Résumé

A résumé or resume (or alternatively resumé),[a][1] is a document created and used by a person to present their background, skills, and accomplishments.

With the launch of YouTube in 2005, video résumés became common, and more and more high school students began to send them to different colleges and universities.

[10] In many contexts, a résumé is typically limited to one or two pages of size A4 or letter-size, highlighting only those experiences and qualifications that the author considers most relevant to the desired position.

Many résumés contain keywords or skills that potential employers are looking for via applicant tracking systems (ATS), make heavy use of active verbs, and display content in a flattering manner.

Acronyms and credentials after the applicant's name should be spelled out fully in the appropriate section of the résumé to increase the likelihood they are found in a computerized keyword scan.

With the launch of YouTube in 2006, job seekers and students also started to create multimedia and video résumés.

Résumés or CVs used by medical professionals, professors, artists, and people in other specialized fields may be comparatively longer.

The functional résumé was used by individuals making a career change, a varied work history, or relevant roles which were held some time ago.

Rather than focus on the length of time that has passed, the functional résumé allowed the reader to identify those skills quickly.

This format is particularly helpful for candidates who have employment gaps, may have more than one to two short-term roles, or have relevant experience from early in their careers.

A blind résumé is a modern and equitable style used by some employers to focus on an applicant's qualifications and experience by removing any personal identifying information that could potentially result in bias.

Studies have shown that candidates with certain demographic characteristics, such as names associated with a particular race or gender, are often unfairly disadvantaged in the hiring process.

While the challenge of deeply ingrained systemic bias cannot be fully addressed by blind résumés alone, and not all recruiters may be familiar with this approach, it is considered a best practice among some organizations and applicants.

Most prefer Microsoft Word documents, while others will only accept résumés formatted in PDF or plain ASCII text.

Résumés written following these rules are more likely to be correctly captured by, and ranked higher by, ATS, thereby making candidates more findable.