Best Interest and Hobbies for Your Resume in 2023

Resumes are a fact-based densely packed one sheet story about who you are, what kind of employee you are, and how you can bring value to the company you’re applying for. According to Google’s head of recruiting, “The no. 1 thing you want to be thinking about is to tell your story — not just your work experience, but also what you’ve learned and the accomplishments you’re most proud of.” This is where interests and hobbies for your resume come into the picture.

One way to tell a story and personalize your resume is to include a select few hobbies or interests that illustrate your life outside of work. While your resume should mainly focus on your career and educational achievements, your listed interests and hobbies for your resume help paint a fuller picture of what kind of person you are in the real world.  

This is a great opportunity to connect with your interviewer on a personal level. Interviewers aren’t just looking for the most qualified candidate, but they are looking for someone they want to work with. Making personal connections during your interview is a crucial step in landing the job.

What is an interest?

Interests are various topics and themes that you enjoy engaging in your personal life. They are the things you feel most passionate about and that excite you in your free time. Some quick examples are modern art, traveling, blogging, or listening to music. Take a look below for a longer list of examples.

What is a Hobby?

Hobbies are similar to interests, but hobbies are the actual activity you engage in. A hobby is an activity you enjoy doing on a regular basis and have a decent amount of knowledge in the topic. These are things you should have examples of so you can share some stories with your interviewer. Some examples of hobbies are rock climbing, cooking, surfing, or gardening. Take a look below for a longer list of examples.  

Should you Include Hobbies on your Resume?

While listing hobbies on your resume is an excellent way to share your personal life, it isn’t always appropriate. If you are running out of space on your resume or have too much relevant work experience already, this is some information you can remove and cover in the interview process. However, if you are early in your career and need to fill space, this is a great way to show skills you have while also conveying information about your life outside of work. 

Here are some key examples of when it is appropriate to include hobbies on your resume:

  • You have minimal education experience.
  • You have minimal work experience. 
  • The job listing description outlines responsibilities related to your interests or hobbies.
  • The company asks applicants to list their hobbies or interests.
  • The company is seeking out applicants with unique characteristics or personalities.

Each job application is going to vary, so it’s important to tailor your resume to that job. For some examples of how to write your resume, click here:

Developing Software Engineer Resume – FREE Template

What Your Hobbies Say About You?

Adding hobbies is not just a space filler. When done intelligently, it can communicate insightful details about you that any sharp interviewer would pick up on. 

For example, ‘playing chess’ shows that you can think strategically and won’t rush into decisions. Similarly, ‘playing cricket or football’ can show your ability to work well with a team. Additionally, talking about how you go surfing or bike riding every week can show that you’re hard-working and determined. 

The important thing is to convey the right insights according to the job you are applying for. For most of the knowledge worker jobs these days, it helps to highlight logic, problem solving, strategic mindset, teamwork and persistence via your hobbies.  

Where to List Hobbies on Your Resume?

Listing your hobbies should be one of the last things on your resume. Similar to skills, you want your hobbies and interests to be listed in bullet point form with no explanations. During the interview, you will have the chance to discuss your hobbies and tell stories. If you want to know what skills to include on your resume, click below:

Key Skills That You Should Include on Your Resume

Best Interests and Hobbies to Include

While there are a lot of hobbies and interests that you might have, the ones you include on your resume should be appropriate, professional, and relevant to the job you’re applying for. Here are some examples.

Relevant Hobbies for an Engineering Resume:

  • Designing websites 
  • Assembling computers 
  • Artistic hobbies such as photography, painting, or drawing 
  • Community Service 
  • Exercises like surfing, rock climbing, hiking, etc.
  • International Travel
  • Public speaking 
  • Playing chess
  • Writing or blogging 
  • Reading (can specify genres you enjoy)

Relevant Interests for a Resume

  • Musicals or theatrical plays 
  • Writing
  • Gaming
  • History (can specify areas of interest)
  • Volunteering (can specify areas of interest) 
  • Travel
  • Nature 
  • Foreign Languages
  • Listening to Music and/or Concerts 

Conclusion

Interests and Hobbies on your resume

are a great way to educate your interviewer about your personal life before and during the interview process. Including these items can be a great way to fill the space on your resume or illustrate why you’re the right person for the role.  

