Your resume is pretty much your first attempt at getting a foot in the door, but in order to stand out, you've got to have more than good qualifications. Your resume will, no doubt, be in a giant pile of resumes against which yours must compete. That's a tall order. Assuming you have the right qualifications and/or transferable skills for the job, it's time to make your resume look tight, read, well, and communicate effectively all the things you have to offer. Here are five important tips to follow closely as you write your resume.
Organize Your Resume for the Position: Don't make the assumption that you should list every single thing you've ever done occupanionally, nor should you assume the standard format works for every position. Unless education for the position for which you're applying is the most important qualification, you should put your employment experience first if you've been out of school for several years. Look carefully at what's the most important things to communicate first and format your resume accordingly.
Also, place more detail in your most recent two or three position descriptions and duties than in positions you held a long time ago. Furthermore, don't feel the need to put every position down, especially if you've been in the workforce for many years. You don't want your resume to be three pages long. Oh, and one more thing. Resist the temptation to stick a photo of yourself in the resume.
Write a Concise Objective: This should be the first item on your resume after your contact information and before your work experience. This will give hiring managers a clear idea of what you're looking for. Take the time to write it carefully, and don't make it too short or too long. It should state your career goals and a job title for which you're looking. Make sure to include key skills that will help lay the groundwork for the rest of your resume.
Here's a good example: "Highly organized and proven digital marketer with seven years of agency experience looking for a marketing team leader position for major lifestyle brand accounts where I can use my extensive client relations experience and social media savvy." Keep your objective to one or two descriptive sentences that illuminate your goals and experience.
Use Keywords: These days, everything is electronic. Rarely do you ever send a hard copy of your resume to hiring managers, so that means making sure your working ticks and ties with the job you're seeking. Insert keywords where applicable that actually match those the employer is searching for. It's more important to include relevant terms and business jargon than it is to write a lengthy description of what you did.
Words like "project management", "supply chain management", "programming", and the like are important when those are key responsibilities are the same ones employers are hiring for. Don't just put them in the position duties descriptions but also in the list of relevant skills. Employers want to know that you have what it takes, and if none of the keywords hit, your resume might just get passed up early.
Use More Than Action Words: Everyone tells you to use "action" words in your resume like, "conducted", "managed", "assembled", etc. But your resume should contain more than a laundry list of the duties you performed at your last position(s). Reading them can be mind-numbing for hiring managers, so make your resume about accomplishments. Talk about how you saved your company money, how you intervened in a difficult client situation and retained the account, or the technical know-how you applied in order to solve a complicated operations issue.
Anything that's measurable is important, too. "Helped increase annual revenue by 17%" or "Reduced time-to-market by 30 days", or any other descriptions that point to specific ways you helped your employer can make a tremendous difference. This will help you to set yourself apart from other job seekers who just put down their duties. It will make you look like more than just a "doer" but instead someone who excels at what they do.
Keep it Clean and Consistent: Many job seekers want to shove everything and the kitchen sink into their resume, but that tactic just makes employers want to toss it in the circular file. Anything long and laborious to read will make you come across like a person who never stops talking. Write only what's directly relevant to the position, and make it easily editable for different positions you may apply to. Also, don't use more than two fonts (one for the header) and one for the body text. Use a sans serif font (Arial, Tahoma) that's business-like it its appearance. No Comic Sans, unless you're applying as a circus clown.
The language should be consistent. If you use "third" in one portion and "3rd" in another, then that's almost as bad a misspelling words (another huge no-no). Make sure it reads well, and proof it several times for errors. Nothing comes across worse than a sloppy resume that reads like it was written by a fourth-grader. Be as meticulous in your grammar, spelling, and syntax as you are with the actual content of your resume.
