Writing in the "Third Person"

Recently, I had a client who thought that all resumes should be written in the "third person".  This is the worst possible way to represent yourself.


You want your resume to present you as a real person, and to create at least a flavor of personality and connectedness with the reader. Hiring managers want resumes to showcase "the professional you", serving as a marketing tool that promotes what you have done and what you can do.  Writing in the third person (i.e. Mr. Reynolds increased revenue by 22%) is written in the context of an observer, a third party and not the person whose name resides on the top of the resume.

Writing a resume has a unique structure and tone; sentences are trunicated and written with words that you normally would not use during candid (or business) conversations.  The resumes that I write are in the modified first person - meaning I do not use "I" or "we" but it is written to infer that the action is taken individually or within a team concept - taking into consideration that we are taking into consideration the perspective of the job seeker (the name on top of the resume).