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Career Assistance: Résumés
What is a Résumé?
A résumé is typically a one to two page document that provides a high level summary of your education, work experience, volunteer experience, certifications, continuing education/professional development and notable skills.General Tips for Writing a Résumé
- Be succinct!
- Make sure your headers, fonts and spacing is consistent.
- Ensure that you use lower and upper case letters appropriately.
- Proofread! You only have one chance to make a good first impression, don't ruin it with grammatical errors.
- Read the job posting carefully, and target your language to match the skills needed as posted.
Ways to Organize a Résumé
- Chronological
- A chronological résumé lists your work history in reverse chronical order. This means your most recent experiences are listed first.
- Many employers prefer this style as it clearly lays out your work history.
- Useful in emphasizing a steady employment record.
- May not be as conducive in emphasizing transferable skills as a functional résumé.
- If you have a solid work history, it can be used to illustrate career growth.
- Functional
- A functional résumé focuses on your skills and experience, rather than employment dates.
- Not favored by many employers.
- An advantage of this types of résumé includes the ability to place less emphasis on large gaps in work history.
- Highlights skills more easily compared to a chronological résumé.
- This type of résumé is beneficial if you have little or no work experience, in the middle of a career transition, or if there is a large gap in employment.
- Combination
- A combination résumé uses both characteristic of a chronological and functional résumé.
- Useful in illustrating your work history along with the skills you have developed.
What Should You Include in Your Résumé?
- Header: This includes your identifying information (name, address, contact information)
- Objective: An objective can be used to make a statement that can be used to support the rest of your résumé. If you already have a cover letter, an objective may not be necessary.
- Work and Clinical Experience: Include your job title, name of employer, city, start and end dates, and brief summary of skills, responsibilities and accomplishments.
*Students: Include your clinical placements and experiences as an ESN if applicable. - Education: List your degree, name of educational institution, city, month and year of graduation. List degrees in reverse chronological order (most recent first), if you have more than one degree
- Honours and Awards: Highlight your awards achieved through academics, your workplace, volunteer work or professional association/college/union.
- Volunteer experiences: Highlight volunteer experiences that relate to nursing and the speciality area you are applying for.
- Certifications: This may include speciality nursing certification, BCLS, ACLS, TNCC, PALS, NRP.
- Professional Membership and Affiliations: This includes your memberships in professional associations like ARNBC, CNA, networks, speciality groups
