Today’s Job Market is TOUGH! For many job seekers, it can be quite intimidating to put your resume out there amongst the plethora of other qualified candidates.

Especially, for those who have a job history that is less than perfect, including employment gaps or “job hopping” – moving from one job to the next without staying anywhere for more than a year or two.

The Founder & CEO of Jobscan, an online resume and job search resource that uses applicant screening software to scan resumes and provide feedback to clients, sums up pretty perfectly why functional resumes don’t function (pun intended) very well with recruiters and hiring managers.

 

 

“Why do recruiters and hiring managers hate the functional resume format?

It’s a fair question, and to understand the answer, you really have to understand how recruiters and hiring managers work.

 

Hiring is fast and furious.

…Recruiters spend their days sourcing, screening, hand-holding and following up with candidates for multiple roles at any given time.

 

In other words, they don’t have time to read between the lines, dig for information, or follow up with questions if you don’t make the information they need crystal clear.”

 

– James Hu, 4 Surprising Reasons You Should Avoid a Functional Resume

With Applicant Tracking Systems in wide use and some many different candidates applying for the same positions, what can you do to ensure that your resume won’t get thrown into the trash?

Many professionals with issues in their employment background believe they would be better served by a functional resume, as opposed to the more common chronological resume.

A Chronological Resume is one which presents all of a candidate’s previous employment experience in reverse chronological order (starting with the current (or most recent) position, then the one before that, and so on).

A Functional Resume focuses more on a candidate’s skills, experience, and achievements, and de-emphasizes the dates for each specific position. While this may seem like the best way to go for candidates with employment issues – that is actually no longer the case.

A decade or more ago, functional resumes were used as a way to mask weaknesses in a candidate, such as employment gaps, job hopping, or lack of experience. These days, however, recruiters and hiring managers know better. The truth is, when a recruiter sees a functional resume, the immediately start looking for potential issues.

Functional resume formats often indicate that there is something wrong with the candidate, which can overshadow their true strengths and skills.

For a complicated career history, your best bet is going to be to utilize a combination of the two formats. Use the top 1/3 of your resume to emphasize the skills/experience that are most relevant to the position, but still present your employment chronologically.

In this case, make sure to showcase your achievements and contributions throughout the resume, in order to overshadow any negative pieces of your job history.

Once you get into the interview, it will be your job to speak confidently on why you are seeking that particular position, and how your skills and experience contribute to you being the right candidate for the position.