It used to be widely accepted that you would list your full mailing address on your resume. People assumed that leaving it out sent the wrong message - that you were hiding something.
Today, many career coaching experts - like our team at The Frontier Group - and executive recruiters recommend leaving the address off.
Here are four reasons why we have found this conventional thinking has changed:
1. For safety and security reasons, it is not a great idea to have on your personal address on your resume. This is true whether you are female or male, young or old.
2. Sometimes, especially in major markets like Atlanta where traffic can play a factor, a listed address can be used to show prejudice towards a candidate under the assumption that they may not be willing to relocate or to make the long commute to your office. As a result, a strong potential candidate can be passed over for an interview.
3. In today's world, if someone wants to know where you live and work, they can generally find it out through a good Google search. Also, most recruiters review the LinkedIn profile of the candidate first before calling for an interview. If they view LinkedIn, they already have a pretty good idea of where the candidate lives or at least enough to satisfy their curiosity.
4. I have never had feedback from a client or from a hiring manager that something was missed or that they thought it was important to have the address on the resume. Good executive recruiters are seldomly concerned at the front end about where someone lives. They first want to establish that there is a potential match between skill sets required and the candidate's accomplishments.
John Richardson is a Vice President with The Frontier Group. He is one of the practice leaders on career coaching, outplacement and executive development.
