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Building Your
Resume
Presented by:
Cindy Chernow, Chernow Consulting
www.chernowconsulting.com
Writing a Winning Resume
Do I Really Need a Resume?
You bet. A resume gives you a fighting chance and a competitive edge against your jobhunting competitors.
• It can open the door to an interview.
• It gives employers information about you that may not be asked on a job
application.
• It shows off your skills, abilities, accomplishments, and potential – it shows what
you can offer an employer.
• It’s a sales brochure. It should offer just enough information to pique the
employer’s interest, make them want to meet you, and get them to set up an
interview. Getting the interview is the name of the game.
What’s the Best Kind of Resume to Have?
The Best Resume is a resume that gets read. Did you know that most employers spend
only 10 seconds reading each of the resumes they receive?
• If you want your resume to be read, it better be clear, concise, visually simple,
and easy to scan.
Things That Should Be Included in Your Resume
Name, address, telephone number (day and evening), e-mail address:
These should be included at the top of your resume. You may have both a current
address and a permanent address you wish to list. This is especially true for students or
people wishing to relocate.
Career Objective/Summary Statement:
Today, Career Objectives have been replaced with Summary Statements that appear at
the top of the page and consist of three to five lines highlighting your experience.
Career objectives are usually only recommended if your resume does not support the type
of position you are applying or if you feel you need to focus the resume towards a
specific position. Otherwise, your objective should be deleted from your resume and
included instead in the first paragraph of your cover letter. Career objectives can often be
limiting. If you do choose to use an objective, avoid this problem by making your
objective focused yet broad enough not to eliminate you from other positions in your
career field of choice, e.g. “a position in the field of marketing.”
Education:
For those who have graduated within the last ten years, your degree is your calling card
and educational history should be listed first at the top of your resume in chronological
order. Be sure to include all universities, degrees, areas of specialization, and dates of
graduation. If recently graduated, include only grade point averages 3.3 or above.
If your work experience is more pertinent or you have been out of school for more than
ten years, you may wish to list your education after your work experience. In either case,
what you list first is what grabs the reader’s attention so market to your advantage.
Honors & Activities:
Under your education, list academic honors, class rankings or scholarships. Activities,
associations, and other forms of involvement can be listed here or at the end of your
resume.
Experience:
Even relevant volunteer work can be listed under the category “experience.” Under this
category list your employer, job title and dates of employment. Include a brief summary
of your responsibilities and accomplishments either in bullet format or short statements.
Be sure to quantify and qualify with facts and figures. Show your skills using action
verbs and your accomplishments using nouns. For example, work experience that
demonstrates skills might include supervision, planning, writing, coordinating,
interviewing or dealing with the public. Include buzzwords that appear in job
descriptions or are commonly used by people in your career field of choice.
Skills/Interests:
This is another optional category for your resume. This section can be used to put a face
to the paper. Skills can be separated out to include languages, special licenses, or
knowledge of computers. Interests might include membership in professional
associations, travel, volunteer work, musical talent, etc. Interests can also appear under
headings such as Associations or Activities.
Do Not Include on Your Resume:
Personal references. However, be sure to keep the reference list of names and
addresses readily available if you are asked to provide them. Also, be sure to contact
those individuals to let them know that you are using them as a reference.
Any mention of your height, weight, color of hair or eyes, marital status, state of
health, date or birth or citizenship. The only exception to this rule might be on a
curriculum vitae and, even then, it is questionable whether such information is
necessary.
Abbreviations.
Fancy fonts. Never go below a font size of 11 points.
Salary history.
Reasons for leaving a position.
Length of Resume:
Today simplicity is the key. Try to keep your resume to one page, however, if you have a
lot of experience, a two-page resume is perfectly acceptable.
Preparing the Ideal Scannable Resume
Leading businesses and organization today are using electronic resume tracking
technology to “scan” or “read” resumes. Your resume is scanned for key words, phrases,
experience, education and skills. Whether you are applying for a position with a firm that
is using manual or automated systems, it is still necessary to tailor your approach for each
new position. Executive search consultants and technical recruiters also maintain internal
applicant tracking systems alongside their subscription to electronic resume databases.
The nature of the automated (resume) systems is saving time while enhancing the quality
and evenhandedness of the recruiting process, thus reducing factors such as age, gender
and race.
