Yes Include Physical Address On Your Resume
- Shows the employer that you reside in the area and will not require relocation.
- Full street address is required for Federal Resumes.
- Removing it looks like you might be hiding something.
- For large cities, include at least City, State or City, State, Zip to address any commuting issues. Neither you nor the hiring manager want to have several interviews only to find out that the commute is a deal breaker.
When To Exclude Your Address Altogether
There are some instances when you shouldnât include any address at all. Some remote positions will not require an address from you during the application process, so there is often no need to include it. Look to the job description for requirements, such as preferred time zones or locations. Use that information to judge how specific you should be on your resume. For example:
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Eastern time zone
-
Located in New York
-
US-based
You should also exclude your address when youâre not sure who will be looking at your resume for example, when you post a resume online or submit it to any forum where people may pass it around. Even your city and zip code can be dangerous in the wrong hands, and you never know who will come across it online! Remove that information from your contact section, especially if youâre just looking for general feedback.
Should Remote Applicants Include Their Locations On Their Resumes
One of the big benefits of working remotely is that you can do it from anywhere. Perhaps youre traveling the world or living in a rural area far from an office center. As long as you have the right tech, youre good to go. So is there really a need to include your location on your resume?
Maybe. Many employers want to know which timezone youre in to ensure your working hours are compatible with theirs. Including your city and state could qualify you as timezone-compatible and help you in the recruiting process.
It is worth noting that some remote workers dont like to disclose their locations because theyre concerned employers, as , will want to adjust pay to the cost-of-living in their areas.
In this case, including your location on your resume is a personal decision, but do consider that youll be asked where youre located during the interview process, anyway. Overall, it seems including your city and state on your resume can do more good than harm.
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Current Employers Contact Info
Remember, this contact information will be used by recruiters to contact you. Do you really want them calling you at work or using an email address that can be monitored by your current employer? Dont inadvertently tip your boss off about your job-search activities. Always list your personal email address and phone number on your resume and job applications. The same goes for any social media accounts associated with your professional brand.
Are There Any Advantages Of Including Your Address
As weve seen above, there are many reasons why recruiters are looking for your address on your resume. There are also many reasons why you may wish to omit your address on your resume. While all of these points remain true, there are advantages for both you and the recruiter when including your address on your resume.
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Jobs That Require A Listed Home Address
Why would a recruiter want your home address? Some jobs require this because they prefer local applicants, or they want to do a background check. Below are different scenarios that’ll require a home address on resume.
- Federal and civil service jobs require a permanent address for background checks.
- Jobs for retail and restaurant industries may request an address because companies prefer applicants who can get to work within a few minutes due to shift changes and overtime.
- Delivery jobs prefer local applicants who are familiar with the area.
- Banking and other jobs that handle sensitive information may request an address so they can run a background check.
- Sales jobs that require knowledge of community residents and hotspots to better perform the job.
Jobs that only accept local residents usually specify which location they prefer, so youll see requirements like Must live in South Dakota or Applicants must live in Boston.
In some cases, a company may send you an interview invite or job offer via snail mail. Although this rarely happens now, some companies still do this, especially for jobs where sensitive information is involved.
Hiring Managers Expect To See It
As mentioned earlier, the inclusion of an address on a resume is a traditional expectation of hiring managers.
Excluding your address may not sit well with employers who are expecting to see it.
This can lead to a negative first impression â something you want to avoid at all costs!
Because many hiring managers still expect to see an address, it is often recommended to include location information in some form.
Luckily, as we covered above there are many different formatting options when it comes to listing your resume.
This allows you to choose a format that you are comfortable with while still meeting employer expectations.
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How Many References Should You Have
Most job seekers should have between three and four references on their reference page.
However, if youre applying for a position that requires extensive vetting like a senior-level role, you should include between five and seven professional references.
But remember that all of your references should be high quality. Each reference should be able to meaningfully attest to your professional strengths and character. Dont include more references just to hit a higher number.
Is It Ok To Exclude My Mailing Address From A Resume
I was reading this thread about if an address is really needed on a resume.
