How to Write a Functional Resume

Use This Resume Type for Career Change or Gaps in Work History

Mar 30, 2009

With employers scrutinizing the employment history of job candidates, job seekers who are changing careers or have one or more gaps should have a functional resume.

Finding jobs in today’s difficult economy is a challenge to say the least. Particularly if the job seeker is changing careers or has lengthy gaps in his or her work history, it is a good idea to reformat the resume from a traditional chronological resume to a functional resume.

Writing a Functional Resume: How is a Functional Resume Different?

A functional resume looks quite different than a traditional chronological resume. The functional resume places the candidate’s summary, skills, and areas of expertise up front rather than a reverse chronological presentation of current and past jobs.

The purpose of a functional resume is to “wow” employers with the candidate’s skills and areas of expertise rather than a chronological work history where they will undoubtedly question lengthy gaps. The functional resume also emphasizes transferrable skills for those seeking a career change.

Developing a Strong Qualifications Summary

The first section of the functional resume is the qualifications summary. It is intended to provide a brief glance of the candidate’s profession, expertise, capabilities, skills, and achievements.

The qualifications summary is similar to an objective, but should be written in such a way as to “market” the candidate and emphasize transferrable skills. For example:

"Information technology professional with experience working on SAP implementation project teams in a fast-paced environment under tight deadlines. Work demanded strong technical, organizational, and interpersonal skills, particularly in collaborating with technical documentation teams and upper management.

Dedicated, hard-working, and committed to going the extra mile in providing superior SAP implementation services for top clients and Fortune 500 companies. Strong history of successfully completing projects on time and under budget."

Below the qualifications summary, the candidate has the option of placing a bulleted list of capabilities which include general job skills, for example, project management or sales management.

This where the functional resume begins to deviate from the chronological resume. In this section, the candidate pulls two or three job roles out of his or her work history. The job seeker then places a bulleted list underneath each job role that highlights achievements. For example:

Employment History

The employment history section is where the functional resume differs the most as opposed to the traditional chronological resume. In this section, the job seeker simply lists job title, name of the company, and the company’s address.

Dates are optional, and are not recommended for job seekers with one or more lengthy gaps. Bullets are also optional. For example:

Writing a Functional Resume: Education

The education section is essentially the same on a functional resume as it is on a chronological resume. Include the name of the college or university, date graduated, and degree received.

Writing a resume can be challenging. If the candidate has one or more lengthy gaps in work history or is changing careers, learning how to write a functional resume including the qualifications summary, experience highlights, and work history is essential to finding a new job.

The copyright of the article How to Write a Functional Resume in Writing Resumes is owned by Daniel Gansle. Permission to republish How to Write a Functional Resume in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.