Remember, the interviewer is often someone who you will work with when starting the job. They are picking people they want to work with in the future, and think will be a great fit for their team. Don’t be scared to share a little bit about your personal life so the interviewer can begin to trust you and feel connected to you as a person. Creating these social connections is a great way to get the job! 

Key Skills That You Should Include on Your Resume

Creating a resume is an important part of the job application process and there are plenty of ways to make your resume stand out from the rest. While ensuring your former jobs and other experiences align with the job you’re applying for, it is equally important that you highlight the right set of key skills in the resume to show that you are the best candidate for the job. 

While there are hundreds of skills that you can mention, a handful are crucial for making the hiring managers feel that you researched ahead of time and are well-rounded candidate. Although the skills should change depending on the type of company and role you’re applying for, here are some general guidelines to help you get started. 

What are the Key Skills for Resume that Industry is looking for?

While it makes sense to think that managers hiring for an engineering role want to see the longest and most impressive list of technical skills, that’s just not the case. While all of these skills are crucial to landing the job, companies want to know that you are more valuable than just the technical skills you have. Proving that you are a leader, a creative thinker, and can show value in meetings and not just on the computer will help you land the job. Here are some examples that you can make your own:

1.     Leadership

No matter what job you are applying for, even if it’s an entry position, showing that you are a leader is incredibly important. Leadership does not have to mean managing a team or project. It can mean being vocal about new ideas or problems that arise or even being a crucial member of someone else’s team. 

Employers want to know that the most technical people on their staff can make tough decisions when necessary and be able to tackle problems on their own.

2.     Presentation Skills

Alert Einstein once said, “If you can’t explain it to a six-year-old, you don’t understand it yourself.” As an engineer, it is your job to understand and explain extremely technical things to people without an engineering background. 

Being able to boil down complex ideas and problems to your superiors or clients can be a daily or weekly part of any engineering job. Knowing how to present ideas in a concise way is a highly attractive skill for engineers. 

3.     Pressure Management

One hard truth of engineering jobs is the real-world time constraints. As the most technical part of many staffs, engineers are often working the longest hours with the most pressing deadlines. New challenges can arise late into projects so showing your employers that you can handle the pressure is a must. 

This does not mean you have to show that you’re the fastest coder or worker. It can merely mean that you understand how to quantify how long tasks will take, know how to delegate them effectively, and communicate these timelines accordingly. 

4.     Problem-Solving

Solving one problem often leads to two more. It’s a harsh reality of any part of life, from cleaning your house to auditing a business. Showing that you can problem-solve in a business environment demonstrates that you have creativity and critical thinking skills. 

Illustrating that you have problem-solving capabilities comes in two parts. The first part is assessing the problem. Understanding that there is a problem and identifying what the causes are is more challenging than it seems, so try to give some clear examples. The next part is showing that you can come up with creative and efficient solutions. These solutions can’t just make logical sense but have to work well within the constraints of time and money, which are most important to employers. 

5.     Project Management

This skill is important because it essentially wraps all of the above skills, and many more, into one. Leading a project takes leadership, creativity, and a deep understanding of the task at hand. This is where examples of personal projects or large team accomplishments are perfect to explain during your interview. Demonstrating this skill shows that you are organized and efficient while having to take on many responsibilities other than just engineering.

Download our sample resume template here.

The Difference Between Hard vs. Soft Skills

There are essentially two categories all skills can be categorized in. There are hard skills and soft skills. 

Hard Skills

Hard skills are more tangible skills that are acquired through accreditation, education, and practice. Some examples include coding, web development, and prototyping. Hard skills are important to share because they give a value to the efficiency and productivity of an individual.

Soft Skills

Soft skills are more based on personality and not easily transferable. For instance, it’s easy to teach someone how to code, but not as easy to teach someone how to communicate. Some examples of soft skills are communication, negotiation, problem-solving, and pressure management. These skills show employers the type of worker you are and how well you can fit into a particular team or work culture.

