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Functional Resumes
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A functional format is very appropriate to use if you seek a career shift from one industry to another or if you are a seasoned professional with extensive work experience that you seek to summarize.

Often the perception in the industry is that a functional resume is used when there are gaps in employment history, or the person's career history has no obvious unifying theme in their work experience. However, a functional format is very appropriate to use if you seek a career shift from one industry to another or if you are a seasoned professional with extensive work experience that you seek to summarize. For example, you may be seeking a position as in-house counsel, but your most recent work experience was at a law firm. A functional resume gives you the forum to emphasize work experience and achievements from earlier in your career.

While not favored by some employers, a functional resume is exactly the right tool in the case of many job seekers. There are many reasons why you may choose to use a functional resume over the more familiar chronological format. A functional resume is often tagged as the resume to use when you have gaps in your employment history, or you have a career history with no obvious unifying thread between the positions you have held. However, a functional format is very appropriate to use if you seek a career shift from one industry to another or if you are a seasoned professional with extensive work experience that you seek to summarize.

A functional resume format highlights your skills and achievements. For example, you may be presently seeking a position as in-house counsel, but your most recent work experience was as at a la firm. You have in-house counsel experience from earlier in your career, but in a chronologically formatted resume, that experience wouldn't show up until the bottom of the page. A functional resume gives you the forum to emphasize work experience and achievements from earlier in your career.

Below is a general template of a functional resume - you can take this format and adapt it to your specific experience which you are trying to emphasize to further your job search.

JANE Q. PUBLIC
222 Nostrand Ave. / Brooklyn, NY 11205
718-555-5555 / jqpublic@yahoo.com

PROFILE

Qualified ------ professional with extensive ------- experience. Excellent ---- and ----- skills with prowess in ------.

EXPERIENCE
  • This is where you will input the bullets from a traditional chronological
  • resume and rearrange them to emphasize the experience that you want to feature.
  • Some rewording will be necessary so that the bullets will be able to stand on their
  • own instead of need to be associated with the particular company
  • where you gained the experience. It is empowering to see all these bullets
  • that describe your work experience and achievements that stand on their own.
  • We recommend that you segment your work experience into the areas
  • in which you have gained experience. You may also choose to segment based on
  • the areas of experience that are required for a particular job to which you are
  • applying.
WORK HISTORY

[List the companies where you have worked in chronological order]
Name of Company, City, State
Title, Start Date - End Date


Name of Company, City, State
Title, Start Date - End Date


Name of Company, City, State
Title, Start Date - End Date


EDUCATION AND TRAINING

Name of School, City, State
Name of Degree Earned, Date Received
GPA 4.0

CONTINUING EDUCATION

This is where you will list any specialized training you have received; you could include computer skills, workshops and seminars, etc. in this area. These need not be directly related to the position you are pursuing or the skill you are emphasizing on your resume.

This is where you should also list any specialized training or classes taken which pertain specifically to the skill your functional resume is meant to play up.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
  • This is where you can list any honors or certificates you have received.
One thing you may have noticed while looking at this sample functional resume format is that it does indeed include a chronological-style employment history listing. This is because many potential employers require a chronological listing of your work experience. If you have no gaps in your employment, this should be no problem.

The best strategy for job seekers is to create several different resumes for different purposes; headhunters and online employment boards frown upon functional resumes, so you will want a traditional chronological resume in addition to your new functional resume. In some professions (especially more conservatively minded ones, such as finance) a functional resume may be simply disregarded - so be warned. Should you create a functional resume? Absolutely - but as with any type of writing, you need to know your audience and send out your functional resume only to those who are likely to be receptive to this type of format - those companies who are more interested in what you know then where you learned it.



Article ID: 40090 www.attorneyresume.com

Article Title : Functional Resumes

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