In last week’s Yahoo! HotJobs poll, 15% said they have been alerted to a typo in their resumes by a recruiter or interviewer. Ouch.
Typos and other simple errors are very, very common in resumes. Ask any recruiter.
“There is nothing worse than receiving a cover letter addressed to a different person in a different company, misspellings of my name or my company name, or obvious errors in a resume,” says Lindsay Olson of Paradigm Staffing. “I receive resumes and cover letters like this daily, and it is hard for a recruiter to stand by their candidate if so little precaution and attention to detail has been given prior to hitting the send button.”
Hearing about your error from a beleaguered recruiter has got to be as fun as having a friend thank you for a 40th birthday card after he or she just turned 38.
A few tips for catching your resume errors:
- Spell-check, using the automatic tool that comes with Word.
- Proofread more than once. If possible, leave a few hours between readings to allow yourself distance. This will help in spotting errors.
- Have a friend read it over. You don’t need a cracker-jack copy editor, just another pair of attentive eyes.
Don’t let simple errors on a resume ruin your chances of landing the job! For more tips, see “Worst Resume Bloopers.”
