Again it's really important here that if you're going to put interests, please link it back to the job
You're applying for why would they care and saying that it can be a really great way for people to connect with you and feel?
More around who you are as a person sharing the same value sharing the same kind of motivations
Hey Badasses, welcome back to the Badass Careers youtube channel
Which is all about helping you to craft the kind of career that has you really happy on Mondays and the other
days of the week too so
This video is all about what not to put on your resume
You can leave that off and a lot of people say to me
how could I possibly get my resume down to one page or two pages and it's like this this is how so just
Public service announcement if you don't have already grab my Killer Resume Cheat Sheet. It's completely free
it gives you a sample resume and breaks down why it works and how you can make a resume that really stands out. It's in the
description box down below
For you to enjoy so without further ado
Let's just jump straight in and talk about these things that you can definitely just leave off your resume
So this is a huge mistake
So just generally the first tip is like this does not have to be every little single thing you've ever done in your career
That's a lie. That is such a big lie
So I'm a big fan of using career highlights
if you've got 20 years of experience like I do not want to see your
Internships on there like you do know. I have to go all the way back to the 90s to have a compelling
Resume and story so career highlights work, experience highlights. That kind of stuff is absolutely fine
Like do you want to leave off entire jobs?
Maybe not depending like you don't want to just randomly leave off five years worth of jobs on your resume
but you don't have to go all the way back necessarily to every little part-time job internship you ever had and
Depending on the job you're going for it might be quite strategic to leave a particular position off
it just depends but you don't have to put
Everything there for one and then you don't have to put within the job everything you were responsible for
So I did this I did that I did that
I did those things like just listing out your job description and just telling me all the things and a big long paragraph about all
The things that you did and then role think about your audience. Think about who's reading this resume
They want to know about your skills your career stories your accomplishments
I don't want your resume to be a snoozefest and I don't want you to just direct them from this so think about it for
Every role what is the mark you made on the role? What does the impact you had? How did you make things better?
How did you contribute what did you achieve and just pull out those things you can have just three to five bullet points?
That's it under each experienced recruiters generally just skim the first view anyway
so leave out those sentences that will distract the recruiter from your
Accomplishments or things that you're really proud of, leave out the fluff about how you are also responsible for admin tasks and general continuous
Improvement like anything like that is gone. I want you to
Dramatically shorten and condenses experiences that don't have anything to do with where you want to go now about the future
I want you to bold things that you want to make a really great first impression
You want to highlight to the recruiter?
But make sure that the other stuff is more subtle and appearance and even with certifications guys in education
Yes, It looks cool it you've been sent on ten different training programs. But is it relevant for this role?
I had someone going for a project management role and they had done a
Certification and teaching English as a second language like, you know, just and it goes it's not everything you've ever done
I know you're amazing. I know you've done all the things but just
Tailor it down to your pitch for this particular role. The second thing that you can remove is a waffle
So removing any additional language excess language that doesn't need to be there. Your resume is a marketing pitch and
Every single word on that document should add value
I want you to go through and be like why is it here doesn't make a difference
Does it help my case if it doesn't add value?
Throw it out and in terms of using really simple
Language that's concise and structured and very very easy to read because that's key as well
This is just one example instead of saying "Responsible for managing advertising department's budget."
It's just "Managed advertising department's budget."
You know, so just try and make sure that is speaking actively not passively. The next thing to ditch completely is references available upon request
They know I mean like everyone knows so you're going for a job, of course
They know that they can call your references upon request if you get to that stage of the process, right?
Okay, gotcha, but there's two main options here firstly like ditch it completely take it off. I don't want to see that at all
That's option one and it's completely fine option two is provide references
But give me their name and their LinkedIn already and their phone number
It can do not quite a nice positive feeling and some trust
I feel comfortable doing that in general recruiters will not contact them before asking you anyway, but if you're concerned about that
Just don't put them on if you do want to put them in or even give them a taster
You can even provide a quote like things
My client says about me or like my current manager said and put some quotes and maybe their job title something like that
You can give them a bit of a teaser
that's another kind of creative and alternative thing to do on your resume if you feel comfortable doing that as well the next thing you
can get off that resume are
Really generic computer skills. So if you've been working for 10 years like we know that you know how to use Microsoft Word like, thanks
Unless the Job Description calls for it. Then it might be a matter of the applicant tracking system looking for that
So as the Job Description says you need to have Microsoft Office suite then ok, put it on there
but like otherwise
I'm pretty sure you know a
Professional with 10 years of experience knows how to use PowerPoint and Microsoft Word and that kind of thing just more focus on the specific
Industry tools that are gonna be like helpful and specific for this job in saying that though again
Don't list all
The programs you ever use and are able to use
Like the ones that are gonna make the difference for this role and will be useful for this role. Yes
Now the next thing that you can take off your resume are around generic interests
So when I say generic interests, I mean things like I enjoy reading
Travel, running, Pilates, and yoga, you know like things like that
So that's not gonna help you to stand out and it's kind of taking up precious space
Now I do think that interests can play a part especially if you're a great because it differentiates you from the pack
But there's a couple things that you can do here
So firstly what you can do is tell me why you do what you do
So rather than just calling it interest you could say something like more about me or something like that
So you say something like I run marathons because I thrive on setting big goals and achieving those, you know
so give me a little bit more context and
let me know what it says about you as a person you can think about things like I'm
motivated in my professional and personal life by doing X
I'm on the board for the homeless dog shelter because you know, what? Does it say about you as a person again?
