Should you reiterate expected behaviors in your resume

Question

Someone asked me to take a look at their resume for them. They are looking for an entry level job with two positions for experience.

One place I have gone back and forth about was their skills section, where they listed items like "proven self-starter requiring little to no supervision to accomplish expected tasks".

On one hand, I feel like that is such a basic expectation of employees that it should go without saying. On the other hand, I'm well aware that many employees do not live up to this expectation.

Two other examples are "able to interact with patrons of varying temperaments" and "Able to quickly digest and implement guidance learned from management".

Is there a general way to address these basic expectations?

Answer 1

Those are garbage, meaningless phrases that every novice job seeker puts on their resume. They're more likely to get your resume trash-binned than they are to get your friend an actual interview.

Your friend might as well be telling them that they know how to count to 10 and can ride the bus by themselves.

Humor aside. As you said, find a more constructive way to tell your friend that those statements are all but meaningless. It's essentially telling potential employers that your friend is a functioning adult. That should be an unspoken given. Focus on tangible qualities, job related responsibilities, and accomplishments. "Proficient in X. Completed project Y consisting of..."