Where Should You Display Key Skills on Your Resume?

There are typically two places you can list your skills. The first and main place is in the skills section of your resume. Generally, this section is at the bottom of the page or the right-hand side of your resume and consists of a short-list of bullet points, about 8-12. Each skill should only be listed in name and have no other explanation. You will have the chance to attach stories and examples to each skill during the interview process.

The second place you can add these skills is embedded in your career experience itself. Using words like “Managed a project that..” or “Presented ____ to ____” will illustrate that you have these skills while tying them to a particular event. This practice makes your resume stronger and can save you space. 

Best Skills for Engineering Resumes

While the above list of skills is important for the current engineering job market, there are a few more that should be considered for most engineering positions. As Google points out in its hiring practices, tailor everything to the job you’re applying for.

  • Computer Science
  • Teamwork
  • Creativity
  • Communication
  • Research Skills – can include types of research you specialize in.
  • Quality Assurance – can include a specific industry you have experience in.
  • Design Abilities – can include specific products you have experience in.
  • Software Skills – you can list specific software you specialize in. Include if listed in the job description.
  • Supplies Management
  • Data Management – can include types of data you have experience in.
  • Accounting Skills
  • Systems Management
  • Language Skills – types of languages you speak with a level of proficiency (e.g., fluent in French, conversation mandarin)
  • Machine Learning
  • Data Structures
  • Web Development
  • UX/UI
  • Cloud Management
  • Debugging
  • Cyber Security
  • CAD
  • Prototyping
  • Troubleshooting
  • Project Launch
  • Workflow Development
  • Budgeting
  • Project Lifecycle Management

Like we said, there are dozens, if not hundreds of examples you can use. It’s always best to research the job description and company you are applying for to assess key skills that are most valued there and then fit them in your resume. Remember, it doesn’t just matter what you think is the most relevant and valuable, it matters what they think. Think of yourself as a product you need to sell and the skills are what’s on the packaging. 

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Purpose

Resumes are often taken for granted. While applicants are busy tinkering their SOPs to perfection, everyone thinks resume is a one night job. Well, may be not. After working with some students, I realized that what I thought was obvious about the resume was not so obvious to the students. And fair enough – since I myself had the benefits of years and diverse experiences before I learned the inside out of a resume writing process. So, I figured that it is time to dedicate a full post to resume building.

First, sit and reflect upon who your reader is and what your resume is trying to convey to her. As an applicant, you want your resume to be coherent with rest of your application. So, while your experiences, education and background are factual information, what to highlight is a matter of judgment. For e.g. if you are showing interest in research/applying for PhD etc, your highlight should be on your research projects and publications. Similarly, if you are applying for a MCS kind of program (geared towards landing corporate jobs upon graduation), your focus should be on professional skills, industry experience etc.
So, before you begin, gather your thoughts and decide the areas/skills in your profile that your resume should be highlighting. Continue reading

How to create resume for internships in Grad School?

There is plenty of advice out there about resumes. And, some of it contradicts. Some people recommend creating a visual resume that stands out. Some say that your resume should be primarily text.

It all matters in different situations.

Let us focus on grad school internships for now. If you are applying for grad school, then look at my earlier post (includes a free template to download). Ok, so internships are about relevant projects and primarily your work experience. That is what you need to highlight.

Instead of generic gyaan, I am critiquing three real resumes to better understand what kind of mistakes to avoid. You will have to watch the video for that, don’t worry its pretty short.

Key things to remember

  1. Most of the space should be used on relevant professional experience.
  2. Don’t forget to mention the projects and coursework you are currently taking in school.
  3. Don’t forget to mention your LinkedIn profile (and make sure its up to date).
  4. Use the keywords mentioned in the job description.
  5. Keep the formatting (font sizes and spacing) readable.

There you go, I will do few more videos on resume soon. Stay tuned and don’t forget to subscribe to the YouTube channel.

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