Resume Critique

[Juked07]

Full time recruiting at my school is about to be in full swing. I have an offer from this past summer, but I'd really like to explore some of my options before committing to a position for a few years.

I have prepared a resume, and I think it's roughly in decent shape, but I'm not really good at the final revisions/touches.

I'd appreciate any feedback/lots of criticism.

Thanks in advance.

http://img295.imageshack.us/img295/7033/resumecensored.png

EDIT: Should have included what I am using this for, of course.. Mostly proprietary trading firm positions, a few big banks/hedge funds.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

i dunno if i'd put down online poker... heh.

 

[PhineasJWhoopee]

Impressive.

A couple of questions:

You had a 3.7 and you only made the Dean's List1 year? What were the rquirements?

I've never seen SAT scores on a resume. Is that common? It seems moot to me.

 

[IronWing]

The "reverse engineering" thing, I know companies do it all the time but is it considered a sufficiently ethical practice that you should put it on a resume? Maybe change to "market research in the area of..."

 

[Farang]

"Learned, Wrote, Created, Reverse engineered, Conducted, Studied, Developed, Created, Designed, Wrote, Worked on, Designed, Refined, Held, Collected, Organized, Planned"

There are areas for improvement here, but overall not bad.

Also titles should be primary, locations secondary.

 

[sjwaste]

Pretty impressive resume for an undergrad. I'd call you in for an interview if that hit my desk.

I know I might get flamed for this, but I would pull the religious activity. I'm a Catholic, but it has little to do with my professional background and how I try to market myself. Doesn't mean you can't have your faith and have it guide your ethics, but at the same time, you might not want to advertise it. It may turn some people off, because there are those people at work who are working harder at their office ministry than their paid work. I'm not anti-religion in the least bit, either, so please take this for what it's worth.

 

[PhineasJWhoopee]

i dunno if i'd put down online poker... heh.

He's looking for a job on Wall Street most likely. I don't think that will be an issue.

What kind of job are you looking for?

 

[sjwaste]

Also, look up the abbreviation for profit and loss. I assume that's what "PnL" stands for. I'm not 100%, but when I worked in financial services, we abbreviated that P&L. One of the worst things you can do is try to use the field's "lingo" and get it wrong. For instance, I concentrated in securities law. There are two major laws passed in 1940, and the Investment Companies Act of 1940 is generally referred to as the "'40 Act". There's also the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, but if you call that the '40 Act you're obviously a rube - it's usually called the Advisers Act (or the IAA).

I'm not certain on this one, though.

 

[PhineasJWhoopee]

Pretty impressive resume for an undergrad. I'd call you in for an interview if that hit my desk.

I know I might get flamed for this, but I would pull the religious activity. I'm a Catholic, but it has little to do with my professional background and how I try to market myself. Doesn't mean you can't have your faith and have it guide your ethics, but at the same time, you might not want to advertise it. It may turn some people off, because there are those people at work who are working harder at their office ministry than their paid work. I'm not anti-religion in the least bit, either, so please take this for what it's worth.

I guess the question for me would be do you want to work for someone who would reject employing you because of your faith? If the answer is no, I'd be inclined to keep it.

 

[Juked07]

These are great, you guys make a ton of great points I hadn't thought of, keep em coming.

I think if lines in my resume require explanation to not seem immoral or whatever, then they're not well written lines, so I should definitely make improvements. But in the meantime, to answer a few things..

DLerium: I think you're right in general, and I'll be careful not to include it for most things. A lot of prop trading firms seem to like it though, and it's an easy talking point that I have a firm quantitative understanding about when it comes up, so that's why I put it on there.

Phineas: The Dean's list requires over a 3.7 both semesters of a school year. I haven't had it since freshman year. The SAT score might be a vestige of when I had fewer things to include. You're almost definitely right that I should remove it.

Farang: I'm not sure what you're pointing out. Are you suggesting I should use stronger verbs? Or that I shouldn't use fragments the way I do? You're probably right that titles are more important than locations, I'll make some changes!

IronWing: Wow, I didn't realize that line looked so bad in that way! What I was describing was absolutely not a moral issue, but it came across that way so I must have done a poor job. What that line really refers to is trying to understand what components are in an exchange traded note so that we could trade it. The issuer of the note is not a competitor, and the information is not proprietary. In fact, they provide that information to the public, just not in a timely, reliable manner. We just wanted to understand their process so we could double check the constituents when things don't look right.

Sjwaste: It is a pretty controversial thing I guess, and you're probably right about it. I had it on there at the suggestion of a friend who landed a great job through a lucky shared connection like religion. At this point I don't think I'm looking for that kind of luck =P

 

[TecHNooB]

damn nice SAT score

 

[sjwaste]

I guess the question for me would be do you want to work for someone who would reject employing you because of your faith? If the answer is no, I'd be inclined to keep it.

It's one thing to have faith, it's another to put it on one's resume. It's not professionally relevant. It doesn't say he was president/treasurer/secretary/officer of that club. It just says he was in it.

The idea is to find a good professional fit. If OP absolutely requires that his employer fully embrace Christianity, then he should keep it - otherwise, he should lose it. It's not that he runs the risk of being rejected for his faith, it's that he runs the risk of being rejected because he's listing his faith on a document that markets him as a professional.

