Blog Post: Two Page, or not Two Page

To this day, I still get questions from job seekers about the age old question regarding appropriate length of a resume. We've probably all heard advice one way or another, the most popular probably being to never go over a page. Well, I'm not a certified resume writing consultant, and I didn't stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but after over ten years of reading every conceivable style of resume known to mankind, I can tell you from my experience that the best resumes are not limited by length.

This doesn't mean that a great resume can't or shouldn't be limited to a page. If the amount of experience that you want to portray accurately and in enough detail to properly sell yourself to employers can fit on one page, great. If you need to go to two or three pages to accomplish this, then I say go for it. Let's face it, if you've spent 20 - 30 plus years in the workplace at a number of different employers, your experience and qualifications most likely will not be able to adequately fit onto one page. Also, keep in mind in this digital age that most resumes are submitted electronically; I hardly notice anymore how long the resume file is. Sell yourself. Tell your story. Make sure the information is accurate, and appropriate for the job you're applying for. Now, if the length of your resume is starting to rival the novel, War and Peace, well then yeah, you may want to scale it back a bit.

Happy resume writing!

What's on my nightstand? Professional Development Reading: Crucial Conversations by Kerry Patterson

Leisure Reading: 1491, by Charles C. Mann

What's in my iPod? Grateful Dead, Dozin' at the Knick, Discs 1 & 2

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