Preparing a Resume for a Career Shift
A resume is your path to a new job or career. With your resume, you quickly and efficiently give a potential employer a rundown of your experience, work history, and skills. However, when you are looking to change career paths, how should you create your resume? What should it look like? In this article, we are going to take you through the many phases of a resume, one in which you can use when you are considering a career shift.

	A resume is your path to a new job or career.

A career shift resume is slightly different than the traditional resume. In general, traditional chronological resumes are used when you seek to continue along the same career path or job industry. You want to be able to give a history of your work experience but also highlight skills and experience that would be beneficial within your new objectives.

For example, let us say that you are now entering the legal profession as an attorney. However, your work history is mainly non-legal. It is important to remember that not only are employers looking for experience in their specific field, but they are also looking at your track record. They want to know how reliable you are, how long you stick with a company, and so forth. Therefore, it is important to provide these details on your resume.

The following is a description of each of the keys areas in a resume.

Personal Information

As with most resumes, you want to be sure that you provide your personal information. This includes your full name, street address, city, state, zip code, telephone number, and your email address. This way, potential employers can contact you for an interview.

Profile

In the case of a career shift, a profile is extremely important include. It is up to you to guide the employer in the right direction. Your work history may show that you have been involved in a different career path; therefore, you want to make sure that the employer understands what transferable skills you have right now that could be a benefit to their company.

Education

Depending on the field in which you are entering, your education will be extremely important. You want to include all colleges or schools you have attended in this area. Make sure that you include the name of the school, the city, and the state. You will also want to identify when you graduated, what degrees you obtained, your activities, honors received, and GPA.

Field Specific Experience

In this section, you will provide the experience you have in the specific field that you are entering. For example, if you are an attorney, you would want to list any legal experience you have. It is important to identify this section specifically. In other words, for an attorney, you would put LEGAL EXPERIENCE as the header. This will allow you to feature your most relevant work history to the position in which you seek. In this area, you will want to include the company name, city, and state, as well as the dates you worked with this company, your title, and any notable events or experienced gain.

When you are looking to change career paths, how should you create your resume?

Other Experience

After the initial section that features your most relevant experience, you can include a subsequent section entitled, for example, OTHER PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE so that you can feature other professional experience that provided transferable skills that will apply to the position in which you seek, and you want to keep those transferable skills in mind when you are preparing it. This section will include the same information as the field-specific experience

The following is a sample resume for an attorney entering the legal field.

JOHN DOE
123 My Street
Anywhere, IL, 555555
Telephone: (555)555-5555
Email Address:john_doe@john_doe.net

PROFILE
Recent law graduate pursuing a career in family law with excellent communication and document preparation skills.

EDUCATION
Yale Law School, New Haven, CT
Juris Doctor, May 2007

• GPA: 4.0
• Graduated With Honors

University of Illinois
Master of Arts in History, May 2003

• GPA: 4.0

LEGAL EXPERIENCE
Someone's Law Firm, Anywhere, IL
Law Clerk, 2004 – 2007

• Assisted director in discovery and other research.
• Drafted memoranda and motions.

OTHER PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Jane Doe's Medical Office, Anywhere, IL
Professional Assistant, 2001-2004

• Scheduled Appointments.
• Maintained client files.
• Directed calls to executive-level staff.
• Prepared memos.

This is just a sample resume and it will look very different from your own, but it should give you a good idea of the format to use for your resume. The bullets that you prepare should be much more detailed than those in the sample. Specifically during a career shift, be sure to clearly identify transferable skills that could benefit potential employers.