Professional Experience
Professional Experience, or any of its synonyms, is the mainstay of a chronological format. You will need a “Professional Experience” category if you plan to use any of the following formats:
- Accomplishments
- Combination
- Chronological variants
- CV
- International
- Linear
- Targeted market
(If you aren’t sure which format to use, refer to the summary at the end of Choose Your Most Flattering Format.) Although “Professional Experience” implies remuneration for your services, this category can also include nonpaid internships or significant, full-time volunteer positions related to your career goal. If this is the case, title the section something like “Experience” or “Career Highlights” rather than any of the terms in the following list that begin with the word Employment. For those retiring from a military career and whose experience best lends itself to a chronological presentation, title your service “Professional Experience” rather than “Military Experience” to make it more palatable for business and industry.
If you’ve chosen to write a functional, or skills-based, résumé, you can still include a skeleton of your professional experience to lend credibility to your work history. This condensed listing needs to include only your position title, the employer, and dates of employment. You can omit the dates if they reflect employment gaps or instability, but be prepared to explain them in an interview. Here is an example.
If you will use a professional experience category, you can choose a title from this menu:
