Nothing makes a hiring manager laugh more than reading some resumes. Our collection contains many “pearls” from the CV of applicants. Some people deliberately make their resume hilarious, others make funny typos and stylistic inaccuracies inadvertently. However, are resume jokes appropriate?

To make your sense of humor help you in your job search, read our recommendations.

“Looking for a job for Spider-Man”

According to the Research Center of the recruiting portal, more than half of economically active users (56%) admit that their sense of humor helped them find work. Recruiters do not doubt the magic power of a smile either: 67% of them consider a sense of humor as an additional plus in favor of the candidate.

Nevertheless, most experts believe that humor is too “sharp” a tool to be used at all stages of a job search. For example, writing a resume – is it possible to joke, ironic, use emoticons in it?

“High level of literacy” – the applicant writes about himself in his resume. It is difficult to say unequivocally: either he really considers himself literate, but cannot write without mistakes and three words, or is joking in this way. If the latter, then with a probability of 99.9% the joke will be inappropriate: the recruiter will smile, but will not invite you for an interview.

“I learned something and somehow”; “Department of Solid State Physics, Strong Spirit and Moral Principles”; “I will get the referees on demand”; Looking for a Spider-Man Job; “English and German – non-speaking, with a laptop”; “Position – cook-dog handler-massage therapist-economist”; “A charming natural blonde is interested in intellectual work” – these are not inventions of popular TV humorists, but real quotes from resumes posted on Superjob.ru. Without doubting that their authors are good specialists, we nevertheless note that it is quite difficult to find a high-paying job with a resume containing such phrases.

Why shouldn’t be joking in a resume?

Why is humor in most cases inappropriate in a resume? It’s about human psychology. A resume is a document, and in official documents, we least expect to find a joke. A recruiter considering CVs of applicants for vacancies is serious, businesslike: his task is to fill a vacancy with a competent specialist in a short time, and not laugh over a cup of tea. Therefore, an experienced HR manager reads the resume quickly, immediately noting the most important things – work experience, achievements, style of presentation …

And if a demonstration of a healthy sense of humor during the interview is likely to add points to the candidate, then trying to joke in the resume is likely to end up in the trash can. At best, in a distant reserve. You should also avoid professional slang, all kinds of emoticons, etc. – better save all this for further informal communication with colleagues.

However, there are exceptions to this rule. A resume for creative positions (for example, a copywriter, journalist, advertising specialist, etc.) often implies a kind of “informal”, non-standard presentation. However, here you should be careful and, as they say, not overdo it. If you are in doubt about a joke, it is better to leave it for an interview or forget it altogether.

Sometimes a recruiter’s smile is caused not even by jokes, but, for example, by the email of the applicant. When a candidate for the position of CFO indicates an email address with the login kitten or sunshine, he seems to say about himself: I am inattentive to details, frivolous and I do not know how to work with modern Internet technologies.

A joke during an interview?

When is humor appropriate in a job search? In very moderate doses – at an interview, if the situation is favorable for this. A good joke that does not go beyond the bounds of decency can help relieve tension, set you and the recruiter in a positive mood.

Humor often testifies to a keen mind, but you should not joke about a recruiter, his appearance, speech features, ridicule company policies, etc. Be careful about anecdotes – you can tell only a really relevant and very short anecdote, and then only when you see the appropriate mood of the interlocutor. Remember: laughter is a very powerful weapon, so use it carefully.