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darobin (1316)

darobin
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http://berjon.com/

Journal of darobin (1316)

Tuesday February 26, 2002
08:09 AM

Hobbies

[ #3130 ]

Most of the feedback I've had so far on my prototypal résumé has been "You haven't listed your hobbies and such." Grrrr. I knew people were going to say that.

Why oh why does one need to include that cruft in a résumé? The one reason I've heard so far is that "it says things about your personality". Repeated many times.

That's totally inept. I write music and songs, what's my personality? I ski, what's my personality? The list goes on... Granted, if I said that I collect dahut action figures as a full time hobbie it might say something. But otherwise... I've been reading dozens of résumés during my time here, and I never even stopped to look at the hobbie section.

I guess I'll just have to add it lest some benighted HR starts making inferences about my hobby-less personality. *sigh*


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  • Who the hell puts their hobbies on a resume? I just put my professional stuff and that's it.

    The real problem with your resume is that it's in some crazy ass language. What is that stuff?
    • "My hobbies include arguing about politics and religion."

      Yeah, THAT'S gonna help me get a job! ;-)
    • My reaction too. It's not a personal ad. Do you also include height and weight? Religion? Whether you're a vegetarian?

      Maybe it's a European thing.

    • From other discussions it would appear to be a french thing. I see no sociological reason for it, so it must be a trend started by some stupid HR somewhere that just happened to stick.

      As for the language, well... given the fact that I'm looking for a job primarily in Paris ATM, having it in french probably helps :) I'll probably be translating it into english in case someone would be interested on the other side of the channel.

      --

      -- Robin Berjon [berjon.com]

      • The language thing was a joke. But the hobbies thing must be a french thing. I've occasionally seen it on resumes here in the US and it has struck me as very weird.
    • At a place I used to work there was a very sporty bloke called Andy who put on his CV his chest size, how fast he could do the 100m, and how many press-ups he could do. This was the primary thing on his CV. He considered the other stuff secondary achievements.

      Yes, he was really that sad. But he knew his Sybase inside out, so it didn't matter ;-)
  • People put weird things in résumés. In my 1994 jumbo-sized Oxford Hachette French English dictionary, there's example résumés (both in English and in French, along with examples of other kinds of correspondence), and they all list date of birth, whether the person is married, and whether they have kids.

    I think it's creepy.

    • And, these days, if an employer feels they require the knowledge of some of that stuff (and some of the stuff other people have mentioned) then they're actually breaching a privacy law.

      Most modern résumés should just include your name, an employment history, skills, education history and that's really about it.

      Of course, that's what the modern résumé guides say and it may not correspond with what the execs look for. Or it may. Or it may be near but not quite.

      Writing résumés
      --
        ---ict / Spoon

      • Privacy laws vary greatly from country to country (and between corporations as well). I know for instance that the SAG considers asking for the date of birth a serious offense because it could lead to age discrimination. In France this is not the case. Age discrimation isn't considered to be a threat (and most of the time isn't) and it is considered that one has enough recourses should it happen (the professional courts are powerful enough that no employer would want to risk going against them). On the o

        --

        -- Robin Berjon [berjon.com]

        • Yep. Absolutely right about privacy laws being different everywhere. BTW: What's SAG?

          The amusing thing being that until yesterday I hadn't seen any application stuff that was asking for hobbies and so on. Today, a job for which I am currently writing an application, I suddenly have to think about what my hobbies are =)

          Hmm. Who has time for hobbies?

          --
            ---ict / Spoon

          • Heh, good luck with finding a fitting list ;)

            SAG: Screen Actors Guild.

            --

            -- Robin Berjon [berjon.com]

            • Ended up writing something about writing plays (spot the synchronicity of SAG and that) and my book stuff (ironing out a book proposal that I hope to have done before the end of March - first pitch is to ORA due to the topic and the intended readership, even though it means it would get a lurid orange cover; at least with the redesign it won't have so startling a spine).

              And some other bits.

              Anyway, emailed all that and the covering letter and so on to my gf who will hopefully print it out later today (it's
              --
                ---ict / Spoon
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