There is Always a Wrong Way
The top of your resume should only contain Resume of Name and title. “Resume of John Doe, Senior Salesperson” The word resume and your title should be in a smaller font than your name, all centered, taking up approximately 60% of the length. The phone number and email are right and justified on two separate lines below this. Then, a clear one-line career objective. “I wish to obtain a full-time job as a car salesman.” Next are three separate bulleted paragraphs with the following centered headings: skills, job history, education, and interests (non-related job items.) End your resume with “references available on request.” Never place your references on your resume. Only use New Times Roman size 10 font for your entire resume.
OMG! You put down your career objective? It’s completely irrelevant. Obviously, the job you are applying for is the objective. Always left-justified your name on separate lines. Never center your words. Why are you separating job history and experience? A reviewer needs to see when you learned your skills. Other interests? Delete that junk! No references? You better list them if you want a job.
I worked at a copy center for a total of 1.5 years, and during that time, I copied hundreds of resumes for every possible job in every conceivable format. We even had a professional resume person on site with whom I often spoke about the topic.
Over the years, I noticed many patterns. Good resumes have the basics right out there. Bad resumes were cluttered and made it difficult for the reader. Some used small fonts, hard-to-read fonts, and mixed fonts. I saw misspelled words, random extra spaces, and uneven tabs. Plus, loads of irrelevant information. Overall, I found that people did not understand their audience.
How do you write a patent? Well, you start off with… (Dear readers. Insert lots of boring patent stuff here.) Alright, message received. A patent is a complex technical description with loads of legal double talk. If you have some time, do a patent search for “dog finder,” “dog locator,” or “dog GPS.” Hundreds of patents will appear. After skimming through a few, you will see that patents do not follow a standard format.
Wait a minute. The patent office provides examples, professional templates, and well-defined rules. Small yes and a big no. The available information and examples from the patent office are challenging to locate, incomplete, of poor quality, out of date with their rules, contradictorily, and written in incomprehensible legal speak. This is because the patent office is a small, underfunded, confusing, uncoordinated government department that is very far behind the times. In short, they are not your friend; they are an overworked government agency full of bureaucracy. While the patents you locate in your search might appear like the provided templates, the wording, diagrams, and internal workings are all radically different.
Years ago, I wanted to start a business, and people told me I needed a business plan to attract investors. It seemed logical, so I bought three books and began reading. Wow, the books all suggested radically different approaches. One flaunted incomprehensible spreadsheets with loose supporting paragraphs and included a non-working computer program to develop the spreadsheets. The second book contained a lofty mess that made absolutely no sense. The third contained five “award-winning” business plans with tips on making your own. After reading the plans, I noticed they differed vastly in format, organization, style, and approach. Plus, there were extra sections that made no sense and others that were impossible to understand. In short, the three books failed to define the basic topic.
To help, my mother hooked me up with a family friend who wrote business plans for a living. He showed me four plans that raised cash for successful startup companies. Then, he hit me up for $1,500 to continue speaking with me. When I told my mother what happened, she became outraged because our family did their family many favors over the years.
After getting yelled at, he printed me out a copy of his four plans. (Side note: He expected $1,500 each for this gesture, which upset my mother even more.) When I looked over his plans, they sort of made sense, but they were detail-heavy and challenging to follow. Plus, I did not feel comfortable with this format. Totally unrelated side story: Three years later, he paid a man to murder his wife. Yikes!
My father then asked a business friend to help me out. Damon took a lot of time to explain all aspects of a business plan, which was a big personal favor on his part. (Side story. He had screwed my parents on a business deal, and this was an attempted apology.) I worked hard for a year and developed a great business plan together.
My plan stood out as having a clear objective, a slick appearance, easy-to-follow finances, and excellent supporting documentation. As a result, I got many positive comments from potential investors. They were all uninterested; one even asked me to write plans for his startups. Sadly, nobody was willing to invest in my company. It was the mid-90s before the .com boom. Still, I learned a lot and like to think I now have an unofficial MBA.
Resumes, patents, and business plans are supposed to follow “a standard format.” Yet, they deviate wildly. What is the goal of all those documents? Get the reader, reviewer, jury, patent attorney, company, investor, loan officer, or random interested person the proper information allowing them to make an informed decision.
Here is the fundamental question intended to be answered by a resume: Do you have the skills to do this job? If a resume reviewer must hunt for the answer, they will go to the next candidate. In my days at the copy center, I copied a resume with jellybean stickers. Really? One had the threat, “If you do not hire me, you are an idiot.” What?
Since I wrote my business plan, I have seen many others. They were all a mess. One was far too optimistic, with a 3000% return! One had flowery language, “I want to make a far-out restaurant.” Business plans are supposed to be serious.
One business plan (written by a friend) did not explain the amount of money requested or how the company would spend it. (Side note. When I questioned him, he answered, “Explaining my plan is unimportant. It’s boilerplate. You ask for the amount in person.”) What the heck? The definition of a business plan = How I PLAN to spend YOUR money. Throw them a bone! Side note. He had difficulty getting funding for some reason and was only successful when somebody helped him. Their first task? Create a business plan. It made me laugh when I found this out.
I have seen more than one patent with misspelled words and one with a misspelled title. Really? Could they not spell-check the title? I have even seen patents with offensive (four-letter) words. And the crazy patent drawings? Wow. Crazy side note. There are patents for adult pleasure devices. Those drawings are quite “realistic.”
The point of this article is that we all perceive that there is a standard format, and our’s is the best. Yet, we know there is some leeway in formatting. What everybody can agree on is that there are wrong formats. There is an old aircraft saying, “If it looks right, it will fly right.”
