Roast my resume

In most cases, no — especially if you have 5+ years of relevant experience and are tight on space. Irrelevant roles dilute your narrative and take up room that stronger, targeted experience could own. The exception: if you are early-career, changing industries, or have significant gaps, older or less directly relevant roles can fill in the timeline and show continuous work history. If you include them, trim the bullets to 1–2 lines and cut anything that does not transfer to the target role.

List your degree in an Education section, typically below your experience — or above it if you are a recent grad. Include the degree type and field (e.g. Bachelor of Science in Marketing), the institution name, and the graduation year. If you graduated within the last 3–5 years and your GPA was 3.5 or above, you can include it. For older grads, skip the GPA — it carries less weight the further you get from school. Relevant honors are optional and only worth including if they are directly relevant to the role.

Create a dedicated Certifications section, typically placed below Education. For each entry, include the certification name, the issuing organization, and the year earned (or expiration date if it has one). If you are currently pursuing a certification, note it as "In Progress" or "Expected [Month Year]." For technical roles, relevant certifications near the top of your resume can be a strong early signal to the recruiter.

Stack your titles under one company entry. List the company name once, then show each role as a sub-entry with its title, date range, and bullet points. This makes the progression immediately visible without wasting space. If the roles were very different in scope or team, separate entries are acceptable — but stacking is usually preferred because it tells a clear story of growth within a single employer, which recruiters love to see.

Most modern resumes do not include references at all — it is standard to have a separate reference sheet ready to send when asked. If you are specifically instructed to include them, add a References section at the bottom and list each person's name, current title, company, phone number, and email. Confirm with each reference that they are comfortable being listed before you submit. For most applications, keep references off the resume and let that space work harder for you.

You can update your LinkedIn profile directly through the profile editor — add new roles, update your headline, refine your skills and summary, just like editing a resume. LinkedIn also lets you upload a PDF of your resume to your profile: go to your profile page, click Add profile section, and choose Resume. Keep in mind that your LinkedIn profile and your resume do not need to be word-for-word identical, but they should be consistent on dates, titles, and employers — recruiters compare the two.