Last Thursday, I attended GRF Seema’s talk entitled “Mini-Seminar Series: Writing an Effective Resume.” A resume is such a difficult document to compose, as it is essentially a compilation of the events of your entire life limited to a sheet of paper. For this reason, I have trouble being concise on my resume. I’m a junior, but I still have some high school activities and awards listed on the document. It’s difficult for me to eliminate this part of my life from the document, as it was such a significant and important 4 years for me. Plus, I’m always afraid I’ll delete something from my resume that may have potentially made an employer choose me for a job had I included it.

I also find writing a resume to be frustrating because, while the document reveals the experiences that you have had, it doesn’t directly showcase who you are as a person – good-humored, determined, motivated, witty, and/or intelligent. A resume can only indirectly imply that you are these things, but it is difficult to interpret what a person is like based on a written list of what they have accomplished and experienced.