No Work Experience? You Can Still Create A Great Resume!

For anyone who is fresh out of school or college and is looking to enter the job market, it could be an intimidating task; learning how to write a resume. It is natural to feel trepidatious of the task at hand, particularly because one has no actual work experience to speak about at this stage. All the free sample resumes that are available online seem to speak about the chronology of past jobs and functional resumes that frankly don’t make a lot of sense to a fresher! So what should one put into a resume when one is a fresher? When people have little or no work experience what should they put in their resumes. When talking about examples of resumes of people with no work experience, what can they say? Here are some dos and don’ts of how to write a resume when you have no job experience: 1. If you have never done this before take help from a website that offers free sample resumes. This will give you an idea of what it should look like, the format, layout etc. 2. Collate all your contact information and make sure it is fully accurate and up to date. If your main email address is frivolous sounding (studmuffin@gmail.com is hardly going to create a good or professional impression) then change it pronto. Create a new address that is more relevant to your identity and name if possible. 3. In a few sentences explain personal traits or qualities that are desirable or are special or job appropriate in any way. Positive personality traits like good people skills (this could help get a human resources related position) or good marketing skills (may be useful if you are applying for sales or marketing jobs), a cheerful disposition (if applying for a front desk sort of job that involves interaction with customers) can also be mentioned. 4. If you don’t have any work experience then do not bluff or lie or create false details. Even if you don’t get caught out, you will have started out on your professional life with a lie which is neither honest nor desirable. 5. Mention vacation jobs if any; their duration and the kind of position you held. Mention highlights if there are any worth mentioning. 6. Mention your qualifications such as educational background, majors and any other skills you may have. Any academic achievements may not be out of place to mention in the resume. Any school or college projects of significance where performance or contribution above average can be mentioned. 7. Other skills that have been learnt can be mentioned. Volunteer work that has been done, roles that one has assumed in the community such as the church, school committees or youth groups can also be mentioned. Anything that displays leadership qualities or managerial abilities can be mentioned. 8. Don’t ramble and add extraneous or irrelevant details. Keep it short (must fit in a page or less) and pertinent to the job that you are applying for. 9. Don’t use pink paper, or scented stationery of fancy fonts. Those are only amusing in movies.