Does not having an address on a resume exclude it from consideration?I recently had a difference of opinion about whether job seekers should include their address on their resume. I hold that it is not necessary since most contact is done by phone or email, and not by snail mail. I also think that it has a risk of ending up in the wrong hands. My co-worker disagrees and says that HR professionals want to know whether the applicant is within commuting distance or not. He says that if there isn’t an address included, the resume will be immediately discarded.
which was answered with
My view is aligned with your position. At least as far as the software industry goes, tons of people are leaving physical address off these days. In fact, many people don’t have resumes and instead use online profiles. In software, there is much more demand than available engineers, so if we throw out a resume just because it doesn’t have an address, we’re shooting ourselves in the foot. It results in fishing in a smaller pond and with more competition.
Throwing the resumes out might be reasonable when doing high-volume recruiting in an industry where available candidates far outstrips demand.
I happen to also share the opinion that since most contact these days is done by email or phone, the address is not necessary on a resume.
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It Opens You Up For Discrimination
Though itâs illegal, discrimination still occurs at every stage of the job search process. Similar to why you should never include your photo on a resume, your address can potentially be used to draw conclusions about you and your lifestyle. These conjectures are mitigated by using simply your city, state, and zip code.
Again, this is illegal. However, some neighborhoods do come with assumptions about the people who live there. Avoid the risk by omitting your exact street address.
Option #: Tell A White Lie
This option is great if you dont want to tell a flat out lie, but youre not getting enough interviews telling the truth on your resume.
Heres what to do Put your name and phone number on your resume, but dont list an address. Where youd normally put an address, instead say something like Relocating to Denver in March 2017. .
Using this approach to apply for jobs in a different city or state should get you a higher number of interviews without having to lie about where you currently live.
This is still a bit of a lie, since youre probably not going to relocate without a job offer, but its also quite true- your goal is to find a job in the new city, and your plan is to relocate to that city if you can find a suitable position.
This will get you the greatest number of phone interviews and will keep your resume out of the garbage pile.
If you do ask you an interview question about this in the first conversation , you can tell them you plan on relocating either way but you are trying to secure a job beforehand. That will put their mind at ease and quickly convince them youre serious about finding a job in their city.
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Should You Put Your Address On Your Resume
Traditionally, including an address on a resume was standard practice as physical mail was the main way employers would respond after a submitted application. Today, most communication about the hiring process takes place online. As a result, including a full address is not always necessary.
1. Name and contact information2. Summary or objectivec. Description of role and achievement4. Education5. Skills6. Optional
Additionally, your physical address may be a piece of information you want to keep private until youve established a relationship with an employer. In this case, its often acceptable to leave your full address off your resume.
Option #: Tell The Truth And Put Your Out
This option is simple, and chances are youve already tried it. Accept that some employers wont want to interview you, but continue to list your full out-of-state address on your resume.
Theres one big drawback, which you probably already know
Some companies only consider local candidates. This will limit the number of opportunities youre able to interview for. Not every company will be open to interviewing you, even on the phone.
Still, I would try this option for a couple of weeks to start my job search. Its a good place to start because its the safest, assuming you can get some companies willing to talk to you. The only risk is spending time applying for jobs and finding out youre not getting enough responses or interviews.
If that happens, youll need to consider other options. Thats where option #3 comes in
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What About On A Job Application Do I Need To Put My Real Address
Resumes give flexibility for some additional clarification but applications do not. Lying on applications is a big no in my book so on an official job app you should be putting your actual address.
If you are worried about being automatically screened out by an applicant tracking system, take matters into your own hands by networking effectively within the company.
Hope this post helped you tackle this common question! If youre currently kicking off a job search, check out our Conquer Your Job Search course here.
Resume Reference Page Example
Check out this properly formatted resume references example to see what a references list looks like in practice:
Note that in this example, the candidate matches the style of her reference page to her resume design.
If you need to include a list of references with your resume, be sure to match the formatting to the rest of your application.
