Professional Experience:: PVSWiki

Professional Experience:

To start, ALWAYS spell out abbreviations in titles and business names. If you are unsure what an abbreviation stands for, Google it.

Example:

Sgt. = Sergeant
Mgr. = Manager
P.A. = Professional Association
Co. = Company
Ltd = Limited
LLP = Limited Liability Partnership

Title: Always take the position that the candidate/official provides. If the title provided is really long, try to compartmentalize and find a broader title that still accurately represents their position.

Example:

Religion Teacher: Teacher
Vice President of Sales, Research Manager, and Business Manager: Vice President of Sales/Manager

Do NOT collect experiences that are vague. Vague means no business name has been provided. If you see these types of entries in admin, try to fill in the missing data, but if you can't, delete them.
If the candidate was in the military, Title = highest rank achieved; Organization = branch of the military where they served; Span = year(s) in which they served.

If unsure of highest rank achieved, Title: Served.
Never put 'Former...' in title if span isn't provided because these men and women will hold these ranks for the rest of their lives.

Example:

Master Sergeant, United States Marine Corps, 1990-1994
Served, United State Navy Reserves

Do not include legislative experiences to which they were elected in this field. If a candidate lists legislative experience in this field, we enter it as Political.

This is primarily for elected offices, such as US Senate/House, State Senate/House, Attorney General, Governor, etc..

Legislative experience in a politician's office (e.g. Chief of Staff, Legislative Aide, Campaign Manager, etc.) should be included under 'Professional'.
If a politician does not provide any year spans but it is clear they no longer work as that position, add 'Former' to the title and leave 'Span' field blank.

Example:

United States Attorney, United States Department of Justice, 2017-2018
Former Teacher, Jefferson Public Schools

Retired Candidates: if a candidate lists that they are retired and do not provide any spans, add 'Former' to their professional titles.
If a candidate DOES provide spans, do NOT include 'Former' in title.
Span: This field should only contain year spans: yyyy-yyyy or yyyy (if experience lasted less than a year). The only time you should ever enter a date, is when a person has been nominated to a federal judgeship.

If an experience is ongoing, the span should be 'yyyy-present' or 'present' (if beginning year is unknown). NEVER capitalize the 'p' in 'present'!! This DOES affect the order in which experiences show up in admin and on the website.

Example:

Manager, Walmart, 2012-2014
Intern, United States House of Representatives, 2010
Attorney, Law Offices of Tracy B. Pratt, Professional Association, 2015-present
Research Associate, Vote Smart, present

Example:
Senior Advisor, Office of Senator John Doe, United States Senate, 1997-2000
Consultant, Tufts University Center on Hunger, Poverty and Nutrition Policy Organization, 1994-1996
Planning and Operations Logistics Materials Manager, Honeywell Information Systems, 1980-1987
President/Chief Executive Officer, Harvey Electrical Supply, 1979-1985
Engineer, Harvey Electrical Supply, 1973-1978
Sergeant, United States Army, Vietnam, 1968-1972
Former Principal, North Shore School District
Served, United States Army

NOTE: There may already be professional experiences listed for some candidates. Do not delete (unless too vague), simply add the new information following the formatting rules. You can take off years if they don't make sense. For example, if "present" is listed for another job or position besides the ones currently listed by the candidate, you can update these.
Moreover, Adjutant Generals get their entire military career detailed out (deployments, bases and ranks), they are the only military members to get this treatment.

Judicial Positions (see also Changes In Office)

Judicial Positions are often nominated and confirmed so we list that as:
Title: [Name of Position], Organization: [Name of Court], [District of Court (if available)], Span: [Date of Confirmation (spell out - Month Day, yyyy)], Special: Confirmed by [governing body (usually the US or state senate)]
Title: [Name of Position], Organization: [Name of Court], [District of Court (if available)], Span:[date of nomination (spell out - Month Day, yyyy)], Special: Nominated by [(usually the president or governor of the state, depending on the position type)]

Example:
Confirmed by United States Senate, Judge, United States District Court, Western District of Arkansas, November 20, 1993
Nominated by President Clinton, Judge, United States District Court, Western District of Arkansas, October 27, 1993
Nominated by President Barack Obama, Justice, United States Supreme Court, January 4, 2014
Confirmed by Wisconsin State Senate, Judge, Wisconsin State Supreme Court, February 13, 1997

Judicial positions should always be listed in the Professional Experience section. Judicial positions should be entered in the following format:
Title: [short office title, as in Chief Justice, Justice, Judge, Associate Justice, etc.], Organization: [name of court], Span: [first year elected]-present OR [first year elected]-[last year of service].

Example:
Justice, Michigan State Supreme Court, 2010-present
Chief Justice, Alaska State Supreme Court, 2009-present
Associate Justice, Alabama State Supreme Court, 2004-2018

These five courts have unique names and should be listed as follows:
Judge, New York State Court of Appeals, 2010-present
Judge, Maryland State Court of Appeals, 2008-present
Justice, West Virginia State Supreme Court of Appeals, 2008-present
Associate Justice, Commonwealth of Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, 2006-present
Judge, Texas State Court of Criminal Appeals, 2000-present

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Professional Experience: