Short Resume vs. Long Resume

If you're a job seeker (like me), you've probably heard that your resume should be as short as possible--one page if possible, two max. This is what I thought too until I started hearing conflicting advice. Some would tell me I should include my complete job history, skills, and experience, with all the nitty gritty details, no matter how many pages that requires. But I would still get the original advice from others--no way should your resume be more than 2 pages, they'd say, no way! Both lines of advice would come from professionals--resume writers, HR specialists, recruiters, etc.--you know, people who you would think know what they're talking about. And whoever the source of this advice, they would be adamant about it--no wishy-washy maybes, no I think, no I-could-be-wrong-but...--it was more like: for sure, I'm certain, it's a fact! I even had a recruiter tell me that the one (or two) page resume rule is a myth.

Well, you can imagine how disconcerting this was for me. Maybe you've experienced it too. This isn't advice on what shirt I should wear to a party, it's essential for getting the attention of employers and finding a job! One would think those dishing out this advice would get their act together and sort out their disagreement. It's like getting opposite advice from two doctors: one says you should get more exercise while another says you need more rest and relaxation. How does one know what the right advice is?

Well, since I wasn't going to get any answers by asking yet more specialists in the field (that would just repeat the pattern of getting advice that conflicts with other advice), I took it upon myself to do a little research and investigation. In this post, I want to relay my findings so that other job seekers don't have to struggle with this confusion and can make sense out of why this conflicting advice exists. Please note, however, that I am not an expert in writing resumes, recruiting, hiring, job candidate matching, or anything of that sort. I am a software developer just looking for a job. But I have gathered some insight into this confusion that I think will help others. So please take what I say with a grain of salt and make your own judgment.

Just a note about terminology before I continue... I think it makes a better impression to call your short resume your "summary resume" and your long resume your "full resume". I can just see a hiring manager hearing "long resume" and thinking, "Oh God, how long IS it?" Whereas, "full resume" sounds, at least to me, like "you're getting the full package (lucky you!)". So I'm going to use this terminology in this post rather than the "short" vs. "long" terminology.

The first thing I noticed is that when I get the advice to submit a full resume regardless of how many pages that requires, it's from recruiters and headhunters. Recruiters and headhunters love the details. The more, the better. It helps them build a comprehensive profile on you and better match you to job opportunities. So it's no surprise that this or that recruiter or headhunter might ask you for a full resume with all the meticulous details, and don't worry about how long it is.

The advice to stick to a summary resume, on the other hand, comes from a resume writer I hired to polish up my resume, employers and hiring managers I've talked to, and (ironically) one recruiter who disagreed with the other recruiters I consulted. One hiring manager told me that when sifting through the hundreds of resumes that come across her desk, she's going to toss out any resume that's more than 2 pages. With hundreds of resumes to sift through, she doesn't have time to read through each and every one, so she gives priority to the short ones. She told me that the ability to be succinct and capture a lot of information in just a few words is a highly valuable skill, and it says a lot about the candidate's abilities and work ethic (all positive, of course). When you get it from the horse's mouth (i.e. those actually reading your resume and making decisions), it's hard to brush it off as just someone's opinion. She's actually telling me what she does with resumes that are too long.

At one point, I had an interesting conversation with a recruiter about this very issue (full vs. summary resume). The way she explained it, recruiters like her do the filtering for the employer. The hiring manager I spoke to had to filter through hundreds of resumes and only the summary ones survived. But when the employer hires a recruiting agency, the filtering is done for them and they receive only a handful of resumes (10 to 20 or thereabouts). This makes the resume pile much more manageable, and it frees up more time, time they can spend reading through all the gory details of a 10 pages resume (yes, my full resume is really that long!).

Because reading through resumes and matching them to job opportunities is all recruiting companies do (or at least it's a big part of it... recruiters, correct me if I'm wrong), they have time. It's what they do! And so the filtering process is not based on resume length but on your qualifications and fit for this or that particular role. So even though a filtering process still occurs, you don't have to worry that length will be a huge factor.

Again, I'm no expert in resume writing or job searching strategies, but based on the above information, it seems logical to me that there is a place for full resumes and a place for summary resumes. My approach is to maintain two versions of my resume--a summary version and a full version--and submit the summary one when I'm applying directly for a job (ex. submitting on an online form or handing it over in person), and the full one when submitting to a recruiter or a headhunter. For good measure, I always ask if the recruiter or headhunter prefers the summary version or the full version--just to be sure--and whatever the answer, I trust that it's in good hands once I submit. I would recommend this approach to anyone who's struggled with the same confusion (my lack of expertise on the matter notwithstanding).

Before closing this post, I also want to touch on what they call the "algorithm". This is another term that was tossed around a lot in my investigation. The "algorithm" they're talking about is the software that some online application forms put your resume through before it gets to the hiring manager. It is said that the algorithm can sometimes filter your resume out if it deems it inadequate or insufficient, or for any other reason the employer might not want to see it. One of these reasons, it's said by some, is the length of your resume. If it detects that your resume is greater than a certain length, it will simply toss it (it would be nice if it gave some feedback explaining why it was rejected and offered a chance to submit an improved resume... just a thought).

Now, I can't vouch for this because I've never seen the algorithm nor have I verified what exactly it does (to be honest, it strikes me as a sort of "Boogeyman"), but I'll repeat what one recruiter told me: she said that the algorithm doesn't actually filter out your resume (based on length or any other criteria) but categorizes it according to what it thinks your area of expertise is. So if it thinks you're a software developer, it will throw you into the "software developer" category; if it thinks you're in finance, it will throw you into the "finance" category--but nothing's tossed out. This might mean that the hiring manager will never see your resume--if, for example, it throws you into the wrong category and the hiring manager is only interested in applicants from the "right" category--but I'm speculating here. Now, as much as this might be true in some cases, it's not like there's one monolithic, overarching, universal algorithm that all resumes go through. What exactly the algorithm does most likely depends on the application form, who you're applying to, what portal you're applying through, and so on. Why? Because each one of these, if it uses an algorithm at all, probably uses a different algorithm from the others. So whereas one company might leverage an algorithm that merely categorizes your resume, another company might leverage an algorithm that really does filter out resumes based on some criteria like length. And then some companies might not use an algorithm at all. And those that do use an algorithm can probably program the algorithm to do whatever they want. So my advice would be to err on the side of caution. If you don't know what the algorithm will do (or if there even is one), it's better to play it safe and submit a one page resume (two pages max) in order to reduce the chances that the algorithm will toss out your resume as if you never even applied.

So I hope this helps. If you're a job seeker like me and you've come across the same conflicting advice about summary resume vs. full resume, I hope the above sheds some light on the subject and makes things more clear. More to the point, I hope this gives you a strategy for deciding whether to submit a summary or a full resume. If you're like me, the strategy is: submit summary resumes when applying directly to the employer or hiring manager; but if applying through a recruiter or headhunter, ask if they'd prefer a summary or full resume and follow up accordingly (sometimes, admittedly, they don't reply to your questions--particularly when communicating through email--in which case I just submit both the summary version and the full version--tedious, I know, but at least it covers all your bases). It would be nice to know exactly what the employer or hiring manager wants, but no one has a crystal ball--so instead we have to rely on strategies like this. This strategy in particular is the best I can think of so far. If you can recommend any other strategies, or if you have anything to add to this topic, or have questions, I would love to hear from you. Otherwise, I hope this post helps in your job searching journey--and more importantly, I hope you land your perfect dream job! Good luck!