foreign resume

jamesleecoleman

Hi!!


I'm helping someone who's from a different country with their resume. She's been in the US for a couple of years. She has held jobs in her home country before she got here. So I'm curious if I should leave the jobs that she held in her home country on the resume or not?? Should I also add on there that she has a visa?

ptilsen

If the jobs from her country are relevant to her line of work, I would absolutely list them. It could still be a problem to prove she held them, depending on the country, but not one that can't be overcome or that she won't face anyway as a result of not being from the US.

swild

If she is not a US citizen, I would most assuredly put the visa on there. It is a MAJOR headache for a company to process a work visa and most would rather choose someone slightly less qualified than have to go through the trouble and the waiting period.

If I was her, I would also want to know the legality of the questions she can be asked regarding past employment, including if they can ask when her visa expires. There are a whole lot of questions that are not legal to ask. Most US citizens don't know about them all and I would expect that they would try to get away with some of a non-native applicant.

thedrama

Thats a nice thread to pick up cos as im from outside usa , i wanna look for my chance to find a job somewhere else. However, you know there are requirements when you are about to leave your home. I have almost no idea regarding such things, what i should take with me, what the possible employer will provide me vice versa. With the lack of money, lack of requirements how am i gonna find my through somewhere else? i do not know.

What would you say about it?

jibbajabba

I am from Germany but worked in different countries (Ireland / Gibraltar / Spain / UK) and I always put every job held in my home country on my resume / CV otherwise you end up having a weird gap.

What is important though I think, is not trying to translate certain educations etc. into the local language ..

For example

My official job after I was done with the degree was

Elektroniker Fachrichtung Betriebstechnik

Which would translate as

Degree in Elecotronics Engineering

However, that could cause confusion as a lot of companies do background checks nowadays .. So I listed both, my German title and underneath a "equivalent to".

One company I applied for wanted to have the degree but we don't have the same system of grading the degrees so I did the same ... used my "German" grade and gave it an "equivalent" grade ....

So far I was fine .. but it might be different to the US obviously ..