How to Improve our Resume

In a slowing economy, you may need an effective resume to help you to obtain a telephone or in person interview. You may only have one chance to have your resume read by a given employer, so you may want to make a great impression the first time.
These tips, which cover how well your resume reads, looks, and presents relevant content, will help give you the best possible opportunity to land an interview, the next step you’ll need to complete to secure a position.

• Objectives section. Some potential employers will tell you that a clearly written objectives section which shows how your skills and experiences map to the employers needs is ‘critical’ to gaining an interview. Other individuals, such as the original writers of this article will tell you If you have an Objective section, delete it. It rarely helps and can easily hurt you by needlessly pigeonholing you. Thus, you, the job applicant need to decide if you should have an objectives section. If you do have such a section, please be 100% sure that the section clearly maps your skills and experiences to the employers needs. A section simply stating: Seeking entry level position where I can learn… will not help you.
• Keep the Skills section clear, brief and concise, especially on a technical resume. Hiring managers will usually skip it because they’re more interested in seeing your skills in context, which is in the bullet points of your Experience section.
• For some positions, experienced employees may wish to place their Education section at the end of their resumes, where some hiring managers look for it. If you’re a recent graduate without extensive work experience, you should plan to put it at the top. If you have had more than one career relevant professional position, you need to consider the relative importance of your job experience vs. your academic experience in deciding where to place the Education section. If applying for an academic job, the Education section should, most likely, always remain at the top of your resume.
• Use as few pages as possible (the actual length will depend on your profession). Extraneous information will divert attention from the heart of your resume. Be objective when deciding what information is truly relevant to the hiring manager. 1-2 pages is a great target for many non-academic resumes.
• Do not mix future and past tenses. Bullet descriptions for your current job should be in the present tense (unless it’s describing a completed project) and descriptions for past jobs should be in the past tense.
• Be consistent in your formatting. Do not bold one job title and italicize another. Do not italicize one former employer’s name and underline it for another. Pick a single style for each element and stick with it. If you make changes, check to make sure the changes are done consistently across the board.
• Choose a clean, subtle font that’s easy to read and look at. For example, Garamond is a crisper, more refined font than Times New Roman. Also, make certain to choose a font that most PCs and Macs will have installed. See this list of fonts common to most PCs and Macs [1]. TIP: If you choose an uncommon font, you can save your file as a PDF and embed that font in the PDF document. You should also choose your font based on how your resume will be presented; sans serif fonts like Arial are best for viewing a resume on a monitor, where serif fonts like Garamond look better when printed on paper.
• To increase readability and comprehension fine-tune your spacing. Studies have shown that maximum reading comprehension is attained when spacing is set at around 1.15x of the font size. For example, an 11 point font should have 13 point spacing. TIP: To automatically adjust line spacing in MS Word, select the text you want to adjust, then go to Format > Paragraph… Then, in the Paragraph window, change ‘Line Spacing:’ to ‘Multiple’ and then set ‘At:’ to 1.15 (you can tweak this number a bit if you are having trouble fitting a resume onto 1 or 2 pages). This method will give you perfect spacing regardless of what font size you choose.
• Convert your resume to PDF format. Many potential employers require that your resume and cover letter be emailed or uploaded in PDF format. PDF stands for Portable Document Format; this type of document is widely requested because it maintains its appearance both on-screen (of nearly any computer) and in print. Documents may be saved in PDF format from many editors including Microsoft word. One might also buy Adobe Acrobat software or other conversion software such as Tweak Word To PDF 3.0. To start the conversion, you can either from the converter or from the file by the button.
• Information on a resume should be listed in order of importance to the reader – your strengths, accomplishments should come first. Title/Position is most important so always list that first, then Company, Location, Dates.
• Create a personal branding statement that describes who you are, your greatest strength, and what benefit you bring to your future employer.
• Identify what makes you uniquely qualified for a position – a qualifications summary can catch a recruiter’s eye and get them to read more carefully.
• Keep it short and pithy to catch a recruiter’s eye.
• Use strong concrete verbs to describe what you did.
• Use a bulleted, easy to read format rather than a paragraph style. It will make your strengths stand out.
• Write your resume for the job you want – highlight past skills and experience that fit what you want to do.
• Keep it to 2 pages, maximum.
• Make your resume accomplishments driven, not responsibilities driven. Quantify wherever possible.
• Focus on the last 10-15 years of experience; you don’t need to list early jobs unless they show skills and achievements that apply to the job you want – then only include those key facts.
• Put jobs in reverse chronological order – most recent first.
• Don’t put anything on your resume that you did not personally do.
• Use a clear font – like Arial/Times New Roman/Georgia at an 11 point size. Avoid fluff, extra words, run on descriptions, and redundancy. Keep it clean and easy to read.
• Include you education – school, program, any relevant classes that directly relate to the position you are applying for.
• Be sure that any jargon you use in your resume is common knowledge. For students – if you are part of campus organizations you may need to explain more than just the name. For tech workers – make sure you use all acronyms consistently – don’t use UNIX and later Unix.
• Do not use italics, script, shading, colors; do use bold and indents sparingly.
• Do not use internal product names, use descriptions but make them brief.
• Spell check your resume by printing it and reading it aloud. Have a friend proofread it to catch any mistakes you may have overlooked.
• Edit and format carefully. You can even hire someone to do it for you, it’s worth the expense.
• Name drop – if you worked with major customers include their names and how you supported those customers.

Resume Words

Achieved Analyzed Assembled Awarded Certified Composed Controlled Coordinated Created Delivered Designed Developed Devised Directed Educated Established Exceeded Founded Fully Credentialed Implemented Improved Increased Leadership Managed Minimized Monitored Negotiated Operated Organized Originated Oversaw Owned Prepared Problem Solving Programmed Published Reduced Reorganized Researched Reviewed Saved Simplified Supervised Tested Trained
Oral / Written Communications

Core Resume Components

• Contact Information – name, address, phone number and email address. Include certification logos in the upper left or right corners.
• Skills Summary/Branding Statement/Objective – The skills summary is recommended for experienced professionals. Branding statement is recommended for mid to senior level professionals with specific strengths companies are looking for. The objective statement is better suited for recent graduates.
• Work Experience – Show progression and promotions. List titles, company name, location and dates
• Education and Training – List highest degree first. Include continuing education.
• Skills – Incorporate throughout resume. Resume should reflect the skills listed in the summary.
• Activities – List only those activities that are relevant to the target job and non-controversial.
• Organizations – relate affiliations in terms of marketable skills, knowledge and achievements.

Honors/Awards – Add only if relative to work, otherwise do not include. Technical certifications can be included here