3 Skills You Should Probably Leave Off Your Resume

Put yourself in a recruiter’s shoes. You’re reviewing hundreds of resumes day in and day out, and you just want to find a few candidates who jump out at you on paper in the best possible way. You’re looking for candidates with unique, yet professional skills that will be vital for success in the position.

Because of this, when you’re applying for a job, you have to think twice before typing out a long list of skills on your resume. As awesome as it would be to list “photography” on your resume because you sat in on a one-hour workshop back in high school, that doesn’t exactly count as a skill.

As you’re writing and editing your resume so that you can start applying to jobs on WayUp, here are a few skills you should definitely leave off your resume so that employers take you seriously.

1. Proficient in Microsoft Word

Your Microsoft Office skills may have swiveled heads a couple decades ago, but now that everyone regularly utilizes these tools, adding this to your resume is a waste of space. The point of the resume skills section is to list the things that will set you apart – not help you blend in with the crowd.

P.S.: Mentioning the amount of words you can type per minute? No longer a thing. Our in-house recruiter Julie Olsson recommends leaving this out unless you’re applying for a secretarial or paralegal role.

2. Witchcraft & Wizardry

Is it important to add personality to your resume? A thousand times, yes, but listing out-of-the-box skills and interests that probably won’t apply in a professional setting? Hard pass. This includes, but is not limited to, tarot card reading, unicycling and the nae nae.

Because your resume is your first impression of you, put your best foot forward, and play it safe. That means you’ll probably need to save your more eccentric skills and interests until after you’re hired – and even then, only when your employer and coworkers have truly gotten to know you.

3. Social media

If you’re a YouTube or Instagram celebrity with hundreds of thousands of followers, or if you’ve managed marketing campaigns through social media in the past, then great: This skill will serve you well when you’re applying for Marketing & Communications roles, but if you’re using this to refer to your own personal social accounts, this isn’t something you should freely list. Everyone is using personal social media accounts, but that doesn’t mean that everyone has the skills necessary to carefully analyze their audience, grow a following and keep other users engaged.

Think of it this way: If you’re in an interview and an employer asks you about a few of the skills on your resume, you want to make sure that your response shows that you’re a highly qualified candidate who can do the job well. Good luck resume writing – once you’re done, upload your new-and-improved resume to your WayUp profile and start applying to some incredible jobs!