How Should A Resume Look

Second Consider Using Color

If youre applying for a job in the art or design industry, consider using color to add a personal touch to your resume. Make sure to use color carefully and if youre selecting a paper color, make sure it complements your font color. The text on your resume should remain legible. Refer to the color theory when selecting your resume colors.

Find Relevant Keywords In The Job Posting

Since hiring managers are searching for information that is relevant to their position, you should carefully review the job posting to learn more about what they’re looking for. It may be helpful to print out the job posting and circle or highlight any skills listed that you may have as well. When you submit your resume, hiring managers will briefly scan the document to determine if the content matches the keywords they’re searching for. Place these keywords throughout your resume to grab the attention of the employer.

Use Clear Section Headings

Most resumes will have similar components: a professional summary, areas of expertise, professional experience, education, and volunteerism. When deciding how to format a resume, remember that these headings must be definitive and must stand out amidst the other text in the document. Don’t be afraid to use a shaded box, bold text, and white-space around each heading.

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Tell A Clear Story Of Your Career Path Even If Its Non

What many job seekers dont realize is that hiring managers read resumes to get a clear picture of a candidates career path. They want to know why you want the job.

So, before submitting your resume to job boards, read over it to see if your career path makes sense. Have a friend do the same. See if it makes sense to them that youre applying for the roles youre applying to. If it doesnt make sense, I try mirroring some of the language in the job descriptions youre applying to. Ask yourself how your experience would make you great at those jobs. If youre able to communicate that, that your resume will make much more sense.

It Lists An Objective

This darling of earlier resume times is now seen as a has-been, experts say. Your objective, current thinking goes, is to get the job youre applying forand by applying, youre stating that objective. Duh.

Today, your resume should be all about marketing yourself. You do that with a career summary that focuses on your experience, talents, and accomplishments, which demonstrates the value you can bring to a future employer.

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Show How You Make An Impact

List your relevant work experience in reverse chronological order, and use action verbs where appropriate.

Dont just list your old job titles. To prove youre worth a hiring managers time, youll need to highlight some concrete wins. Statistics that build upon your skills section are most impactful bonus points if they show a track record of growth, revenue, and profitability, Leavy-Detrick says.

If youre drawing a blank, she suggests adding resume skills that can help solve a problem area for the company youre applying to.

Impact doesnt always have to be measured by metrics, she says. Cultural improvements, special projects, customer growth anything that shows success can work.

Keep things short and sweet dont try to list as many projects and responsibilities as you possibly can, Leavy-Detrick advises.

Focus on a couple of key takeaways, she says. Really try to make it a best of document.

What Your Resume Should Look Like In 2021

Since the recruiting process has taken a turn for technological, our resumes need to adapt. For starters, download our 2021 resume template and then customize it for your own job search.

Over the past 30 years, resumes and the hiring process, in general, havent changed that much. That is up until the last few years where weve seen an emerging relationship between tech, AI, and human resources. It may seem counter-intuitive to manage a human-centered process with tech and AI, but when done with a human-forward approach, it can make finding a job faster and easier for candidates, and more efficient and economical for companies.

And since the recruiting process has taken a turn for technological, our resumes need to adapt. For starters, download our favorite resume template and then customize it for your own job search.

Since we spend a lot of our time reviewing resumes in order to match candidates to great jobs, weve come up with a list of some of the most important aspects to think about when writing your 2021 resume. We often get on the phone with candidates and ask them to tweak some of these resume mistakes and see them go on to land amazing jobs.

Are you making any of the mistakes listed below? Read on to find out!

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What Are Technical Or Hard Skills On Your Resume

When listing hard skills on your resume, include specific proficiencies and certifications. Front-end web developers, for instance, would report their level of expertise in HTML, CSS and JavaScript, and other technologies the company lists in its job posting. A financial controller, meanwhile, might claim a strong foundation in GAAP or SEC reporting, and an administrative professionals resume skills could advertise a CAP or MOS certification.

Here are some hard resume skills for 15 in-demand fields:

College Student Resume Example And Writing Tips

When creating a resume as a college student, it’s important to emphasize both your work history and your education. For a student resume, you can also demonstrate your skills and abilities by including volunteer work, internships, and other extracurricular activities.

