Consider a functional resume according to your work history. Its focus is on the experiences and personal abilities that make you a perfect candidate for a particular position. Unlike traditional resumes, it focuses on the skills you have to meet the requirements of your desired jobs, but it doesn’t highlight your chronological employment history. Who should choose this type? A functional resume is perfect for job seekers with gaps in their work history and for people who are new to a specific industry.
What is a Functional Resume?
Its key purpose is to hide your imperfect working experiences or help you transfer from one business field to another. It conceals your periods of unemployment effectively. You need to hide these time periods because a hiring manager or a recruiter will decide that you’re a high-risk candidate. Explain these gaps in your functional resume. Its ultimate goal is to make potential employers or hiring managers consider your working experience or history close to normal.
Many people don’t have perfect employment records. Use effective strategies to cover up your gaps. To understand how a functional resume can help you achieve this goal, you need to learn its structure and look at useful templates.
Is it Right for You?
Employees have many choices when writing a resume. Make sure that you’re making a good choice. A functional resume focuses on professional skills rather than dates, and that’s why it’s excellent for job seekers with employment gaps, newcomers, or people making a career switch. It’s not as popular as a chronological resume today.
When should you opt for a functional resume?
It allows you to group job experiences so that you should choose this resume type if:
- You have different working experiences, not a clear progression in a specific field;
- Highlighting your accomplishments and talents outweighs listing previous job titles, employers, and service length;
- You’re thinking about changing careers;
- Your working experience isn’t relevant to specific positions;
- You have obvious resume gaps from education, training, disabilities, diseases, or homemaking;
- Most of your employment experience is unpaid (leadership or volunteer activities);
- If you list your work history by date, you’ll look too young or underqualified;
- Some jobs were at the same level, so repeating them will show a lack of your career progression;
- You don’t want to work in conservative fields, including law, finance, or banking, as employers and hiring managers expect candidates to submit chronological resumes.
The Structure of Your Functional Resume
This type of resume should contain the following structural elements:
- Contact information;
- Qualifications summary;
- Relevant skills;
- Professional experience;
- Education.
How to create each one? Keep reading to get the right answer to this question.
Contact information
Adding your contact details is the easiest stage of the entire resume writing process because you only need to include your email, phone number, name, and address. Look at a matching template to get a clear idea of styling because your name must be the largest text. Add your professional site it in this functional resume section.
Qualifications Summary
It’s a great way to start your resume because this section allows you to hide specific dates and gaps in your employment history. A qualification summary has an extra benefit of allowing you to showcase your major achievements and traits at the top of a functional resume. Include the accomplishments relevant to the job you’re applying for.
Relevant Skills
In a functional resume, your skills are more important than your employment history because it has gaps or you want to change your career path. Pick a few skills applicable to the chosen position. Use bullet points to provide supporting evidence. Adding numbers to a resume can make a potential employer confident that you meet specific job requirements, so add a quantified bullet point for every skill.
Professional Experience
Consider your legitimate reasons for unemployment and use them to label work gaps:
- Independent studies;
- Family or home management;
- Personal or adventure travel;
- Being a full-time parent or student.
Show that you did something during these periods. Your attempt to explain them as a result of medical problems or a recession is a big mistake that affects your chances.
Education
When writing your functional resume, covering education is one of the basics because you need to include the name of your college or university, state, city, etc. Specify your graduation date, GPA, and degree.
Functional Resume Writing: Useful Recommendations
- Consider a resume summary;
- Organize by theme;
- Use keywords;
- Mention relevant projects;
- Include some employment history.
Functional Resume Example
John A. Doe
999 Main Street
Ann Arbor, MI 99999
(123) 555-1234
[email protected]CAREER OBJECTIVE
Experienced and versatile professional with strong urban planning as well as people, management, and research skills seeks a position in urban planning and environmental impact analysis with a major city or Fortune 500 company.
CORE QUALIFICATIONS
- Background managing direct transportation planning and programs
- Adept at managing urban planning programs and people
- Able to anticipate and project organizational change
- Background as administrator of office operations
EXPERIENCE AND SKILLS
- Skilled in Government Guidelines
- Quality Control
- Urban Planning
- Environmental Impact Mitigation and Research
- Urban Planning
- Geology/Hydrology
- Site Evaluations
- Computer Software Tools
- Scientific and Business Grant Writing
Administrative: Lead coordinator for the daily processing of thousands of checks for payment and the mailing of confidential reports, meeting strict deadlines, and avoiding late fees.
Problem Solving: Designed a waste-management program involving Recycle Ann Arbor and a major book company, intended for the efficient handling of tons of paper, cardboard, plastic, metal, and glass, achieving net savings of $20,000 per building annually and reducing company disposal obligations.
Management: Oversaw operations of an expanding research lab, providing expertise, commitment, and quality control during a time of significant transition.
EMPLOYMENT HISTORY
Senior Process Engineer, September 2016-Present
Zezee Corp., Ann Arbor, Mich.Process Engineer: Technical Support, September 2012-September 2016
Zezee Corp., Ann Arbor, Mich.Technical Professional, September 2010-September 2012
City of the Stars, Mich.EDUCATION
Master of Business Administration (2015); GPA 3.9
Southern Nazarene University, Bethany, Okla. (Online Program)Bachelor of Science (Emphasis: Ecosystem/Environmental Business) May 2012
Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti, Mich.
Why Consider a Resume Summary?
Write a brief summary that focuses on your relevant skills. It’s an effective approach because it has a positive impact on how potential employers and recruiters see you and your resume.
Organize by Theme
Organize your functional resume by theme instead of listing all previous jobs in their chronological order. What are suitable themes? These can be the qualifications and skills listed in your resume, such as a customer support or recruiting experience. Group your skills together. This approach will enable hiring managers to understand that you have appropriate qualifications for a specific job, even if your employment history isn’t sufficient.
Use Keywords
Use keywords from a job description in bulleted lists, subheadings, or other parts of your functional resume. They prove that your abilities match job requirements.
Mention Relevant Projects
Include both professional and personal projects if they’re relevant to the chosen position because they demonstrate your ability to complete tasks.
Include Your Work History
Put it at the bottom of a functional resume to let recruiters focus more on your qualifications.
Do you need help? Look for reputable online resources. Get expert assistance and let professionals complete this task to give yourself a higher chance to get a future interview.