Some give and take on the shidduch resume

A reply via email that came in to my post asking about the history of the shidduch resume on the 5 Towns Shuls list. I'll refer to the writer (a woman) as M.

[from M.:] Hi, Ariella -

Happy New Year!

Here's my opinion, being from out of town and dating, married,.and divorced in several states. Men and women and their families and shadchanim have always wanted to find out about potential shidduchim, and they have always used whatever resources they could find - word of mouth, letter-writing, phone-calling, internet searches, databases, and so on. They have always tried to organize that information in whatever medium they had - index cards, notebooks, computer, spreadsheets, checklists, videotapes,etc. The websites like JDate have checklists and standard questions that they ask. It makes sense for shadchanim to streamline their information collection and ask for standard information from each prospect as well.The current "shidduch resume" is just a means of gathering information, the newest trend, and just another means to learn about the people available and make informed decisions. it's no better and no worse than any other means of data collection. I don't think it merits its own article - the questions are the same as they always were, the answers still have to be honest and complete, and G-d is still ultimately making the matches, so it doesn't matter which resources we use.

Ariella:I am not writing a “how to” write a shidduch resume. That would be a rather superficial piece that does not interest me. Rather I am interested in how people view them and the possible ramification of boiling down the summation to vital statistics (and in the case of females, it seems, a photo). Most people find them mostly negative, and at best only a short hand tool for the info, as you mentioned. You can see the results of the poll I posted on Imamother, as well as comments in 4 posts on my blog related to the topic. See http://kallahmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/10/anyone-know-history.html

http://kallahmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/09/responses-to-my-shidduch-resume-post-at.html

http://kallahmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/09/shidduch-resumes-additional-comments.html

http://kallahmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/10/shidduch-resume-poll.html

-Ariella

M: I see. Some stuff can be screened out, and some can't.

Ariella: Based on what you say and the historical inception of the shidduch resume – most put it at about 2005 – it is possible that the increased use of the internet is a prime factor in its popularization. It is so quick and easy to email a resume over. It takes less time than dictating over the phone. But I get the sense that they close more doors than they open. I tried to ask someone with a single son if he thought there would be a shidduch possibility with one of my relatives. He replied that he already had her shidduch resume. The way it came across was that he had already rejected the possibility based on the resume, so that was that. Possibly there is no real match possible in this case, but it still sounds to me that people view these resumes the way HR people do the thousands that flood their systems – a list of things you skim over to screen people out. That’s my theory. I wanted to get more feedback from people to see if it holds up.

M: Point taken. Yes, any of these forms is a screening tool.If one looks at shidduchim as a job interview and a business transaction, then it makes sense to pre-screen the applicants beforehand. it is kind of cold and heartless and takes the fun out of it. It's also overwhelming to sort through so many people (kayn ayin hora there are so many Jews who want to get married), so one should know what one is looking for and not waste time. I think nothing takes the place of the face-to-face contact. That makes or breaks the deal.