It's really important here that if you're going to put interests, please link it back to the job
You're applying for why would they care and saying that it can be a really great way for people to connect with you and feel
More around who you are as a person sharing the same values
Sharing the same kind of motivations so it can be quite strategic in that way
The other option with your interests is to make them as quirky as possible if it's if it's true
So something quirky could very well strike an emotional chord or trigger a nice icebreaker or something to discuss mid interview
So it's a bit more of a risk
I mean
It shouldn't be a risk if you're going for companies that have a culture that fit the kind of person you are
But if you're open, like if you're willing to be really genuine and open with us
Imagine an interest section that said something more like enjoys playing Settlers of Catan loves Quentin Tarantino films
Mediterranean cooking and Lego Star Wars collections
Do you see how that might actually strike a chord with someone and be like me too. The psychology behind this?
is that when we share our
uncommon
Commonalities and someone sees that we both stand out and have the feeling that we fit in
Automatically at the same time so it can be a risk worth taking it's a huge bonding opportunity for your resume reader
So don't waste it
So as you can see, it's either leave them off entirely
Especially if you need the space to be more strategic and if you're going for a more mid-level role in there
And you've just found other things that are really gonna shift the dial for you on your resume and leave them off
That's fine or if you're gonna leave them in don't waste that space now
The next thing that you can leave off is personal data, and I know that this is really differs by country norms
Okay
but in general I think you can leave off things like the marital status
the level of your health and your full address as well. I've seen that a lot people putting their full address
Just put the maybe like maybe the suburb the city
But just put the city like you do not need to put your full address on there because there's so much bias that comes into
That and maybe you're trying to get them to you know, think good things like I live in a nice neighborhood
so I'll put my full address and impress them but who knows what effect it might have on the person and
Likewise for like less good suburbs. So just leave it off anything that can elicit human bias
Like if you put on their three lovely kids to age 12 13 and 17
Who knows what the recruiter might think? Oh gosh. That's a handful
How are they how we're gonna rely on them to pull long hours how I you know, it's lose-lose
So just leave it off
Likewise here leave off the phone if I mean if it's the norm in your country to not put a photo don't put a photo
Like the reason in the States, for example, there are laws against
Discrimination and bias from from photos. So if you put a photo on there you might have recruiters alike
I don't touch it
like, you know, I don't like don't even go near it because they'll feel in a position where you know
They could be making a decision based on bias, which would make them feel uncomfortable
If the norm for your country for your state for your region is no photos just follow that norm
I would say so leave the photo off even though a lot of the modern templates do and include a photo
So the standard in New Zealand and the UK in Australia US Canada
I'm pretty sure as no photo. Now some countries
You have to put a photo like if you do not put a photo in France
There are credibly like what's wrong with this person? What are they trying to hide like?
Yes, it's a risk for discrimination
But hey, isn't the whole process as a you know
By the time they meet you like your name your suburb potentially your photo your the previous companies your work
There are all sources of bias and discrimination
Unfortunately, and at some point they're gonna meet you in the interview and see what you look like anyway
And they can just find you on LinkedIn. So
It's an interesting topic and the answer to that is just firstly yes
we need to train more managers and recruiters on unconscious bias and not bringing that into the recruitment process first and foremost and
Just follow the country norms on this one
But yeah
don't put a photo if it's not the norm do put a photo if there is one there's no real other options there just to
make sure
You take off your resume a crappy photos
So we want to make sure that these photos are not necessarily professionally taken that clear you're smiling
You're making eye contact. You don't look like a serial killer. You don't look like you've cropped out like a facebook photo
Where your friends have beers on their hands
Then you're at a party or a wedding. Like please don't crop out a photo when you're in a crowd. Oh my gosh
Anything like that
just make sure that if you are gonna put a photo that
At the sharp and sleek and you can actually upload your photo to a site called photo filler.com
I'll link it in the description box down below and you can actually get people
Rating and ranking your photo based on various factors around perceived confidence perceived likeability these kinds of things
So if you are keen for that
you can actually
Upload a few photos that your choosing between and see what the voters say and it might help you to choose which photo you end
Up going with in the end
The last thing to take off your resume is every single reason you've left the job
like I've seen the resumes like that and they tell you every single reason why they left and honestly
It looks quite defensive and it just looks like you're justifying yourself
So leave that off you you can't win with this one
Like if you lift a job voluntarily that's against you if you got laid off, it doesn't necessarily work in your favor
Anyway, because people like oh, is it a euphemism for something. If you say you leave to go traveling?
Maybe they'll be like oh, so maybe they you know want to do that again
I think in general like you don't need to justify like why you're leaving now in this particular
context post Covid
You can provide a little disclaimer like role affected by covid 19 pandemic or whatever that is
That's something understandable because everyone's going through that and yeah, I mean if you want to mention that and go for it
That's completely fine
And if you want to meet - quite a big gap just with a sentence like about what you were up to completely fine
But please don't give me a justification for every single move. You've ever made throughout the course of your career
So guys, I hope that that helps you when it comes to writing your next strategic
resume as I said
You can download my Killer Resume Cheat Sheet in the description box down below
And hopefully after doing all of us your resume feels like 10 pounds lighter and as nice
Short and concise and all that good stuff as well
If your hesitating and you have any questions about or should I shouldn't I anything like that?
Please ask me down below. I do get back to my comments
I will response it back to you
And otherwise if you want more inspiration around finding your career purpose figuring out your next step branding yourself
So CV's, cover letters, LinkedIn, all that good stuff. Job search strategies,
interview strategies. Hit subscribe and join the badass careers fan because you'll be getting new videos out
Every single week to help you with your career development think of me as your personal HR manager. Otherwise guys until the next video
Stay badass, and I'll see you next time. Bye