Smart Resumes for Success
A resume is your chance to present your skills, education and your work experience
to a prospective employer. With several articles on resume writing, a
job-seeker may end up churning out a formulaic resume or over the top resume. Neither
of this would help you. To ensure that your resume comes up tops among thousand
others, you have to make it relevant. These simple tips will help you write
professional resume.
1.
Summarize for success
HR managers take on an average 20 – 25 seconds to ‘scan’ a resume that
lands in their in-box every day. When they scan quickly, if the keyword that they
are looking for is not in the first few lines of your resume, it will end up in
the recycle bin.
Make sure that you highlight your most recent and relevant skills to the
job in the first section of your resume. Make that 25 seconds count by summarizing
your career objectives as a solution to their problems.
2.
Research to be relevant
Don’t commit the cardinal sin of sending out same resumes to 10
companies! Do your research first on the company you are going to apply. Understand
what keywords are given in the vacancy announcement. Find a way to mirror those
keywords in your resume.
Also doing the research on an organization will let you know what style
of resumes you could send them. An advertising or a creative professional may
send out artistically designed resume to showcase his /her prowess in using the
design software. But, unless you are in the media or other arts, it is better
to stick to a conservative style in your resume design
3.
Avoid job descriptions in your resume
In their eagerness to copy the keywords in a job advertisement,
candidates sometimes end up reproducing the entire JD of that position. You
should avoid giving job descriptions of what you had done – rather emphasise what
you had achieved, what problem you had solved in a given job.
HR managers look for your problem solving skills an important indicator
of Emotional Intelligence in your resume, so make sure you give the information
that is unique to you and not a generic job description.
4. Add only Contemporary skills
Remember to include only the modern and most relevant skills in your
resume. For example, saying that you know MS Office suite is nothing great in a
resume. The HR managers and people who hire you expect you to be proficient in
computer skills. 20 years ago, inclusion of MS Office skills may be very novel,
but now it is taken for granted so don’t waste your time and precious space in
your resume talking about skills that you are anyway expected to have.
Instead, add skills like writing blogs, designing websites or any other
skill that is relevant to 21st Century businesses.
5.
Proof-read for Perfection
A badly written resume is sure to raise the hackles of your hirer. So
make sure that you do a proper proof reading before sending it out. Ask your
friend to double check the spelling and grammar. Avoid using colloquialism or
slangs in your resume. Use UK English for applying to jobs in UK or Europe and
use US English for American companies. In all cases, make sure you avoid “WhatsApp”
or texting lingo in your resume.
A neatly formatted, well written relevant resume is guaranteed to get
you the desired results. So go ahead and follow these tips in your resume. In
my next article, I will talk about the importance of a Cover Letter.