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Irrelevant Social Media Accounts
Not only is this information a waste of resume space, but including personal social media accounts that arent aligned with your professional brand can derail your job search. If youre applying for a job at TikTok or Facebook, it might be acceptable to leave your social media accounts on your professional resume, otherwise remove these links from your resume and take steps to safeguard your brand.
Flesh out at least one professional profile on sites like LinkedIn, GitHub, or About.Me, depending upon your line of work, and include the link at the top of your resume. If you work in a creative field, consider creating a personal site that has a mobile-responsive design so you can share your portfolio from any device.
How To Include Your Address On A Resume
If you have decided to include your address, there are a few ways you can go about it. If you have any security concerns or have decided to include your address in case it would be helpful for the employer, you have the option to simply list your city or region.
Here are a few examples of ways to handle listing your address, depending on what you are comfortable with and what you think will be most helpful in the hiring process:
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No Address
- City, State and Zip CodeExample: St. Louis, MO 63101
- Complete Address
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How To Format Your Resume Contact Information
Place your contact information at the very top of your resume so recruiters can’t miss it. If you’re using Word, be sure to not place these important details in the header section of the document, as not all applicant tracking systems are able to properly read and parse information stored in this section of a Word document.
Place your name at the top of this section, using a larger font size than the other pieces of contact information so that it stands out. Depending on how much space you have to work with, you can place the rest of your contact details in one or two lines, located just below your name. Below are a few examples of how you can format the contact information on your resume.
Background Checks Are Dependent On It
A whopping 96% of employers use background checks to screen candidates, according to Global HR Research and these background checks are dependent on jurisdictions pulled from your current records. So, leaving it off entirely can hinder the screening process, which could make employers less likely to move forward with your application.
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Spelling And Grammatical Errors
A recruiter survey by TopResume found spelling and/or grammatical errors to be the No. 1 resume mistake that could cost you the job. However, with a little effort, you can easily avoid this resume deal-breaker. Print your resume out in a different font, read it aloud, and ask someone with impeccable writing skills to edit your resume for grammar.
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Why You Should Never Put Your Address On Your Resume
Of all of the mistakes you could make when putting together your resume, you likely wouldnt consider including your home address as one of them.
But for many recruiters where you live is a potential red flag. The problem: the commute your address suggests.
Thats according to Donna Svei at Avid Careerist. Her insight:
You might not have thought about it, but in-house recruiters know that people with long commutes have more stress and often eventually quit because of the commute. If you quit, they dont look good AND they have to replace you. Thats more work, with no more money, for them.
The slow-boiling terror of the commute has been born out by research: behavorial scientists have found that somebody with an hour-long commute needs to make 40% more than somebody who walks to work. Bonus tip: long commuters are more likely to get divorced, too. No wonder recruiters count the commute so hard.
When you put your address on your resume, believe me, they do the math, she continues. If your commute would be longer than whats tolerable long-term, your resume often finds its way into the maybe or no pile.
what to do about the commute if youre already in it
If recruiters are going to discard your resume for having a too-far address on it, then dont put your address there. Instead, Svei says, put your most recent employers city location only.
Or you could just move closer to the job. Research suggests itll make you happier.
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Beautiful Resume Templates To Land Your Dream Job
Adding your address to a resume is a traditional expectation from hiring managers.
But what is the expectation for more modern resumes?
The answer ultimately depends on several factors, including:
- The location of the job
- Whether the job description specifically asks for an address
- How relevant the address is to the job
A hiring manager is unlikely to communicate via physical mail, so they are also unlikely to use your address as a method for contacting you.
Instead, employers will likely use addresses as a point of reference for:
- Where an applicant lives
- The applicantâs proximity to the job
- Whether or not the applicant will need to relocate
How To Include Your Contact Information On Your Resume
When you’re writing a resume, it’s important to include all of your contact information at the top of the page. This allows employers to see how they can contact you.
Without detailed contact information, or with incorrect contact information, employers will not be able to get in touch with you. You want to make it as easy as possible for an employer or hiring manager to contact you about the job you’re applying for.
Learn more about what to include in your contact section and where to put the information. Plus, see a sample contact section for a resume.
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