I had a thought. One that’s bothered me the past few days. Maybe you’ve had a similar thought too. Résumé are like career eulogies. Hang with me now.
Writer’s note: I will spell resume this way because I think it’s stupid with accents.
Most resumes read like somebody’s standing at a podium saying a few respectful words about a job that has passed on.
• exceeded expectations
• worked cross-functionally
• demonstrated excellent communication skills
• proficient in Microsoft Office
It will be missed.
We clean up history. Remove the awkward parts. Smooth over the politics. Make every project sound successful, every relationship collaborative, every deadline like it was no problem when it was the biggest problem.
That’s the problem.
Your resume shouldn’t be a memorial for jobs that no longer exist. The past matters, sure. But only because it shows what you’re prepared to do now.
An employer isn’t hiring your old job description. They’re trying to answer a much more practical question:
Can this person walk into our shit-show and shine?
That means your resume shouldn’t just list what you did. It should show what those years taught you.
• What kind of problems can you spot early?
• What do people trust you to fix?
• What have you learned to do without needing every step explained?
• Stays calm when everyone else starts producing smoke?
• Does he use terms like “shit show” all the time?
Talk about the difficult parts. Real work is never clean or tidy or straightforward.
Departments disagree. Clients get nervous. Deadlines move. Leadership gives conflicting feedback. A simple project grows six extra arms and starts crawling across the ceiling.
Don’t hide that friction. It’s where your experience becomes valuable.
“Collaborated with internal stakeholders to develop integrated marketing materials” tells me almost nothing.”
“Turned competing input from sales, product, and leadership into one campaign the company could approve and customers could understand” tells me there was a mess and you knew what to do with it.
A strong resume doesn’t say, “Look at everything I’ve done.” It says, “Here’s the pattern of problems I know how to solve.”
Quit writing an obituary for your career when what you really need is an argument for what comes next.
Writer’s note: I’m utterly embarrassed by the resumes I’ve sent over the years. Even the one that went out this week. #facepalm
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