What's in a Resume?

Since the dawning of our college days, the necessity of having an impeccable resume is nearly unparalleled.  In a way, resumes are one of the main motivating factors affecting college enrollment in the first place.  As much as we’d like to believe that these documents are merely a set of credentials, perfectly representative of the person being examined, this is not the case.  Well-compiled resumes take hours to compose—if it were truly a list of schools attended and job positions held, this would not be the case.  Specific language is employed to make every life experience as prestigious as possible.  Universities advertise courses, businesses provide workshops, and counselors offer editing—all in the pursuit of making a high school graduate with fast food service experience seem capable of the most impressive positions. (learn more)

I had an opportunity to experience this process firsthand this last summer.  Working as a secretary for the professors at the law school, I was able to help in the hiring process for the new part time employee.  For weeks, our office received countless applications.  One of my most enjoyable daily tasks was reading through the resumes—they were frequently quite entertaining.  With time, we had singled out the impressive resumes and invited those candidates for interviews.  What an eye-opening experience!  Many candidates who were our highest prospects, based on their applications, were quite bad in interview.  They had poor physical demeanor, lacked social skills, weren’t articulate or capable of the tasks in the job description, and sometimes seemed altogether disinterested.  The person we ended up hiring had a decent resume, but it was through their impressive interview that we determined their capability.