Career and Professional Development Center

Creating a Resume

To effectively look for a job in the United States, you must prepare a U.S.-style resume. Your goal in creating this resume is to make it an effective marketing tool for an American audience. This means that:

  1. You must portray your education and experience in the most favorable light possible in order to convince a prospective employer to take a closer look at you; and
  2. The information must be presented in the format that Americans expect.

Format

Although formats vary, most students will want to use a fairly standard resume format. A standard format allows employers to find the information they seek in the places they expect to find it. Whatever format you choose or devise, remember that a good resume should emphasize your strengths in a clear and concise manner. It should be visually attractive and should present the most important facts relating to your education and career.

Americans expect resumes to be one-page documents. (Studies indicate that an employer spends an average of only 30 seconds looking at each resume when it is first received.) If your resume is longer than one page, an employer may conclude that you are unable to present materials succinctly. Experienced lawyers with several years of practice who find it difficult to reduce their qualifications to one page may want to prepare a "Representative Deals (or Case) List" as an attachment to their resumes.

The visual aesthetics of your resume can be very important. Use bullets, "white space," and font to make your resume easy to understand at a glance. Variable font sizes and styles can help you include more information, and the use of bold and italics will help you emphasize certain items, such as the names of schools and employers. Avoid using too many different typefaces or graphics, however. Use short phrases rather than sentences. Use active verbs and avoid the use of personal pronouns in the resume.

Many employers may not consider a resume with typographical, grammatical and spelling errors. Please proofread very carefully and then ask an American friend or staff member to review your resume. Do not rely only on computerized spell-checkers because you might misspell the word you mean by producing another word that happens to be correctly spelled. See below for special format considerations for resumes sent by email.

Name, Address, Telephone, Email

Center your name in bold type at the top of the page. If you go by your middle name, you should use an initial for your first name; for example, if your name is "Eva Maria Gabrielsson" and you go by "Maria," you should consider using "E. Maria Gabrielsson." While you should not use an informal nickname on your resume, if you go by a name that is very different from your full name, or if you have chosen an "American" name, you may wish to include it on your resume, e.g., "Weeravej (William) Sirichatchai."

Typically you will use both a local address and a permanent home address (from your home country), one justified with the left margin and one justified with the right margin. Be sure to include your Durham telephone number and Duke email address so that employers can get in touch with you.

Education, Educational Honors and Activities, and Grades

Because you are currently a student, it's logical to begin the body of the resume with your educational background. Use "Education" for the heading, which can be centered but is usually flush with the left margin. List institutions attended in reverse chronological order, with honors, activities and perhaps grades (see below) listed under the respective academic institutions at which you received them. List Duke University School of Law first, and be sure to include the city (Durham) and state (North Carolina). Indicate the degree for which you are a candidate (LL.M.) and the month and year you expect to get the degree.

You should list any graduate programs you attended and then "undergraduate" program(s) following the above format, also including the city and country in which they are located. Be sure to explain any degrees that might be confusing to Americans (e.g., "(J.D. equivalent)" for the law degree that qualifies you to apply for admission to a bar association). Ordinarily, you should not list any pre-university education, but do include studying at an American or English-speaking high school, because it indicates fluency in English. If you attended a certificate program (e.g., a Duke Summer Institute), include it in this section in the proper chronological order.

Honors and Activities

List your educational honors under the respective academic institutions at which you received them. Include any honors that indicate a high level of academic performance, and explain their significance if necessary (e.g., "Presidential Scholarship (awarded to top 5% of students)"). Be sure to include any nationally-recognized honors. If you received a scholarship or grant to pursue your LL.M. degree, be sure to include that under "Duke University School of Law." If you completed a thesis or major paper, you may want to indicate the title of your thesis in italics under the appropriate educational degree.

Finally, be sure to include any university team sports, positions of leadership and community organizations in which you participated, as employers view these as an indication of your ability to cooperate and achieve a common goal. Likewise, if you participated in academic competitions such as moot court competitions, these should also be listed.

Grades and Class Rankings

Grades and class rankings do not have to be listed on a resume. Your resume is a marketing tool designed to highlight your strengths; if your grade point average ("GPA") is an asset, you may list it. For Duke grades, round to the nearest hundredth, e.g. 3.25. Similarly, if your university published rankings of students, you may list your ranking. However, if your GPA or ranking is not outstanding, you do not need to list it.

