Editor, Publisher

Resume or Résumé?  Do you know which is the correct word used to describe a document that summarizes an individual's professional and academic experiences?  Many people take this question for granted, but the answer is actually résumé just in case you didn't know.  Jobseekers type some variant of the word in countless search boxes on the Internet in hopes of finding information on how to create resumes, locating resume writers, uncovering results-producing resume databases, finding employers accepting resumes and so on.  While many experts in the recruitment field are probably amply familiar with résumé's French origin and know how the word should be correctly spelled, they still however prefer to write it as resume.  Just look at the side list of articles on this page, specifically under the heading "Resumes."  What do you see there?  The word resume, right?  And a total of 12 times, right?  Well, it's no wonder that you and just about every other jobseeker around is also using the word resume to coin the all-important document that usually accompanies a jobseeker's cover letter. 

"Resume" in Search Engines

Now, just because resume supposedly isn't the right word to use, well, at least supposedly not the original French word, doesn't mean you should stop using it.  Right?  Besides, it's usually a lot easier locating information on the Internet when you use terms that people use frequently regardless of the fact if they're using them correctly or not.  Additionally, if just about every career site out there is creating articles with the word "resume" headlining its many pages and you're using instead résumé in the different search engine fields, then you're assuredly going to miss out on countless career sites with documents containing just the words resumes. 

Also worth mentioning is the fact that even if you wanted to type the word résumé in the search field of say for instance Yahoo or MSN's site, you'd have an extremely difficult time trying to create the special characters that appear in the word résumé.  The only way that I currently know of getting around this obstacle is to type the word résumé in another program such as Microsoft Word or WordPerfect.  Next, shade the word and click on the copy icon.  Next, minimize whatever software you were currently using, open up Netscape or Internet Explorer, type Yahoo or MSN's url address in your computer's url field.  Once either site comes up, paste your word in Yahoo or MSN's search field and hit return or enter and the site will bring up pages after pages of career sites containing pages with the same word résumé.  But if you wanted to avoid this irksome copying and pasting process from Word to a unique search field on the web, then just type the word resume to begin with in your favorite search engine.  All of the major search engines unanimously recognize the word resume and easily allow site users to type resume's six simple characters in their search boxes.

"Resume" Within Word Documents

Another cool thing about the word resume is that it's easier to work with from a word processing standpoint.  To show you just what I mean, I'll briefly provide an example.  I found a lengthy 1-page document with the word résumé appearing in it 15 times that I decided to type.  I got through the first paragraph with no problems, but the second paragraph was a whole different story.  The word résumé appeared in it six times.  To create the word the first time within the document, I had to click on Insert from Word's top menu bar.  Then click on Symbol.  Next, opened a large drop-down box with a huge assortment of symbols for me to sort through.  Once I finally found the symbol é, I clicked on it, then hit the Insert tab and somehow the special symbol was miraculously placed within my document.  Now, so I wouldn't have to keep repeating this step, I copied the word and every time it was needed I pasted it into the new section.  It took me 11.14 minutes to type the whole document. 

To illustrate my example further, I pulled out a fresh piece of paper and retyped the same document over again.  The only difference this time around was that I replaced the word résumé with resume.  I finished this document in 10.25 minutes.  Why did I finish this second document sooner?  Well, that's because there were no extra keystrokes for me to contend with as was the case with the first document.  In typing the second document, I didn't have to search for the special é character from Word's standard drop-down symbol list and I didn't have to struggle with the repetitive chore of pasting the word résumé within the document 14 times. 

Now, as I'm sure you can gather from my illustration, it was just a heck of a lot easier working with the second document over the first one, and I wouldn't be too surprised if other writers and typists chose to use resume over résumé because it also afforded them similar conveniences.  This could definitely help explain the growing popularity amongst today's newest jobseekers in readily using resume over its outdated predecessor, and to shamelessly toss a phrase at you again, it just goes to show you that resume is just plain easier to work with.

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