Review what to include in your resume, tips for writing a resume that highlights your qualifications, and download a resume template you can use as a starting point for creating your own resume.

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Before You Get Started

Read the entire job announcement. Focus on the following sections to understand whether or not you qualify for the position. This critical information is found under:

• Duties and Qualifications
• How to Apply
• How You Will be Evaluated

Make sure you have the required experience and/or education before you apply. Hiring agencies use the job announcement to describe the job and the required qualifications, including:

• Level and amount of experience
• Education
• Training

How To List Education On Your Resume

The next section were going to cover is your Education. Lets start with the basics – how to format the education section & what to mention there. Then, well move on to tips & tricks thatll help you stand out

• Program Name. E.g.: B.A. in Business Administration
• University Name. E.g.: New York State University
• Years Attended. E.g.: 08/2008 – 06/2012
• GPA. E.g.: 3.9 GPA
• Honors. E.g.: Cum Laude, Magna Cum Laude, Summa Cum Laude.
• Academic achievements. Any interesting papers youve written, courses youve excelled in, etc.
• Minor. Minor in Psychology

Here’s an example:

Tips on perfecting your education section:

• If you dont have any work experience, mention your education section first.
• Mention your latest educational entry on top.
• If you have a university degree, dont mention your high school at all.
• ONLY mention GPA if you had a very impressive academic career .

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Format Your Resume Properly

The right resume format makes your resume easier to read and highlights your most marketable skills and experiences.

Here are three tips to help better format your resume when you have no experience:

• Dont center any of your text. All of the text on your resume should be aligned to the left. This makes your resume easier to read because the eye naturally returns to the left side of the page after reading a line.
• Change work experience to relevant experience. If youve never held a job, make your experience section more general. This way, you can include information about extracurricular activities, volunteer work, or relevant coursework on your resume.
• Use digits when writing about numbers. Make your resume easy to read by using digits .

What Are Employers Looking For In A Resume

Building a resume can often be a challenging task as employers expect to see a resume that is both unique to the position and simple to understand. As you decide what a resume should look like, review the job posting of the specific position you’re interested in. Employers want to see a resume that features the specific skills and qualifications they’re searching for. Review the job posting and pick which of those preferred skills you have and clearly list them in your resume.

Hiring managers are also looking for resumes that are simple to read. They may receive several resumes at once, which can cause them to quickly scan your resume, rather than reading it carefully. This is whyyou should keep your resume clean with fonts that are simple and consistent throughout the entire resume. Feature enough white space that your content looks well-spaced and clean. You should also try to only include information relevant to the position and keep your resume one to two pages long.

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Next Add Your Contact Information

Make sure the contact information you provide is accurate and up to date. It should be easy for recruiters to reach you to schedule an interview. Make sure your contact information is easy to locate by putting it near the top of your resume. Ensure that your phone number is correct, your voicemail outgoing message is appropriate and states your name and your email address is professional.

What Is The Best Resume Format

The best resume format for most job seekers is the reverse-chronological format because its easy to read and follows a logical order of when you held each position in the order that you held it.

Additionally, hiring managers are most familiar with this format and will know exactly where to find what theyre looking for in your application.

However, that doesnt mean its the best resume format for everyone. If you have a nontraditional work history or need to put emphasis on your transferable skills, youre better off using a functional or combination resume instead.

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What Should A Resume Include

Your resume should include certain elements and sections that allow it to capture the attention of hiring managers. Important details and sections a resume should include are:

• Contact information that’s easy to find and listed at the top of the page

• A brief but detailed summary or objective

• Your experience with specific job duties and responsibilities

• Where and when you received your degree and the name of the degree you received

• Soft and hard skills that match the skills listed in the job posting

• Certifications you’ve received

• One to two pages of relevant skills, qualifications, education and experience

• Proper font style and sizes

Incorporate Keywords Based On The Job Description And Industry

The way an ATS determines if your resume is a good match for the job is by scanning the text for relevant keywords. Keywords usually refer to a specific skill , educational background , or previous position . You can get a good sense of what the keywords for the job are by looking at the job description. Note what the employer is asking for in the Qualifications section and see whats on the list of job responsibilities. From there, you can adapt your resume to incorporate the words and phrases that appear frequently.

