When was the last time you updated your resume? Was it the last time you changed jobs? Monster.com, an employment and job listing website in the United States conducted a poll and found that only 39% of people participating in the poll updated their resume just before applying for a job. 8% couldn’t remember the last time they looked at it.

A resume is a living document, that means you should be making changes to it as your personal situation changes. When you gain a new skill or certification, if your contact details change, if your current role grows or progresses into new duties, you should make the appropriate updates to your resume to keep it a current reflection of you and what you bring to the table.

That said, an article in the Huffington Post gave 9 strong suggestions of what not to include on your resume. As GetSet work very closely with employers to recruit for a wide variety of roles, we agree with all of their suggestions.

Top of our list are typos. Make sure your resume is free from typos and grammatical errors. Most employers want employees who have attention to detail. They want to know you will pay close attention to the tasks at hand. Turning in a resume with words misspelled will immediately put a potential employer off. Take the time to spell check and let someone read through your resume to make sure it’s up to the challenge.

Next on our list are resumes with fancy fonts and complex formats. It’s not a greeting card it’s a resume. Keep your font choices and formatting simple and easy to read. Employers get a lot of resumes so make yours easy to read and easy to understand. If you have the qualifications they are after, a simple resume format will help you get to the next round. Keep in mind what you may think is fancy, a potential employer will likely see as unprofessional.

We agree with the remainder of the results on their list, don’t put a photo on your resume unless you’re applying for a modeling or acting role, ALWAYS include referees and their contact details, leave out buzzwords and use a professional email address.

When you are competing for a job with other people who have the same skills as you bring to the table, these are the things that could mean the difference between being called in for an interview or missing out on the job entirely.