What Is a Resume? Meaning, What It Includes and an Example

A resume (also spelled résumé) is a short document that summarizes your work experience, education, skills and accomplishments for a job application. Merriam-Webster defines it as a short account of one's career and qualifications prepared typically by an applicant for a position. Harvard's career office calls it "a concise, informative summary of your abilities, education, and experience."

The word comes from French: résumé is the past participle of résumer, to summarize. In everyday English the accents are often dropped, and Merriam-Webster lists résumé, resume and resumé as accepted spellings.

In plain terms, a resume is your case for an interview. UC Berkeley's career center says its purpose is "to stimulate the interest of a potential employer enough to want to interview you." It will not get you the job by itself, but a weak one can stop you from being considered.

Employers use your resume at three points. First, to screen: a recruiter, often helped by an applicant tracking system, checks whether your experience matches the posting. Second, to decide whom to interview. Third, during the interview itself, when the interviewer uses it as a guide for questions.

That is why a resume is built for one job at a time. Harvard's guide tells you to tailor it to the type of position you are seeking, and Canada's Job Bank says a resume must "clearly, concisely and strategically" present your qualifications. The same person might send a different version to a hospital, a school and a software company.

Applicant tracking systems read the text of your file and sort it into fields such as job title, employer and dates. Plain headings like "Experience" and "Education", a single-column layout and a PDF or Word file make that sorting easier.

Five sections appear on almost every resume: a header with your contact details, a short summary or objective, work experience, education and skills. Optional sections such as certifications, projects, volunteer work, awards and languages earn a place only when they support the job.

What you leave out matters too. Harvard's resume guide lists including a picture, your age or gender, and personal pronouns such as "I" among the things not to do, and says to keep references off the resume. Canada's Job Bank adds marital status, height and weight to the list and warns never to include your Social Insurance Number; for US jobs, the same goes for your Social Security number.

A typical resume is one page (two for experienced candidates) of dark text on a white background, with your name in larger bold type at the top and a single line of contact details beneath it. Section headings run down the page in order of importance, and within each section entries are listed in reverse chronological order, most recent first, as Harvard recommends.

The University of Iowa's guidelines give practical ranges: 10 to 12 point font, margins between 0.5 and 1 inch, dates aligned on the right and 2 to 5 bullet points per experience. Most resumes are sent as a PDF so the layout holds. The sample resume further down this page shows the shape in plain text.

A resume summary is the three- to five-line paragraph under your header that tells the reader your job title, experience level, strongest skills and one or two results. It is also called a professional summary or profile. Students and career changers often use a one- or two-line objective instead, which names the job they want.

Example: "Dental assistant with four years in a busy general practice, assisting chairside with about 20 patients a day. Certified in dental radiography and fluent in Dentrix and Eaglesoft." The resume summary examples guide has more than 30 samples by job and career stage.

People often send all three words together, but they are different documents:

• Resume: one or two pages, tailored to a single job and focused on results. This is what US and Canadian employers mean by default.
• CV (curriculum vitae): in the US, a longer academic record of research, publications, teaching and grants, with no length limit. UC Berkeley calls it "an academic resume" used for research and university teaching positions. In the UK and much of Europe, "CV" means the same thing as a resume.
• Cover letter: a one-page letter sent with your resume that explains why you want this job and connects your experience to it. Harvard's career office calls it a writing sample and part of the screening process, and says to keep it to a single page and address it to a specific person if you can.

There are three standard formats. A reverse-chronological resume lists jobs from most recent to oldest and suits most people with a steady work history. A functional, or skills-based, resume groups experience under skill headings and is sometimes used by career changers, although many readers find it harder to follow. A combination, or hybrid, resume opens with a skills summary and then lists jobs in order.

If you are unsure, use reverse-chronological. It is the layout most employers expect and the easiest to check against a job posting.

1. 1

   Collect your raw material

   List every job, internship, volunteer role, certification and tool you have used, with month and year dates.

2. 2

   Read the job posting

   Highlight the title, skills, tools and licenses it repeats. That list decides what goes near the top of your resume.

3. 3

   Choose a simple layout

   One column, standard headings and a readable font at 10 to 12 points.

4. 4

   Write your experience bullets

   Two to five per job, each starting with a verb and showing a result or the scale of the work.

5. 5

   Add the summary, education and skills

   Write the summary last, once you can see your best material, and list only skills you can back up.

6. 6

   Proofread and save as a PDF

   Check every date, name and number, name the file after yourself (for example marisol-vega-resume.pdf) and send a PDF unless the employer asks for Word.

A fictional entry-level resume, shown as plain text. The person, employers and numbers are made up.

A short fictional cover letter to send with the resume above.

• CV vs resume
• Resume Summary Examples and How to Write a Professional Summary
• What Is a Cover Letter? Definition, Parts and Example
• Types of Resumes: Choose the Right Format
• How to write a resume
• What should a resume look like?

We opened every page below on that date. Pay, rules and requirements change, so check the source before you rely on a detail.

1. Merriam-Webster: Résumé (noun) (definition; spellings résumé, resume and resumé; French origin from résumer, to summarize)
2. Harvard University Mignone Center for Career Success: Create a Strong Resume (resume definition; tailoring; reverse chronological order; no photo, age, gender or pronouns; cover letter guidance)
3. UC Berkeley Career Engagement: Resumes (purpose of a resume; CV as an academic resume)
4. Job Bank, Government of Canada: How to write a good resume (present qualifications clearly, concisely and strategically; personal details to leave out)
5. University of Iowa Pomerantz Career Center: Building your resume (PDF) (font size, margins, bullets per experience, GPA above 3.0)