The adage "It's not what you say, but how you say it" holds particular weight when it comes to resumes, a
recent survey shows. Eighty-four percent of executives polled said it takes just one or two typographical errors
in a resume to remove a candidate from consideration for a job opening; 47 percent said a single typo can
be the deciding factor.
The survey was developed by OfficeTeam, a staffing service specializing in placing highly skilled administrative
professionals. It was conducted by an independent research firm and includes responses from 150 senior executives at
the nation's 1,000 largest companies.
Executives were asked, "How many typos in a resume does it take for you to decide not to consider a job candidate for a
position with your company?" Their responses:
One typo: 47 percent
Two typos: 37 percent
Three typos: 7 percent
Four or more typos: 6 percent
Don't know/no answer: 3 percent
Resumes are increasingly getting caught in e-mail junk filters and may never reach intended recipients. Try e-mailing
your resume to yourself, both as an e-mail attachment and pasted into the body of any e-mail. If it goes to your
junk-mail box, try to determine what offending word(s) might be responsible -- and eliminate the offender(s).
The "keep your resume to one page" rule may be on its way out, a new survey suggests. While more than half (52 percent)
of executives polled believe a single page is the ideal length for a staff-level resume, 44 percent said they prefer two pages.
That compares to 25 percent polled a decade earlier who cited two pages as the optimal resume length; 73 percent of respondents
preferred a single page at that time. Respondents also seemed more receptive to three-page resumes for executive roles, with
nearly a third (31 percent) citing this as the ideal length, compared to only 7 percent 10 years ago.
Both national polls include responses from 150 senior executives -- including those from human resources, finance and marketing
departments -- with the nation's 1,000 largest companies. They were conducted by an independent research firm and
developed by Accountemps, a specialized staffing service
for temporary accounting, finance and bookkeeping professionals.
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