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Comment by Bedon292 | Hacker News Reader

Just curious, why one page? It seems to compress a ton of information into a small area, which I would think makes it less appealing. If I were looking at the example resume, it would just be too much. I always heard 3 pages was the right length, first one for the hooks, and then the other 2 for the detailed history. Is that different from others experiences?

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In the tech industry, the recommendation unless you have 10+ years experience is a one page resume with all of your info. If you have 10-15+ years experience, you can do 2 pages but most HR departments won't read beyond the first anyways.

Very true. Also consider: The "screening" phase is the toughest part to get past. When someone has 400 resumes on their desk to quickly go through, they are going to barely scan maybe the top 1/3 of the first page of your resume, and I guarantee they won't look past page 1. You need to have your strongest pitch front and center on the very top of page 1.

Your resume is the first hint a company gets about your communication skills, including your ability to edit and summarize. Unless you've got heaps and heaps of experience, 2+ pages can send the message "trouble editing".

The strongest pitch is when they turn the page and realize you've got numerous real world experiences in what they want. Even more than what's on the first page ;)

I don't think this is true. At least not in my experience.

I do a lot of hiring of fresh out of university people. The amount of 2-3 page resumes with their 9th grade achievements astonishes me.

Something like this format certainly makes sense for fresh out of Univeristy, since they should really not be going that long. But seems much less useful for someone with 5+ years of experience and several jobs. But I am definitely interested to see what other HR departments are looking for these days. Is this format attractive as someone doing hiring?

1 page for people with no to little experience.

2 pages for everyone else.

I already had a solid two pages, though definitely not this dense, after 5 years. And have kept it at 3 pages now for a few years. I am sure it could have initially fit on this one page, if I wanted to compress it to this format. But to me it just seems like its too dense for an HR department to even review. I would much rather have the important hooks on that one page, nicely spaced and not overwhelming, and then if they are interested they can move on. But none of the advice I have relied on for this has been from the Tech Industry, its just been general advice. So its very interesting to see another perspective.

The convention in the U.S. is a one-page resume and a cover letter.

A resume in the U.S. is not like a CV in Europe. It is an abbreviated list of highlights that are relevant to the position you are applying for.

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