You're thinking about your resume all wrong.

Thinking of your resume as a

? static document,

? a career timeline,

? a broad overview of all about you

is the wrong approach.

A resume serves one purpose:

? It is a strategic document showcasing the value?you can add to a specific (type of, or target) role.

When you try to stuff EVERYTHING you've ever done onto a couple of pages, you end up with anxiety, existential dread, and no job offers. This is one of the reasons writing a resume is SO HARD.

Your mindset about resumes needs to shift before you can actually write a good resume.

You need to show them the 10% of you that is 100% relevant to the job they are hiring for.

If you think you'd be good at marketing, OR product management OR business development, that's fine! You're probably right. You probably would be good at all those different things.

But, (and here is the key point), the strengths that you would bring to each of these roles are different, and how you would use your background and experience to thrive in each of these roles is different, too.

These roles need different skills and proficiencies, so your different, tailored, resumes need to make a compelling case that you have the skills and proficiencies needed.

A resume is about SHOWING previous results from your past positions, so that the hiring team feels confident you'd be able to succeed in your future role.

If you are using the job of "barista" on your resume, and applying for 2 different roles, the skills you would want to highlight from that position would be different.

EG: For a product manager position, you might want to highlight your understanding of customers' needs and your excitement for working with customers. Talk about the results you achieved. Discuss why this position made you think you'd be a great product manager.

EG. For a marketing position, you might want to highlight the art that you did on the chalkboard or the way that you designed and marketed different seasonal drinks to keep up with trends.

You did both things as a barista, but chalk board art is less likely to be a valuable or applicable result for a product management role.

Your chalk art is less likely to make a recruiter say "Wow! This person could be a great PM!"

This is what I mean when I say "tailor your resume." This is what I mean when I say, "When you're using the same resume to apply to every job, you're doing it wrong." And this is the #1 thing I see candidates failing on OVER and OVER and OVER.

How do we do this? Here are four articles to get you started on the topic:

?? The Job Description is The Problem, and you are The Solution

?? The most painless way to tailor your resume

?? Writing a results-focused resume

?? If you are applying to every job with the same resume, you're doing it wrong

And one sarcastic how to guide on how NOT to do this

?? A sarcastic how-to guide on writing a terrible resume

Happy resumeing folks.