When I was coming out of college, I didn't list any activities on my resume where I did not have a leadership role. Beyond that, I don't advise anyone list their political, religious, sexual, or any other personal affiliation on a resume unless it is 100% necessary to the person's employment choices or is germane to the nature of the employer itself.

Do I mention I'm a Catholic when I'm talking to a faith-based legal services clinic about doing some intake hours for them? Sure. Doesn't mean I had the same conversation with my interviewer for my government position.

 

[Farang]

My point was that the first word on your bullet points is the most important. You "held" office hours? You "worked on" something? Not impressive. Most of them are good but these can be improved.

I can assume by the fact that you're attending U Penn engineering that you have a high SAT score. SAT is for high school students, doesn't seem appropriate in a professional resume.

By titles, I mean you have it all backwards. Not just with the professional experience. But you have U Penn as the most important header, and Bachelor of Applied Science as the least important. This should be reversed.

Also your street address should not be on your resume.

I think you might be better off with a leading "Summary of Qualifications," and dropping the skills/interests. Summarize yourself and relevant skills. Your interests aren't that interesting and should be dropped.

Overall though its very well done.

 

[sjwaste]

Sjwaste: It is a pretty controversial thing I guess, and you're probably right about it. I had it on there at the suggestion of a friend who landed a great job through a lucky shared connection like religion. At this point I don't think I'm looking for that kind of luck =P

I wouldn't even say it's controversial, it just might not be a risk you want to take. You can always have multiple versions of your resume for different types of work or employers that you'll apply to. In fact, I'd advise that anyway.

As I said, nothing wrong with it at all, it's just easy for an anti-religious resume screener to pick that up and make the wrong assumptions about you. I'm not suggesting you actually ARE like the guy at my office who used to spend his work hours on his religious outreach activities instead of doing work, I'm just suggesting that someone else could think that.

 

[PhineasJWhoopee]

It's one thing to have faith, it's another to put it on one's resume. It's not professionally relevant. It doesn't say he was president/treasurer/secretary/officer of that club. It just says he was in it.

The idea is to find a good professional fit. If OP absolutely requires that his employer fully embrace Christianity, then he should keep it - otherwise, he should lose it. It's not that he runs the risk of being rejected for his faith, it's that he runs the risk of being rejected because he's listing his faith on a document that markets him as a professional.

When I was coming out of college, I didn't list any activities on my resume where I did not have a leadership role. Beyond that, I don't advise anyone list their political, religious, sexual, or any other personal affiliation on a resume unless it is 100% necessary to the person's employment choices or is germane to the nature of the employer itself.

Do I mention I'm a Catholic when I'm talking to a faith-based legal services clinic about doing some intake hours for them? Sure. Doesn't mean I had the same conversation with my interviewer for my government position.

Good points, I agree. I would guess that this is a campus fellowship group like Campus Crusade for Christ, or Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. I was in a campus fellowship and frankly it never occured to me to put it on my resume.

 

[rcpratt]

I wouldn't put my ACT/SAT on a post-undergrad resume. I would never use it after MAYBE my freshman year of undergrad. And I agree, pull the church line, it doesn't have any detail under it anyways.

Looks great though.

 

[sjwaste]

Good points, I agree. I would guess that this is a campus fellowship group like Campus Crusade for Christ, or Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. I was in a campus fellowship and frankly it never occured to me to put it on my resume.

That's a good example. At my university, the folks in CCC were pretty out there. Spent a lot of time telling other that they were going to hell and the like. For on-campus interviewing, one would not want to put that affiliation on his or her resume because its likely that an alum is doing the screening and/or interviewing, and might remember that. Unless, again, it is a requirement that the candidate's employer espouse those values, or they know going in the alum was also in CCC or something. Intervarsity, on the other hand, was much less "controversial" on campus because they weren't really confrontational people or ever looking to get a rise out of others. The latter was more acceptable on a resume, but I still think it's irrelevant unless it was a leadership role.

I happen to like my faith, but there are people with strong opinions out there. It's moreso about avoiding the opportunity for someone else to make an untrue assumption about me than it is that I want to hide the fact that I have some sort of faith. I also think it's irrelevant in my case, because I'm not going to change my ethical code to fit in.

But enough about what I think. I hope the OP finds a job. It sucks out there right now, but those are some good credentials from a top university.

 

[PhineasJWhoopee]

When I'm hiring, I look for the best candidate. Period. Unfortunately there are employers that have a built in biases and may reject you on grounds other than your ability to perform the job.

I went to a Jesuit school but attended Campus Bible Fellowship at a nearby secular university. It had an interesting mix of "nerds" and star athletes. I don't have any idea how this group was perceived because I wasn't on that campus often. My guess is it was way off the radar.

 

[Juked07]

Gotta go for a while, but I plan on posting an revision tonight..

Random q for sjwaste. I vaguely remember you having mentioned something about working on a trading desk. I can't seem to find the post so I may be remembering wrong, but do you mind sharing some about your experience if my memory is correct?

EDIT: Gonna update tomorrow