When is it Too Old to Put on Your Resume?
Win an award? Increased profits? Reduced waste? Great! Put it on your resume!
But when is it time to take it off your resume? When is it water under the bridge? When does it smack of desperately trying to hold onto past glory?
It's great to list awards you have won and highlight your accomplishments, but keeping them on your resume forever can work to your disadvantage, too. There are different categories of achievements you can place on your resume, and they all have their own expiration dates:
School awards. If you won Student of the Year five years ago in college, by all means list it. Just be aware that you're at the outer-most reach of listing the year you won it. If you won it in 1987, however, it's well past time to drop it completely - in fact, you'll look silly if you keep it on 20 years after the fact. Generally speaking, school awards have the same life span as your first two "real" jobs. You can still list the award and year it was won within five years, but drop it from your resume all together after eight years.
Civic awards. Like school awards, you should drop the year you won a civic award after five years. Civic awards, however, have a longer resume shelf life. If, for instance, you are a member of an organization and won Governor of the Year, you can continue listing the award long after you drop the year it was won. How long after? Civic awards, sans the dates won, can be kept on resumes for almost as long as you're in the work force (but it may be sticky to explain 25 year old awards in interviews).
Work awards. These tend to have an even shorter resume life span than school awards. Employee of the Month is generally good for a year. Perfect Attendance awards are only worthwhile to list when looking for your next job.
Work accomplishments. These have the longest resume shelf life before you drop them. If they occurred within the past ten years, by all means list the dates. If your main accomplishments happened during the Reagan Era, however, drop the dates. For the Disco Era, reconsider listing them at all.
IN A NUTSHELL: Know when to drop just the dates of your accomplishments from your resume - and when to drop them all together.
Published by Mike Thomas
Over the years, I've helped thousands find jobs. But I have other skills too: cooking, finding other revenue streams, relationships, tech and more! View profile
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