Recruiter "Pet Peeve" Survey - Recently, ResumeDoctor.com undertook the immense project of conducting a survey of over 2,500 recruiters / headhunters throughout the US and Canada to find out their "Pet Peeves" with resumes. These recruiters stemmed from varied specialties and industries, (Engineering, Information Technology, Sales and Marketing, Executive, Biotech, Healthcare, Administrative, Finance, etc.). ResumeDoctor.com sought to find out what the recruiter’s likes and dislikes in a resume and what is going to get a resume read by them.

Here are the top twenty Results of the Survey. Click each item for a detailed discussion.

 
  1. Burying important info in the resume
  1. Gaps in employment
  1. 1st or 3rd Person - Resumes in either 1st or 3rd Person
  1. No easy to follow summary
  1. Pictures, Graphics or URL links no recruiter will call up
  1. Resumes sent in .pdf, .zip files, faxed, web page resumes, mailed resumes and not sent as WORD Attachment
  1. Font Choice - poor font choice or style
  1. Objectives or Meaningless Introductions
  1. Lying, misleading (especially in terms of education, dates and inflated titles)
  1. Employer info not included and/or not telling what industry or product candidate worked in
  1. Personal Info not relative to the Job
  1. Unqualified Candidates - Candidates who apply to positions they are not qualified for
  1. Paragraphs - Long Paragraphs ... not Bullet-points
  1. Long Resumes - too long
  1. Functional Resumes as opposed to writing a Chronological Resume
  1. Poor formatting - boxes, templates, tables, use of header and footers, etc.
  1. Contact Info - none or inaccurate contact info or unprofessional email addresses
  1. Dates not included or inaccurate dates
  1. Too Duty Oriented - reads like a job description and fails to explain what the job seeker’s accomplishments were and how they did so.
  1. Spelling Errors, Typos and Poor Grammar