Content: Your resume will contain your name, address, and telephone number, and information about your education and work experience. Other sections, titles, and arrangements are at your discretion. Education and experience are usually presented in reverse chronological order. Give the most space to the most important experience. If you have several years of experience in your career field, your resume will focus on more specific accomplishments and skills. Ifyou have years of work experience in severalfields or are changing fields, a resume organizedby skill areas may be more appropriate than achronological resume.

Name, address, and telephone: This isthe most important information on the resume.Usually it is centered and in capital letters atthe top of the page. If you must give a schooladdress and a home address, place your name at topcenter and the addresses to the right and left.

Education: If you are a student or havejust completed your education, put this sectionfirst. List your degrees or degree expected anddate, your concentration, subject of senior honorsthesis, and electives which are relevant to youremployers. Include selected honors if you havereceived recognition for outstanding academicwork. Ph.D. students should list their department,area of interest, relevant electives, and selectedhonors. The dissertation topic may be included ifof related interest.

College activities can be listed and describedunder Education, Experience, Activities, or mostbriefly under Personal Background depending uponhow much emphasis and space you want to give them.If you've had leadership positions,responsibilities for organizing or initiating newprograms, financial management or any kind ofcareer-related experiences, be sure it is clearlydescribed. Explain for the non-Harvard reader whatthe organization is.

Secondary school is usually listed onundergraduate resumes. Space devoted to honorsand/or activities should depend on theircontribution to the total message.

Work Experience: This section shouldinclude all experience, paid and unpaid andextracurricular activities which have given youthe opportunity to develop the skills such ascomputer programming or foreign language fluency,you may want to list in a skills section.

Interests: Save at least one line for alist in series of avocational interests such as,"Reading, playing guitar, running and choralsinging." Even a brief list rounds out yourpresentation and may establish an initial bond ofcommon interest with the reader.

Personal Background: On a one-pageresume you have had to leave out a great deal.This section may be used to mention informationthat you consider important such as: "Have workedevery term to help pay college expenses deliveringnewspapers, washing dishes, bartending, driving ashuttle bus." "Born and grew up in New York City."(Where you spent your youth may be an importantmessage to the employer.) "Played varsity lacrosseand intramural basketball."

Job Objective: Only if you have aclearly defined employment goal should you write ajob objective. Otherwise, the cover letter is thebetter place to state your job objective. Thatway, you can tailor it to each job application andhighlight and expand on relevant information