From: jfm@jupiter.SLAC.Stanford.EDU (John F. McGowan)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Interview Experiences?
Keywords: Resumes
Date: 25 Jul 92 01:06:38 GMT
Distribution: world, local
Organization: Stanford Linear Accelerator Center

In article <1992Jul24.020955.29781@cco.caltech.edu> jeffp@cco.caltech.edu (Jeffrey E. Prisbrey) writes:
>This sounds trivial, I know, but:
>
>A curriculum vita is usually pretty long.  I have been told that this
>can be a problem, that people in the real world (tm) don't like
>resumes longer than a page.
>
>Some of the people here have experience hiring -- what are your veiws
>on resume length?
>
>thanks,
>
>jeffp
>.

	My $0.02 worth based on several months of learning about job 
hunting and seeking a job (I am getting a Ph.D. soon).

	The general consensus is to shoot for a one page resume in
industry.  _However_, if one page doesn't do justice to your skills
and experience, despite much effort to cram it into one page, do 2 or
even 3 pages.  There is a school of thought in advertising that long
copy sells better than short copy.  It is not clear that short is
always better.  I have gotten face-to-face interviews out of a quite
long resume mailed in response to classified ads.  These were highly
technical positions.  In all these cases, I shared a common background
(physics) with the people, which I suspect had more to do with it than
the length of the resume.

	However, keep in mind the typical resume reader.  This is either
(most often) a human resources person with limited technical knowledge who
also has to scan hundreds if not thousands of resumes.  Or it is a hiring
manager with a lot of work to do and quite possible a stack of many
resumes to go through.  He/she is probably going to give your resume
a very cursory look unless something catches his/her eye.

	What I have generally done is include a Skills: section at the
top of the first page of the resume.  I do this with one page resumes as
well.  This section lists all the buzzwords for the skills I possess.  For
example, if you know C, Fortran, and LISP, list these as skills.  If you
know SPICE (analog circuit emulation software) list this.  If you know
technical drawing, list this.  Try to identify the names used by industry
for your skills.  Organize the skills section so the skills particularly
sought by the company you are approaching are easily seen.  Perhaps
bold face or highlight the skills that the company is particularly
interested in.

	One class of job I have looked at I was told by a headhunter
"well, there is this myth that resumes should be only one page.  At this
level, for this kind of job, 2-3 pages is ok/ prefered".

	I would say one of the main reasons for short resumes is that in
practice the people reading resumes have very limited time to read the
resume, hence they simply wouldn't bother with a 4 page resume unless
really interested.  for this reason, you must catch the reader's interest
with a resume, especially a longer one, get him to take the time to
read your longer stuff.

	In summary, short is better, but there are exceptions.  I would
suggest working up a one page resume and a longer resume if you feel that
one page doesn't work.  Use the one page in situations where you feel the
longer resume might be out of place, be viewed as evidence of mental
imbalance or incompetence.  

				John McGowan