Functional Resume
Purpose
To convince an employer to interview you based on how you used your skills, listing your accomplishments by skill areas relevant to your job objective.
Key Strengths & Weaknesses
- Strengths: Highlights your relevant skills and accomplishments without emphasis on job titles or paid employment. Usually works best for new graduates and career changers.
- Weaknesses: Some employers may prefer a chronological format.
Objective: short phrase stating your job target
Qualifications Summary: short statements summarizing your key selling points
Experience: accomplishment statements (organized into three or four skills areas relevant to your objective) that tell what you did, where you did it and the results
Employment History: one liners telling job dates, job titles, employer information. Hint: dates should be on the left if currently employed and on the right if you are not currently employed; years (i.e. 1995-1997) work best in most cases. Variation: some job seekers use a 2-3 line scope of responsibility statement here to explain duties.
Education: summary of your education & training relevant to your objective
Optional Parts
- Professional Affiliations,
Computer Skills, Licenses, Certifications
Other hints
Try to limit your resume to one page. One page means that you must make a few words tell your historical employment story.This page must have quality so invest in good paper.
Also avoid loud colors unless the job you seek is artistically related.
Try your resume out on someone you know by asking for feedback. You can always email careers@mccc.edu or call the Mercer County Community College Career Services at 609-586-4800 ext. 3397.
