Minor Items Left Off Your Resume May Cost You A Job

                                                                       

I am suddenly receiving a large percentage or résumés which are missing essential information –  home address, zip codes, phone numbers, email and even jobs and education.  Each of these missing elements could cost you an interview or a job.

Let’s start with this premise.  A résumé should contain all relevant information.  The reader should have a complete look at the person whose paper they are reading. After someone looks at your résumé, they should be able to obtain a quick picture of who you are and what you might be able to contribute to their company.  A résumé should make it easy for people who are interested in you to be able to find you and contact you. 

Remember, a résumé is an ad for yourself.

But I see a lot of résumés which do not contain home addresses, zip codes, home phone numbers, colleges, degrees and graduation years.  And, of course, people who are over forty or fifty tend to lop off jobs and their graduation dates.  When these items are missing, despite whatever the reasons the résumé writer has, it may communicate negatively about you.  At the least, it may communicate that you are bad on details.

Home Addresses
I fully understand why people, particularly women, are not putting their home addresses on their résumés.  But it may be counterproductive.  What one might save in security, one looses in incompleteness.  If I get a job in New Jersey and there is no NJ address in the résumé, the candidate might lose out on a perfectly appropriate job because I didn’t know to call her.

Every good recruiter or interviewer will ask for this information in an interview, but what if they forget? 

And it isn’t as if a résumé is out floating around on the internet.  The job sites - the Ladders, Monster and the like - require that companies actually have to pay to see your résumés, which, I would think, precludes most people with bad intentions.  (I am sure that I have not read of a single case of identity theft based on a résumé.  Identity theft comes from bank and credit card transactions.)

Zip Codes

Many candidate leave zip codes off their résumé address.  I ask about it and I am often told that it interfered with graphics and the format. This is a case of form over function, but your zip code is an essential element in your address.  Omitting it, may communicate that you are not detail oriented and someone might reject your résumé based on this incomplete information.

Home Phone Numbers
These days most calls are made to one’s cell.  I get it.  But there have been many times when I needed to speak to someone during the weekend and their mobile phone was turned off and either myself or a client needed to reach them.  It isn't vital but it is a good thing to consider.

Office Numbers
Office numbers are rarely on résumés any more; they are not necessary because, if I want to reach someone at their office, I can always get the main number and call the company.

Graduation Years
Every professional interviewer can immediately tell when someone is trying to fudge their graduation year so people can’t tell their age.  It is ridiculous.  Like all recruiters, I can smell it a mile away.  Leaving off that information is, to me, a sign of weakness and possibly insecurity.  Besides, when graduation years are omitted, I automatically assume that early-career jobs are missing as well.

Eliminating Jobs
Lopping off jobs is always evident.  People don’t start their careers as vice presidents!  And, besides, the experienced gained early in a career may be very relevant to current interviewing – and it certainly gives perspective to one’s background.

Depending on one’s level, a catch-all paragraph listing previous experience may or may not be relevant.  However, that experience may contain important information.  Someone who is sales trained, worked on or at a great company like Procter or IBM should make sure that this information shows.  These days, most recruiters use computers which contain all your information; single industry recruiters like myself can always tell when information is left off - sometimes candidates are in my data base for many years before I meet them.  

 Something which happened in the way distant past may make you the perfect candidate for a current job.

Social Media
Putting Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook logos on your resume is superfluous, at least for me.  It is not important to know that someone tweets.

I have observed that many LinkedIn profiles are out of synch with their resumes.  Dates are often misstated on one or the other.  Companies are often on one and not the other.  A word to the wise: be careful.

When you submit a resume to a job board and they do not respond, this could be one of the reasons.

The whole purpose of a résumé to enable people to gain a complete snapshot of you and to make it simple for them to reach you.  The information must be accurate and complete.