The resumé—so much rests on a sheet or two of paper. Knowing that yours might end up in a big stack (or a crowded email inbox) how do you help it stand out? We asked a team of professionals to share their best advice. Here’s what they had to say:
Philip Ruffini
Philip Ruffini is currently a Product Manager at Microsoft and the founder of hackingpm.com. He is a graduate from the University of Michigan where he studied business and computer science. He is formally a Product Manager at ZX-Ventures.
Don’t include everything
My #1 resume tip that I think most people mess up is don’t include everything. It is only going to be two to three really impressive things that land you an interview, not all of the small things that you have done over the years.
A recruiter will only read your resume for five to 10 seconds and you want them to read the impressive content right away, not have to find it in the crowd of bullets. Be short, concise, and to the point.
Katherine Millers
Katherine Miller is a certified professional resume writer and interview coach specializing in the psychology of career branding. Her modern job search strategies and bold career dossiers have landed executives in 15+ countries and interviews for 7-figure roles at Fortune 100 companies. Her work is currently featured on two Forbes 100 career websites. Find her at: notablewritingstudio.com
Interactive Resume
Linked icons
Pro Tip #1: Showcase your talents and value offer with linked icons at the top of your resume. Resumes can be interactive, even for executives. Subtle icons under your contact information can be hyperlinked to your career website outside of LinkedIn that showcases your portfolio of work, Challenge / Action / Result stories, and other value-adds. These links will engage the reader and instantly brand you as a go-getter who goes the extra mile.
Call-out boxes
Pro Tip #2: Strategically place call-out boxes, graphs, and even testimonials for a memorable, eye-catching value-add throughout your resume. Colored call-out boxes with 1 or 2 bite-sized nuggets of impressive project results or bottom-line impact statements help grab the reader’s attention and prove your value on the first scan since the eye is drawn to these elements. You can swap accomplishments to showcase those that are most relevant to the specific role and company, showing the reader that your success is directly relevant to the role.
Lindsey Marx
Lindsey Marx, Marketing Content Strategist at bestcompany.com
Be organized
- Put your most crowning achievements at the top
- Be well rounded
- List your skills (hard, technical skills) first
- Tailor each resume to the specific job, don’t send in a generic resume
- Be organized
Other tips:
When it comes to resumes, everyone has a different opinion. Typically, resumes are supposed to be no longer than one page in length. This can be tricky to [achieve] for some people. Whether you have loads of experience or not, your resume should be between 1-1.5 pages in length. Make sure to have fonts and sizes that work together and show appropriate sizing.
Typically, it is best to showcase your education, experience, service, and skills. However, I have seen companies increasingly looking at digital resumes such as tableau created, LinkedIn, and even prizes. Either way, make it look professional and easy to read. The purpose of the resume is to provide a showcase of who you are and what you can do.
Make yourself well-rounded and interesting. Companies want to hire people who don’t just work all day, but have hobbies outside of work and will get along with other employees. Make sure to keep tenses consistent and ensure that your resume can be read easily.
Ryan Hankins
Ryan Hankins, copywriter, and content creator. Find him at copywritingbyryan.com
Online portfolio
Don’t have a resume. Have a website—an online portfolio. Portfolios show work, they show a proven track record. They take more time to build than a resume. They’re harder to fake or makeup. They show that an employee will be more than just another number—they will be “intrapreneurs” that take responsibility and have accountability and do their job like it’s their own business. But all this heavily depends on the type of job the applicant is going for.
Quantify your achievements
My number one resume tip for job seekers is to quantify their achievements. Too often, job seekers describe their accomplishments without using numbers, which means hiring managers have no way of evaluating their successes within the context of their actual work.
When job seekers write their resumes, they should quantify everything: how many employees did they supervise? By what percent did they increase sales? How big of a budget did they manage?
To illustrate the point, compare these bullet points on a hypothetical esthetician’s resume:
- Upsold cosmetics products to clients
- Upsold an average of $300-worth of cosmetics products to clients per month
The bullet point with a dollar amount is much more valuable to hiring managers since it shows them what kind of productivity they can expect if they hire this candidate.
Job seekers should try to insert a statistic, number, or percentage into every bullet point on their resume to catch the hiring manager’s attention.
Ben Taylor
Ben Taylor is a career coach since 2004 and founder of www.homeworkingclub.com, an advice portal for remote workers.
Keywords
Next time you update your resumé, give some thought to keywords. The reality is that many companies use automated systems to filter applications. Even those that are processed entirely by humans will benefit from including key terms that the recruiters are looking for. You can find software and services to assist with this keywording nowadays.
Margo Waldrop
Margo Waldrop is a Freelance Copywriter and Content Strategist who has been producing high converting copy for over 18 years. She is also the owner of The Word Bar, a boutique B2B copywriting agency.
Make it stand out
The top resume advice has always been to make sure your resume ‘stands out’ from the crowd, particularly since many job posters receive hundreds of resumes. While this is true, there is one strategy that will not only help your resume stand out, but also make a quick emotional connection with the hiring manager.
BE A REAL PERSON.
Most of the resumes I see are robotic and dry. Remember, the person reading your resume is a real person. You are a real person. You can write professionally while also imparting a little of your personality into your resume.
Are you passionate about coding? Tell them. Let them know what you love about it and how you continually build your knowledge.
Did you get fired from a job? Tell them. Explain where you went wrong and what you learned from the experience.
By being real and establishing a personal connection with the person reading your resume, you are no longer a ‘number’ but an authentic person who is willing to be a bit vulnerable to land their ideal job.
Do a research
Research your dream job as much as you can. Check reviews on Glassdoor, message previous employees on Linkedin and read up on customer/vendor reviews. You can and should use this data to curate a resume that lends itself to the theme, personality and work experience that they are looking for.
On your work experience, be sure to note successes you have had in previous positions. Talk figures, culture, and personality – giving a full 360 view of yourself and your talents. Bullet points are for boring people, weave it into a punchy tone – embellishing on the traits you have learned that they are looking for.
If/when you get an interview, research the people who are interviewing you. On LinkedIn, there is a referral section where current and ex-work colleagues leave reviews for others. Take note of the compliments and buzzwords people use about your interviewer and be sure to drop these nuggets of information in there when talking about yourself. It has been proven that people like people who they can see themselves in.
This is a crowdsourced article. Contributors are not necessarily affiliated with this website and their statements do not necessarily reflect the opinion of this website, other people, businesses, or other contributors.