However, dont stuff your resume with keywords. Using them once or twice, if its an essential part of the job will suffice. In addition, if you use industry-related acronyms in your resume, the ATS might only be calibrated to pick up on the full spelling of the word or phrase. Its best practice to include both .

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Use A Professional Format

You can use a professional format to ensure that your resume looks good to potential employers and other professionals. If you would like, you can base your resume on a template. Most professional resumes follow reverse chronological order. In this format, you can list your most recent work experience first and work backward through your past work experiences. This method of organization can make it easy for recruiters to read through and understand your credentials.

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Hard Vs Soft Skills: Whats The Difference

Heres the difference between hard skills and soft skills:

Hard skills

Hard skills are quantifiable, job-specific abilities learned through education, training, or on-the-job experience. Language skills, computer skills, and being able to operate heavy machinery all count as types of hard skills.

Heres a list of 24 popular hard skills to put on your resume:

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The Best Resume Format Guide For 2021

By now, as a seasoned job hunter and student of The Interview Guys, you should know there are a few essentials you should have in your arsenal: business cards, a solid cover letter, your elevator pitch, and your well-formatted resume.

Hang on, havent we already gone over all this in that other article, How to Make a Resume 101?

Yesand no.

In that article we did go over how to write a resume, but in this article, were going to take you to the next step and focus specifically on one seemingly small but massively huge part of resume building: resume format and how to select which one is right for you in 2021.

FREE BONUS PDF CHECKLIST: Get our “Perfect Resume CHECKLIST” that gives you a handy 38-point Checklist that will let you craft the perfect resume.

Proofread Your Resume And Finish Strong

Once youve written your resume and cover letter, youre in pretty good shape to send out that first application. However, youre not quite done yet.

The most important step before sending out any resume is to read it over and make sure that there are no issues that could get your application discarded.

To help make that process easier, heres a checklist you can go through to make sure your resume is looking spotless:

The Resume Genius Resume Checklist

Is your contact information accurate?

Does your resume NOT include details like headshots or sensitive personal information?

Does your resume fit on one page ?

Is your information easy to read ?

Is the design of your resume appropriate for the position youre applying for?

Did you include all relevant sections on your resume?

Did you include quantified achievements in your work experience section?

Does your resume address the requirements stated in the job ad?

Is your resume free of typos and grammatical errors?

Is all of your information clearly formatted and professional?

Feel free to use our on-page checklist, or and begin reviewing your resume.

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Why Are These The Best Resume Formats

These three resume formats are some of the best options because theyre easy to read and the most likely to be processed through an ATS without critical errors.

Recruiters often have to review many resumes for a single open role. They can read a resume in a standard format more easily and thoroughly because they know where to find the information theyre looking for. For example, if a role requires a specific skill, a recruiter will look for it in your skills section included either above or below your work experience. They have a limited amount of time to spend reviewing each resume, so they may move on and assume you dont possess the qualification if it takes too long to find the right information.

Also, most applicant tracking systems will perform a more accurate review of your resume if the format is simple, straightforward and follows a few basic rules. The three resume formats discussed in this article mostly adhere to these best practices, though some ATS may have difficulties scanning a functional resume, and can help ensure that your resume is successfully processed through an ATS review.

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How To Edit Your Resume

Youve written your resume, and read it twice, but thats not enough. A good editing job will take a little longer â and some specific tactics meant to catch resume errors.

First, dont attempt to edit your resume until its done. Yes, it can be difficult to leave a glaring error while you move on to write your skills section, but force yourself to finish your resume before you edit it. Why? Youll save yourself time, and letting go of errors now could help you write a better first draft because youre focusing on the writing itself. Youll be glad you decided to go back and make all the edits at once.

Next, never try to edit your resume right after youve written it. In fact, you should give yourself a 24-hour break before editing your resume. With time away, youll see your resume with fresh eyes and for what it really isânot what you meant it to be.

When you give your resume a read, try reading your resume backward. It sounds odd â and its not always easy â but reading backward forces you to focus on each word, and helps you better catch both spelling and grammatical errors in the text.

Ask a friend or family member to read your resume, too. They may spot errors that you missed, or have suggestions for how to show yourself in an even better light.

And lastly, be sure to look for common resume pitfalls before you press send.

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