Condense 20+ years of experience into a two-page resume

If you have had a long career of almost thirty years, condensing it down to just one or two pages on a resume will be quite a difficult task. You can’t just mention all your jobs on the resume and call it quits either. You need to showcase the contributions you have made in each role and highlight the impact that you have had on the company.

Here are five excellent strategies to help you condense more than twenty years of experience into a two-page resume:

Focus on your impact, not your tasks

When describing past roles, it is important to focus on your achievements instead of your job duties. When you describe your career on your resume, you will find that there isn’t space enough to describe everything you have done all these years. The job duties and responsibilities of your past roles will take up a lot of space on your resume without adding any value to it. Use bullet points to highlight your best professional achievements in each past role. You can use up to six bullet points for recent jobs and around three bullet points for older jobs.

Pack a punch in the top one-third

The top one-third of your resume is very important when you are trying to make a great first impression. As you are well aware by now, hiring managers scan a resume for less than seven seconds at first. If your resume fails to make a great impression within that time, you are likely to be rejected from the competition. Mentioning your best achievements toward the top one-third of your resume where they are bound to be seen by a hiring manager is a smart move. Use the resume summary statement to mention your best achievements as well.

Group similar roles

If you have worked for several decades, you will have all kinds of experience in the working world. This gives you an opportunity to present your work experience by categorizing them. Any multiple similar positions that you have held over the years can be grouped together on your resume. Create a condensed approach to your career history by grouping your work experience as leadership positions, sales-related positions, banking positions, etc.

Select a hybrid resume format

Go for a hybrid resume format instead of a traditional chronological one. This will give you the freedom to rearrange the resume sections to fit your career trajectory. Then, you will have the option of highlighting your skills and accomplishments equally, without drawing the reader’s attention away from your work experience. Also, the hybrid resume format is excellent when you want to age-proof your resume.

Tailor to the job

No matter how long your career was, the work experience you mention on your resume must be all relevant to the job you are applying for. When tailoring your resume to the role, you may have to leave out certain past jobs that are unrelated to the new position. Consider this as a win, not a loss. Because removing past work experiences from your resume will help you age-proof the document. If there are important jobs that you believe are relevant to the new role, you can create an Early Experience section for your resume and place them there. Take care to remove any dates that are older than the last 10-15 years.