Get that resume in shape

Dust Off Your Resume

The resume is a document in progress. Even presidents of the United States, justices of the Supreme Court and movie stars updates their resumes.

Work on your resume for at least one hour a week and do not send it out until you have worked on it for at least 40 hours. The exception is for the job at Burger King or Target. Send them anything.

Yes, there are people who will write your resume for under $100 dollars and you know they do not spend 40 hours on it. It is not that they are not trying to give you quality. Many of them are free-lance writers who will give you a great format and good grammar. I have written resumes for clients and I did my best in the time I had.

In the world of high paying jobs, however, you need a high power resume and that takes A MINIMUM OF 40 HOURS. You must do-it yourself.

Your resume is never finished until you are retired or dead. Keep perfecting it. Have several resumes. You will probably have several careers and you will need a different resume for each.

Here is how to do it.

1. Work for about one hour a week on the resume.

2. Save back copies. Every January, I save the current resume as “Resume 20__” That leaves the last draft of last year's resume still there. If I make several changes, and many of them don't work out, I can go back to last year's resume. Professional writers usually save their first drafts and often many drafts after that. You need to save the first draft and many drafts of your resumes.

3. Have someone proof read the resume from time to time. Their efforts count toward the 40 hours.

4. To check for errors, read the resume backwards.

5. A resume is one page, but start planning your Curriculum Vitae. The term means life work. It is a document you will need for jobs in management, higher education and advanced technologies. Anything that is edited out of the resume can be saved for the Curriculum Vitae which is often called a CV can run for many pages. 

How many hours have you spent working on your resume. Estimate if you are not sure.