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Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 12:34 am
by NiccoloA
Should I include the crappy jobs at Walmart during half a school year and two summers and my university's workstudy job on my resume?


I have no internships, no great work experience, the jobs I held were for pocket money and I changed them often (more than 4 jobs in 4 years).

I'm afraid that if I put them on there, I'll be laughed out of the admissions pool because I'll look like a dumb kid who wasn't good enough to aim for anything professional.

I'm afraid that if I don't put them on there my resume will look like a big white hole of nothingness. I've been involved on campus, but not enough to fill up one page of a resume, and only with marginally important student organizations.


I hate resumes.

Re: Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 12:46 am
by bdubs
Something > Nothing

I don't think schools will fault you for working random jobs through undergrad. If you had graduated and worked many, many jobs in a short period of time it would be more troubling.

Re: Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 2:13 am
by ThreeRivers
Yea I listed Giant Eagle, A local deli, Red Robin as my work experience... lol

Re: Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 10:46 am
by NiccoloA
Thanks for the responses. So would something like this (Google Doc) be acceptable?


I know it is now turning into a resume critique when I first just had a question, but I'm on edge about this all of a sudden for no apparent reason.

Re: Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 11:22 am
by bdubs
That's fine, although it should be max 1 page (I know Google Docs does funny things with formatting).

You don't need bullets under self explanatory positions unless you really did something outside of the scope of that employment. I would use a one or maybe two sentence description.

Re: Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 12:10 pm
by coldshoulder
You speak five languages? Nice.

Re: Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 12:29 pm
by kurla88
NiccoloA wrote:Thanks for the responses. So would something like this (Google Doc) be acceptable?


I know it is now turning into a resume critique when I first just had a question, but I'm on edge about this all of a sudden for no apparent reason.
You can also include descriptions of what you did for student groups.

Re: Resume question for those with crappy jobs

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 12:41 pm
by omega918
In your descriptions, also, I would try to reword things to add more depth to the tasks. For example, did you just do "data entry", or did you "utilize systems of organization for multitudes of complex data/documents..." Even better if you created or updated the system of organization.

The resume is your opportunity to sell yourself. Employers, law schools, and lawyers do this all the time for themselves, and we must do it too. Don't outright lie and say you did things you did not do, but definitely use language in your favor to make you sound as impressive as possible