My advice in life is to pick a path and follow it, but learn from mistakes and try to improve. In closing. What if there was an accepted standard format for these common documents? I suppose life would be easier, but everybody would be a professional.
You’re the best -Bill
Setember 23, 2020 Updated May 03, 2025
OMG! You put down your career objective? It’s completely irrelevant. Obviously, the job you are applying for is the objective. Always left-justified your name on separate lines. Never center your words. Why are you separating job history and experience? A reviewer needs to see when you learned your skills. Other interests? Delete that junk! No references? You better list them if you want a job.
I worked at a copy center for a total of 1.5 years, and during that time, I copied hundreds of resumes for every possible job in every conceivable format. We even had a professional resume person on site with whom I often spoke about the topic.
Over the years, I noticed many patterns. Good resumes have the basics right out there. Bad resumes were cluttered and made it difficult for the reader. Some used small fonts, hard-to-read fonts, and mixed fonts. I saw misspelled words, random extra spaces, and uneven tabs. Plus, loads of irrelevant information. Overall, I found that people did not understand their audience.
How do you write a patent? Well, you start off with… (Dear readers. Insert lots of boring patent stuff here.) Alright, message received. A patent is a complex technical description with loads of legal double talk. If you have some time, do a patent search for “dog finder,” “dog locator,” or “dog GPS.” Hundreds of patents will appear. After skimming through a few, you will see that patents do not follow a standard format.
Wait a minute. The patent office provides examples, professional templates, and well-defined rules. Small yes and a big no. The available information and examples from the patent office are challenging to locate, incomplete, of poor quality, out of date with their rules, contradictorily, and written in incomprehensible legal speak. This is because the patent office is a small, underfunded, confusing, uncoordinated government department that is very far behind the times. In short, they are not your friend; they are an overworked government agency full of bureaucracy. While the patents you locate in your search might appear like the provided templates, the wording, diagrams, and internal workings are all radically different.
Years ago, I wanted to start a business, and people told me I needed a business plan to attract investors. It seemed logical, so I bought three books and began reading. Wow, the books all suggested radically different approaches. One flaunted incomprehensible spreadsheets with loose supporting paragraphs and included a non-working computer program to develop the spreadsheets. The second book contained a lofty mess that made absolutely no sense. The third contained five “award-winning” business plans with tips on making your own. After reading the plans, I noticed they differed vastly in format, organization, style, and approach. Plus, there were extra sections that made no sense and others that were impossible to understand. In short, the three books failed to define the basic topic.
To help, my mother hooked me up with a family friend who wrote business plans for a living. He showed me four plans that raised cash for successful startup companies. Then, he hit me up for $1,500 to continue speaking with me. When I told my mother what happened, she became outraged because our family did their family many favors over the years.
After getting yelled at, he printed me out a copy of his four plans. (Side note: He expected $1,500 each for this gesture, which upset my mother even more.) When I looked over his plans, they sort of made sense, but they were detail-heavy and challenging to follow. Plus, I did not feel comfortable with this format. Totally unrelated side story: Three years later, he paid a man to murder his wife. Yikes!
My father then asked a business friend to help me out. Damon took a lot of time to explain all aspects of a business plan, which was a big personal favor on his part. (Side story. He had screwed my parents on a business deal, and this was an attempted apology.) I worked hard for a year and developed a great business plan together.
My plan stood out as having a clear objective, a slick appearance, easy-to-follow finances, and excellent supporting documentation. As a result, I got many positive comments from potential investors. They were all uninterested; one even asked me to write plans for his startups. Sadly, nobody was willing to invest in my company. It was the mid-90s before the .com boom. Still, I learned a lot and like to think I now have an unofficial MBA.
Resumes, patents, and business plans are supposed to follow “a standard format.” Yet, they deviate wildly. What is the goal of all those documents? Get the reader, reviewer, jury, patent attorney, company, investor, loan officer, or random interested person the proper information allowing them to make an informed decision.
Here is the fundamental question intended to be answered by a resume: Do you have the skills to do this job? If a resume reviewer must hunt for the answer, they will go to the next candidate. In my days at the copy center, I copied a resume with jellybean stickers. Really? One had the threat, “If you do not hire me, you are an idiot.” What?
Since I wrote my business plan, I have seen many others. They were all a mess. One was far too optimistic, with a 3000% return! One had flowery language, “I want to make a far-out restaurant.” Business plans are supposed to be serious.
One business plan (written by a friend) did not explain the amount of money requested or how the company would spend it. (Side note. When I questioned him, he answered, “Explaining my plan is unimportant. It’s boilerplate. You ask for the amount in person.”) What the heck? The definition of a business plan = How I PLAN to spend YOUR money. Throw them a bone! Side note. He had difficulty getting funding for some reason and was only successful when somebody helped him. Their first task? Create a business plan. It made me laugh when I found this out.
I have seen more than one patent with misspelled words and one with a misspelled title. Really? Could they not spell-check the title? I have even seen patents with offensive (four-letter) words. And the crazy patent drawings? Wow. Crazy side note. There are patents for adult pleasure devices. Those drawings are quite “realistic.”
The point of this article is that we all perceive that there is a standard format, and our’s is the best. Yet, we know there is some leeway in formatting. What everybody can agree on is that there are wrong formats. There is an old aircraft saying, “If it looks right, it will fly right.”
My advice in life is to pick a path and follow it, but learn from mistakes and try to improve. In closing. What if there was an accepted standard format for these common documents? I suppose life would be easier, but everybody would be a professional.
You’re the best -Bill
Setember 23, 2020 Updated May 03, 2025
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