your cover letter with the position of interest and your most notable and unique qualifiers for the position. Then transition into presenting a bulleted list (I like to use three) of the experiences that you feel position you for the opportunity. Incorporate a second bulleted list exploring the softer skills you possess such as multi-tasking skills, organizational capabilities, leadership talents, etc. Then use the last paragraph to close the letter and present your action-oriented follow-up statement.

Using this strategy will allow you to communicate a lot of information while maintaining a very readable format. Use of bullet points in a cover letter also pushes the reader to the "heart" of the letter, which is what you actually want the reader to know.

Dear Sam: I have had a lot of different jobs in the last 5 years. I've been laid off from most of them after working for just a few months. As a result, it looks like I am a bad risk to any hiring employer who looks at my résumé. If I send out 20 résumés, I may get 1 or 2 responses and the ones I do get will ask me about the number of jobs I've had over the past 5 years. I can usually address it at the interview but there are so many that won't even give me the interview. Should I not list all the different jobs on my résumé? If I don't list them, my dates of employment will not match up. I don't want to lie about the dates so I'm debating if I should leave the dates off, although you say never to do that. I feel like I'm between a rock and a hard spot in getting a personal interview from my résumé. – Carole

Dear Carole: I understand your dilemma. You definitely don’t want to omit dates as the hiring manager could assume a worse situation. Instead make sure you are not using months on your résumé. When you display your time of employment in years only, it can really clear up a messy looking background. Also, for positions that are completely unrelated, or that you held for such a short period of time, it is entirely appropriate to not include them within your résumé. If you were completing an employment application you would need to mention them, but your résumé does not have to be a narrative of everything you have ever done. I think when you take out unrelated or extremely short-term positions, and replace the months with just years, you will see a much crisper image of your background emerge.

Samantha Nolan is a certified professional résumé writer and owner of Ladybug Design, a full-service résumé writing firm. Reach her at dearsam@ladybug-design.com, www.ladybug-design.com, or 1-888-9-LADYBUG (1-888-952-3928).