On resumes

I've been a corporate recruiter for several years. During that time, I've seen a bit more than 100,000 unique resumes.

After reviewing all those resumes, one thing has become obvious: almost nobody spends the right amount of time creating them. Some people spend far too much; some spend far too little. Some clearly have agonized over every word, perfecting the right action word (spearheaded instead of led, etc). Some whip something up in 10 minutes in a haphazard, half-hearted application. This claim begs the question - what is the appropriate time to spend on a resume?

Answer: An amount of time that is in relation to the effectiveness and importance of the document.

The resume is probably about the third or fourth most important thing in a job search and should be treated with such respect. If you're relying on your perfect resume to get you the job, you're doing it wrong. This isn't a trusted adage in recruiting, but it should be - posting online with your resume is how people who don't get the job apply.

This isn't to say you shouldn't put time or effort into it. You should spend enough time to accomplish the following goals:

• highlight your relevant experience, focusing on measurable success. When possible try to focus on numbers (rankings, metric impact, anything that is quantifiably tied to the bottom line)
• Don't metaphorically throw up on yourself - Avoid spelling mistakes. Don't put your picture on the top. Don't put emoticons in it.
• Make it follow a clean, consistent format.

I decide if a candidate is worth considering within the first 15 seconds of looking at a resume. If they pass that review, I'll look it over for another 20 seconds. If they still look like a potential candidate, I'll call them and see if they can string together a coherent sentence. That's it. You get about 30 seconds (at best) to get my attention. During that half a minute, I'll check out the following things roughly in this order:

• Your previous job title / briefly scan responsibilities
• Professional awards
• Gaps in employment / Job-hopping tendencies
• Education

Some will argue, then, that even more emphasis should be placed on one's resume. I will disagree, noting that every activity in the job search has an opportunity cost. If you spend 10 hours on your resume when you could have spent 2, you are missing out on 8 hours of networking, which tends to be much more effective at yielding job opportunities. And the difference between an 10-hour resume and a 2-hour resume will probably have negligible effect on whether I'm interested in picking up the phone and speaking with you.

A final thought: Candidates who come to me who have professionally networked their way into being considered for positions represent probably about 50% of the hires I make, but represent about 1-2% of the candidates.