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Chronological Resume vs Functional Resume
I prefer a functional resume due my sprawling work experience over the years. I have five areas of expertise, so I have five unique resumes.
Does anyone else use functional resumes? And are then asked to provide a chronological resume?
Functional resumes serve an important purpose. I have used a couple of different formats that have worked well over the years. One important factor is that mine include a simple list of employment, so that prospective employers can see where and when my clients worked. (Technically, this makes these combination rather than functional resumes.)
Why is this important? A very large number of employers and recruiters do not like functional resumes. They believe people use them to hide gaps and job hopping.
Even with listing employment, there will be employers and recruiters who are dissatisfied. They want to see where accomplishments were made. To solve this, include your accomplishment under functional categories the way you normally would--only at the end of each accomplishment put the company in parenthesis,
I always include the full work history in each functional resume, so they can ask all they want.
Fabulous post -I've had this loooooong resume for years - I am going to switch it up!
Good luck!
I make a "master" resume in order to keep track of all of the experience and accomplishments. Then it is so much easier to tailor to the position and not forget anything.
Just a thought.
I switched to a functional resume last year. As a freelancer, I had more clients than full-time employment, leading to too much repetition under each job. I took the main section of my resume and broke it into small categories with bullet points. A skinny column timeline of employment dates and clients sits on the right side of it. I feel putting my skills on display rather than my place of employment was helpful.
However, I kept a text document of my resume that was chronological, making an easy cut and paste situation when companies want it put into their system.
Thank you Lucy! Sounds great!
I switched to a functional resume a few years ago.
Why? Because my chronological resume was, as you mentioned above, sprawling and in my case, my functional resume was not highlighting my experience, it was only highlighting my age.
When I was looking for work a few years ago, I used the functional resume and was never asked to provide a chronological resume. I didn't even know that was a thing - that companies would also ask for a chronological resume
Thanks for the response!
For example, BCBS specifically asks for a chronological resume. And I am noticing that more are asking for them again, and I'm not sure why.
I've recreated a new chronological resume to include the "good" stuff, and now the resume is so long. But I can't leave it off as it pertains to the job. Arghhhhhhh!
I have been sending it to contract houses only right now with this length.