Experience

The next category is "Experience." If everything included in this section is a paid job, you can call the section "Work Experience," but if you have included internships and volunteer positions, you should simply call it "Experience." Begin with the most current or recent position you have held and work backwards chronologically. Do not leave large gaps of time unaccounted for, as you will waste precious interview time explaining these gaps. It is not necessary to list every job you have had, however, particularly non-legal jobs you held while a student.

In formatting this section, typically the name of the employer should be first, then the location (city and country), the dates (months and years) and then your position title. Following the position title, you should include a brief job description. If this section on your resume is not particularly lengthy, you may also include activities from your law school experience, such as Teaching or Research Assistant.

When describing the work you did, be succinct and use action words. Avoid phrases such as, "My responsibilities included writing/reading/researching...." Instead, say "wrote/read/researched" or use other action verbs (see appendix on "Action Verbs"). Use the past tense unless you are currently doing the job. In choosing which experiences to include in your job description, ask yourself the following:

  1. What were my primary responsibilities?
  2. What major tasks or projects did I undertake?
  3. What specific examples of my work show my skills as a lawyer?

Additional Categories or Attachments

Following the Experience category, you may wish to include some other miscellaneous categories. Most L.L.Ms should include a Languages category. Indicate your level of competence and be prepared to be interviewed in that language if you state that you are fluent. "Proficiency" indicates that you can speak a particular language comfortably, although not "fluently."

Although not required, an Interests category can provide a good starting point for an interview. Use this category if you have a hobby that is out of the ordinary or demonstrates dedication, such as backpacking, running marathons, SCUBA, Flamenco dancing, or playing a musical instrument with a high degree of skill. Reading and traveling are examples of interests held by almost everyone and are, therefore, too commonplace to include in this category.

A Professional Affiliations/Certifications/Memberships category can contain relevant past and present memberships, positions held and responsibilities, particularly if the time spent demonstrates the use or development of skills or expertise.

If you have published articles, a Publications section can be used. A lengthy list of publications that makes the resume longer than one page can be produced as a separate document and attached to the resume.

Americans do not expect to receive reference letters with resumes. A list of References can be helpful, however, produced as a separate document and attached to your resume. The reference list should include at least your name at the top and may also include your address. The list should have at least two references: an academic, preferably a Duke Law School professor, and an employer who knows your work. (It is not likely that a Duke professor will be able to serve as a reference until the second semester following the results of your exams.) Of course, you should seek permission before you list someone as a reference. Likewise, you should provide each reference with a copy of your resume. When you list references, you should include their name, relation to you, and telephone number. Employers typically contact references by phone if they check references. Lately, more employers are checking references when considering applicants for a job at a firm with which they have no previous affiliation.

Attorneys with experience in large national or transnational commercial transactions or cases may wish to prepare a Representative Deals (or Cases) List enumerating and discussing projects you have worked on as a practicing lawyer. This list should use action verbs and mention major transactions or cases in which you played significant role, as well as describing what work you performed.

You will ordinarily not need to supply a Writing Sample with your resume. Only when employers are seriously considering you will they require a writing sample. If a sample is requested, work submitted for the legal analysis, research and writing course may be useful.

Items to Exclude From Your Resume

Printing your Resume

With the availability of sophisticated word processing programs and laser printers, you should have no trouble printing a professional resume. Your resume should be printed on white or a neutral color (ecru, very light gray) bond that has at least 25% cotton or rag content. Be sure to purchase sufficient quantities of matching plain paper and matching envelopes for your cover letters. If you produce an original resume on regular copy paper and take it to a print shop such as "Kinko's," they can darken it and print it directly onto your high quality paper.

Emailing your Resume

As more and more employers use electronic databases for job applicants, e-mailing resumes is becoming more common. Some employers even require it. If you are required or choose to e-mail your resume, you need to prepare it using a program that can be opened by the person who will receive it. In addition, you need to be certain that your formatting will not be altered when the resume is opened. For these reasons, you should use the U.S. version of standard software to prepare your resume.

Submitting Duplicates

You may want to send your resume both by mail and e-mail. You may also want to send it to more than one person at the same firm, for example, the recruiting coordinator and a partner in the international practice section of the firm. If you chose to send duplicates, be sure you make clear to the recipients that more than one copy is being sent. If using e-mail and regular mail, say, "I will send a hard copy by mail." If sending the resume to more than one person, use "cc." with the names of other person(s) to whom you are sending the resume.