Formatting Your Job Titles, Dates, and Organizations

Now that you’ve started building your resume, it’s time to get the details right. This section is crucial because how you format your job titles, organizations, and dates will determine how quickly and clearly a recruiter or hiring manager can understand your career progression.

Start With Your Professional Timeline

For each role you list, use reverse chronological order (most recent job first). This makes it easy for employers to see your career trajectory and recent experience.

Here’s the ideal format:

Job Title
Organization Name (or Acquired By: New Company Name)
Month Year – Month Year

For example: Senior Biostatistician
XYZ Pharma (formerly ABC Biotech)
Jan 2023 – Present

If the company was acquired or merged, make sure to reflect that. This helps recruiters see the continuity and ensures they can recognize the current name of the organization.

💡 Tip: Align your dates to the left margin. Hiring managers often scan down the left side of the resume to see how long you stayed at each position. This improves readability, especially on mobile devices.

How to Show Promotions or Role Changes at the Same Organization

If you’ve been promoted or held multiple roles within the same organization, structure your experience like this:

Senior Biostatistician
XYZ Pharma (formerly ABC Biotech)
Jan 2023 – Present

• Lead statistical design and analysis for global oncology trials, collaborating with clinical, data management, and programming teams.

Biostatistical Analyst
XYZ Pharma (formerly ABC Biotech)
Jun 2020 – Dec 2022

• Conducted data analysis and statistical modeling for Phase II/III oncology trials, working closely with cross-functional teams to ensure data quality.

This format shows career progression and leadership potential. It gives a clear picture of how you’ve advanced within the organization.

Including Older, Less Relevant Experience

Sometimes, you need to show more than the last 10 years. To do this without cluttering your resume, condense older roles like this:

Earlier Experience (Pre-2015)

• Biostatistical Consultant – BioData Solutions (2008–2012)

• Research Assistant – Harvard School of Public Health (2005–2007)

You don’t need to elaborate—just list titles, companies, and dates in italics. This shows depth without taking up too much space or distracting from your most relevant work.

Describing the Organizations You’ve Worked For

Not every employer is instantly recognizable. Briefly describing each organization helps hiring managers understand the context of your experience.

Here’s what to include:

• Industry (pharmaceutical, biotech, CRO, academic research, etc.)

• Size (e.g., “150 employees” or “global team of 500+”)

• Scope of work (e.g., “focus on oncology trials” or “supports early-phase CNS research”)

• Notable collaborators (e.g., “collaborated with NIH, Pfizer, Roche”)

Example:

• Mid-sized CRO with ~200 employees, specializing in Phase I–III oncology trials for global biotech clients, including Novartis and AbbVie.

This adds context and helps employers visualize the environments you’ve worked in, making your experience more relatable.

💡 Tip: Include remote work experiences. With remote roles becoming more common, employers value candidates familiar with remote work dynamics. If your role was remote, make sure to note it. It highlights your adaptability, which is highly valuable today.

Write an Overview of Each Role

For each job, start with a brief 1–2 line summary of your core responsibilities. This sets the stage for the bullet points that follow and gives context to the recruiter about what you did in each position.

Do this:

• Leads statistical design and analysis for global oncology trials, collaborating with clinical, data management, and programming teams.

Avoid this:

• Served as statistical analyst on oncology trials.

The second version sounds passive and doesn’t give the hiring manager a sense of action or leadership. Your job descriptions should feel current and impactful, not like something from the past.

Also, refer to job postings for the types of language employers are using. If you’re applying to pharmaceutical research roles, for example, use the same terminology. Aligning your experience with job descriptions helps make your resume stand out.

💡 Action Step: Update Your Job Titles and Dates
Go through your work history and:

1. List your roles in reverse chronological order (most recent first).

2. Include promotions or role changes under the same organization, using the format shown above.

3. Add a brief description of your responsibilities for each role, using active language.

4. If you have older experience, condense it to a section titled Earlier Experience (Pre-2015).

By structuring this section clearly, you’ll not only make your resume scannable, but you’ll also give recruiters and hiring managers an easy way to see your progression and qualifications.