JIST Works - 2005 - Expert Resumes - Expert Resumes For Career Changers

This book is good for career changers, with a focus on white collar jobs, though anyone in a career transition can find useful material here. The first section of the text is quite good and makes many important points. It is particularly strong on discussions of keywords, advantages and disadvantages of various resume styles (chronological, functional, and hybrid formats are thoroughly reviewed,) and presentation standards (fonts and type size, uses of type enhancements such as italicizing, etc.)

There are a few examples where similar resumes with relatively identical information to convey are compared and contrasted in differing formats, and I find that quite helpful. Where the book falls down a bit is in the sample resumes presented, and in the organization of the book, which makes it difficult to find the most relevant examples for a specific situation. Some of the sample resumes seem to disobey the basic tenets discussed in the beginning of the book, and are rather ornate and crowded with relatively small font sizes used. (Probably the worst example is that on page 110 for Melanie Martinson who is attempting a career transition from library science to information technology.)

Overall this book makes many excellent points in the opening sections, but the examples and samples are sometimes less than ideal. If you use this book for background information it can be quite helpful, but you may or may not find the sample resumes particularly germane to your situation.

This is a good read for those professionals who are thinking about switching into a new career field. The book helps the reader see how to change industry related jargon items from an older resume format so that the new resume will make the candidate attractive to a hiring managers in other fields. The overview of why the candidate needs to change formats based on goals, recommended changes, and resume samples should give any reader ample material to update their own resume.

This expert resume book was pretty good for those (like me) who are starting a new career. Or in general.