The following are tips and information that will assist you in the journey through
employer’s electronic resume tracking systems and will increase your opportunities for
matching requirements and getting “hits”.
Stick to sans serif fonts or very popular, easy to read serif fonts. This includes
Helvetica, Times, Futura, New Century Schoolbook, Univers, ITC Bookman, Optima,
Palantino, ITC Avante Garde Gothic, and Courier.
Use a font size of 11 to 14 points. Do not use anything smaller.
Boldface is accepted by most systems. Some scanners, however, do not handle
boldface well, so you may want to limit your boldface type or substitute capital letters.
Avoid italic text, script and underlined passages.
Avoid using graphics and shading.
Use horizontal and vertical lines sparingly. Computers will try to read lines. The
horizontal lines may blur into characters, resulting in black globs that look like inkblots.
Avoid compressing space between letters. When you scrunch up your text, it becomes
unreadable.
Never use a dot matrix printer. A 24-pin letter-quality dot matrix printer is passable.
A laser printer is best.
Always send originals. Avoid fax copies that may become difficult for the scanner to
read.
Minimize the use of general abbreviations. When in doubt, spell it out.
Maximize the use of industry jargon.
Use a more traditional resume structure.
Avoid a four page on a folded 11”x17” sheet. Recruiters must tear these oversize
sheets in half and scan page one, then flip it over to scan two, and so on.
Use light-colored, standard-size 8 ½”x11” paper, printed on one side only.
Your name should be the first text on a resume. Avoid putting your name, address,
and telephone number on the same line.
Do not put staples in your resume. Even when removed, the previous compression
may cause pages to stick together.
Do not fold your resume. If the crease falls across a line of type, it can be murder to
read. If you must fold your resume for some reason, be certain the fold does not occur
along a line of text.
“One page” is no longer the automatic answer to the question. The more marketing
points you present about yourself, the more likely you are to be plucked from on
electronic resume database now, in six months, or a year form now. But three pages are
the maximum.
Don’t print hollow bullets. Computer eyes see these as little “o”s.
Do not put two dates alongside the name of institution. A computer will not penalize
you for omitting a date, but will leave you in the wings when you use a double date next
to a school name. If you are concerned that someone may determine your age is too old
based on the year of graduation, omit the years. The system reads numbers not words
to determine years.
Hiring managers using a sliding scale can weigh each predefined category or keywords
that are matched with highlights from a job description. This is called “building a
search.”
Use keywords and nouns to describe your proven skills, experience, education,
achievements, affiliations and languages spoken as opposed to the more traditional
action verbs. Use concrete words that are concise. This can include industry specific
jargon (buzzwords). Remember to tailor the language to the specific industry.
Use common headings such as: “Objectives, Experience, Professional Experience,
Accomplishments, Strengths, Licenses, Publications and Honors.”
Include interpersonal traits and self-management skills such as: dependable, high
energy or motivated.
The Cover Letter
Whenever you send a resume, be sure that it is accompanied by a cover letter.
The cover letter provides you with an opportunity to highlight and amplify some of the
information in the resume, to address directly the needs and interests of the employer, and
to suggest the areas in which your skills match the organization’s needs.
The cover letter should always be typed on paper identical or, at least similar to,
that of the resume. It should be no more than one page and businesslike in appearance.
When possible, address the letter to a specific person, preferably the one who is
likely to make the employment decisions. See the sample below:
Title
Company Name
Company Address
City, State, ZIP Code
Your address
City, State, ZIP Code
Phone Number
Date
Dear
Opening Paragraph
The opening paragraph should arouse interest on the part of the reader. Tell why you are
writing the letter. Identify the job title and position for which you are applying. Give
information to demonstrate your specific interest in the company. If someone referred
you to this position, now’s a good time to mention it.
Second and Third Paragraphs
The second paragraph should tell the reader in brief terms about your academic or
professional background. Don’t make the reader guess at what would be of interest to
you.
Your middle paragraph should create desire by relating you and your background to the
company. Show the reader why you should be considered as a candidate. Cite specific
examples of your qualifications for the particular position you are seeking. Refer to your
resume or other material. Be brief and to the point.
Closing Paragraph
In your closing paragraph, ask for action. Ask for an appointment time. A positive
request is much more effective and harder to ignore than a vague hope.
Very truly yours,
Type your name