So your changing careers and need to write a resume; but you don’t know which format to use. Your probably already familiar with either the chronological or functional format; but have decided that neither one of these will do in this situation. Well you’ve come to the right place; where you’ll be introduced to the combination resume.

The problem with using a chronological resume is that the HR manager will normally start reading at the bottom of the work history/professional experience section and continue reading their way up through your career history. This will bring employment gaps and unrelated jobs to there attention right away, which spells trouble for your employment search. Most HR mangers prefer this format because it is so easy to find what they are looking for. If you have been in the same type of position for the better part of your career this could be an excellent advantage because this shows continuity and progression in your field.

What if you have held different positions across multiple industries? There are many reasons for gaps in employment and holding positions in different fields, but this doesn’t help your resume and subsequently your career search. Don’t be discouraged though, the first thing you will need to accomplish is tossing out your old resume and getting a fresh start with a combination resume.

The first order of business with this new resume will be to create a career summary section that will emphasize points in your career that will be of most interest to the particular company in which you are interested. In particular you’ll want to indicate transferable experience and skills that best match the qualifications of the position you desire.

To make things easier on the reader you’ll also want to create a keywords section that lists all of your transferable skills. Making things easier on the reader will put things in your favor, also this section is useful if the company employs resume scanning technology.

When writing your professional experience/work history section you’ll want to present your experience in functional sections. To do this you’ll want to gather up all the experience gained over the years and collectively categorize it into particular skill areas. When finished with this section you’ll want to have at least three categories to show multiple strengths, and you’ll want each category to have at least four bulleted sentences to support it.

Next you’ll want to make a section to list the companies, locations, job titles, and dates of your previous employment. You can chose to either title this section something like work history or you can just leave the title out and it will be generally understood.

By: Blake Siseme

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