We’ve all heard the advice that a resume must be no more than one page in length. When you were fresh out of school, this may have seemed easy to do, since you were struggling to find ways to fill up the white space on a single page. After you’ve been working for several years, however, you may find that a single page just doesn’t seem to hold all of the important information that you would like a hiring manager to know. Luckily, the advice that a resume can’t ever exceed one page does not always hold true. Here are a few things to consider in deciding whether your resume should be longer than a page.
1. Consider the application requirements.
Most potential employers don’t have any particular requirements for the length of the resumes they receive. Some graduate schools, however, require that the resumes they receive cannot exceed one page. If you are applying to a school with this requirement, it’s a bad idea to disregard it; it could cause your application to be turned down on a technicality.
2. Be sure you aren’t including unnecessary details.
Your resume should include plenty of details about the job duties and achievements that are relevant to the job for which you are applying. However, it is important to resist the urge to include irrelevant information that a hiring manager will not need to see. You may need to include an irrelevant job in order to avoid having large time gaps in your resume, but it isn’t necessary to also include five or more bullet points about your duties at that job.
3. How far does it dangle onto the second page?
If your resume is written as concisely as you can and it is appropriately targeted for a specific job you desire, and yet it still takes up a page and a half or more, then your resume most likely justifies a second page. However, if only a few lines appear at the top of the second page followed by a lot of white space, this can seem awkward to a hiring manager. If this is the case, try to condense it slightly so that it fits comfortably on a single page.
4. Are multiple pages required?
If you have had extensive job experience over a decade or more in the same industry, you may find that even the most concisely-written job history will no longer fit on two pages. If this is the case, consider creating a curriculum vitae that can be used in place of a resume. While similar to a resume, a CV can provide room to expound upon an extensive career and include lists of awards, published works, and other relevant information. It would be unusual to submit a CV for an entry-level position, but it is appropriate to submit a CV for upper-level positions that require a very extensive job history.
Although a one-page resume is appropriate for many people, it is neither necessary nor appropriate to force two or more pages of information into a single page if your job history is substantial and the recipient of your application does not require a one-page limit for resumes. After considering the relevance of the information contained in your resume, the intended recipient, and whether there is enough information to include a second page, you can draw an informed conclusion about whether it makes sense to present a two-page resume or curriculum vitae rather than a single page of information to catch the attention of a hiring manager.
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For some excellent examples of well-written resumes, check out Resumes That Get Jobs
on Amazon.com.
