Land of the brave, home of the free. You’re free to do as you like here! Apart from the US resume format. Turns out Americans are pretty attached to it.
Dave Rygielski Career Expert
Do you think life would taste better if you were allowed to carry a Colt .45 on your belt at all times? Or perhaps you can’t live without the NYC pizza slice, or the LA traffic? All valid reasons to move to America.
The American resume format doesn’t differ that much from CVs around the world, but American CVs are something else and reserved mainly for academic position applications. The US resume format is pretty straight forward, so—alright, this is America, time is money.
In this guide you'll see:
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932 Hickory Heights Drive
Baltimore, MD 21234
Personable waitress with 3+ years of fine dining experience in a dynamic Baltimore location. Used to handling 300+ orders a shift with 100% accuracy, managed to maintain a 99.8% guest satisfaction score and win Waiter of the Month four times in a row. Looking to apply proven skills and friendly persona to provide world-class service at Gaucho’s.
Work Experience
Waitress
The Lobster, Baltimore
Skills
Education
BA in Food and Nutrition, 2015-2017
University of Maryland, College Park, US
Languages
Certifications
Seems easy enough, right?. But before we dive in let's learn what American resume exactly is:
A typical American resume is a one-page document that closely resembles a CV. The format of resumes in the US presents information in reverse-chronological order, meaning you start with your most recent job and work backwards. Most American resumes begin with a heading statement, followed by sections on experience, education, and skills.
Now, let's see what you should put on your USA resume:
There are only a few specific things about American resume you should know about, but overall it's very similar to the international CVs.
Both are used when applying for job and shows your experience, skills and interested personalized to the job you're applying for.
But there ara a few things you should be aware of when comes to the US resume format:
Okay, we've covered the basics. Now let's learn how to write an American resume
Most American resume templates order your experience in the reverse-chronological resume format. This brings the most recent stuff to the top, and creates an easily skimmable structure.
If you’re undergoing a career change, or you are at the very beginning of your career, you could opt for a skills-based resume, also called a functional resume format. This will shift the spotlight to your chosen skills and will help justify any employment gaps or other positions. Now let’s run through all the relevant US resume sections.
Of course, you don’t need to be told that you need to include a resume header, however, it’s important you check you haven’t missed anything important. It should include your address, phone number you can always be reached on, and email address, at the very least.
For office and corporate jobs (careers), most people add a LinkedIn profile. This allows you more depth and information (if they want it), without exceeding acceptable resume length (more about that later).
For specialist jobs, portfolio links are needed, for example, Behance for graphic designers, GitHub for programmers, etc.
Be sure to omit things we've mentioned before (also more on that later) on your US resume, since it can harm your resume at the very beginning. Here's how it should look on your US resume:
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The importance of the education section on your US resume will differ depending on your industry and amount of experience. Starting from your highest qualification, list the degree or diploma name, and below, school name and location. List a graduation date. If you have a degree, skip the high school stuff.
If you don’t have much work experience and this is one of your first jobs, you can list some academic achievements in bullet points below, such as scholarships. If that’s not going to fill much space, you can list coursework that is relevant to your new job.
Want to try a different look? There's 21 more. A single click will give your document a total makeover. Pick a cover letter template here.
For a US resume that gets interviews:
Did we answer all your questions on the US resume format? Was our US resume template helpful? Leave a comment. We’ll be happy to reply.
At ResumeLab, quality is at the crux of our values, supporting our commitment to delivering top-notch career resources. The editorial team of career experts carefully reviews every article in accordance with editorial guidelines, ensuring the high quality and reliability of our content. We actively conduct original research, shedding light on the job market's intricacies and earning recognition from numerous influential news outlets. Our dedication to delivering expert career advice attracts millions of readers to our blog each year.
Written by Dave RygielskiDave is a career expert delivering a wide range of well-researched advice regarding the job hunting and application process. At ResumeLab, his data-driven resume and cover letter guides help readers capitalize on their potential.
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