John Rossheim  Monster Contributing Writer 

Employee & Job-Seeker Tip

GET YOUR

50 PLUS RESUME

RIGHT

CHOOSING ANAN APROPRIATERESUME FORMAT1.

• Many 50-plus job seekers adopt an "I am what I am" approach. They simply update the top of their traditional chronological resume with a brief description of recent projects, subtracting a few lines from the bottom for brevity

• The opposite tack, often taken out of fear of age bias and professional obsolescence, is the "I am whatever they want me to be" approach. These mature job seekers start from scratch, selectively creating from their past a chronology-free professional identity that precisely matches the needs of the hiring company du jour. The resulting functional resume is so artful that it could be mistaken for fiction

1.1 PLAY UP YOUR EXPERIENCE, OR HIDE IT?

• Career experts recommend the middle path• Workers should highlight their latest and greatest

accomplishments in terms that will appeal to youthful recruiters and hiring managers, customizing each resume to directly address the needs of prospective employers without pandering to each job posting down to the bullet point• "There's no reason to disguise the dates in a work history;

just don't use your entire history," says Sarah Hightower Hill, CEO of Chandler Hill Partners, a career search strategies firm. • Setting a time limit on work history may be O.K. , because

experience more than 10 years old can become obsolete

1.2 TAKING THE MIDDLE GROUND

EMPHASIZE YOUR ACCOMPLISHMENTS, NOTYEARS OF EXPERIENCE 2.

2. EMPHASIZE YOUR ACCOMPLISHMENTS, NOT YEARS OF EXPERIENCE • Another common mistake is to brag about depth of

experience as a virtue unto itself. By contrast, recent accomplishments that are relevant to the job

opening automatically make a candidate appear more youthful• As you draft your resume, "compare yourself to

younger workers, who are engaged with the job market and know what employers want," says Karen Riggs, a professor of telecommunications at Ohio University and author of Granny@Work: Aging and New Technology on the Job

ADDRESS THETECHNOLOGY ISSUEHEAD ON 3.

3. ADDRESS THE TECHNOLOGY ISSUE HEAD ON

• Whether you're a programmer or a cosmetics executive, your resume must confront any reservations the prospective

employer may have about your technical aptitude

• The greatest concern employers have about hiring older workers is that they won't keep up with technology,

according to a survey by the Society of Human Resource Management

• So flaunt what you've got when it comes to technology, whether it's recent certifications or a simple mention of office-productivity software training you've undertaken.

• Also ensure you show up in a social media search

more on this topic:Get Your 50 Plus Resume Right

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