Written by Theresa Balsiger, Vice President of Candidate Relations
It’s the advice I get asked for most frequently. How do I make my resume stand out amongst the 100s of applications? My response is consistent. A resume has to speak to the needs of the employer, no more, no less. It must check the 3-4 boxes a recruiter is looking for. Industry experience? Tech Stack alignment? Years of experience? Job Title? Tenures? This doesn’t take long. Studies have shown most resumes get around 7 seconds before a recruiter decides whether to move them to the interview stage.
Perhaps, instead, this article should be titled 7 Seconds in Heaven. 😉
A well-crafted resume is your first impression to potential employers. It’s your opportunity to showcase your skills, experiences, and achievements in a clear and concise manner. Here are some tips to help you create a standout resume:
1. Tailor Your Resume to the Job
- Keyword Optimization: Use keywords from the job description to tailor your resume to the specific role.
- Highlight Relevant Skills: Emphasize the skills most pertinent to the position you’re applying for. Don’t assume the reader knows that you have MS Office skills, list it! Make it so clear to the reader that you have every requirement listed in the ad, that they want to speak with you.
2. Start Strong with a Powerful Summary
- Concise and Impactful: Keep your summary brief and to the point. Who are you and why are you a match for this role?
- Highlight Key Achievements: Showcase your most significant accomplishments. Include key metrics and data points that support your candidacy. How big was the budget of the project? How many sales did you make within your first year? These details can matter!
3. Format Your Resume Professionally
- Clean and Readable: Use a clean and easy-to-read font like Arial, Calibi or Times New Roman. Font size shouldn’t be less than 10. If this means making it two pages instead of one, that’s okay! Better to be a little longer and readable.
- Consistent and Proper Formatting: Maintain consistent formatting throughout your resume and save it as a PDF so the formatting doesn’t get garbled when you send it through an application portal.