Start Writing Your Resume Today
Weve covered a lot of ground in this article. I hope you now feel equipped to write a resume that will get you the job you dream ofor at least that first entry-level job or internship that will put you on the career path of your choice.
If you take nothing else away from this article, remember that you can and should ask for help with your resume. Youll learn so much, and you may even make a valuable professional connection in the process.
Updating your resume due to recent job loss? Read this next.
Professional Summary Example For Data Analyst
A graduate in Information Systems with two years of hands-on data analytics experience. Passionate about working with large amounts of data and to turn this data into information, information into insight and insight into business decisions. I also have a keen interest in the field of data visualization and am fascinated by the power to compress complex datasets into approachable and appealing graphics.
Whats The Best Resume Format
There is no such thing as the best resume format. The type of resume you choose should be based on your work history, work experience, skills, and qualifications. Here are examples of the formats you can use, and who should use them:
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Resume Summary Example For Stay At Home Mother
Performance-driven and knowledgeable Stay At Home Mother skilled at conducting detailed market research, developing new sales tools, creating reports, and promoting products and services. Certified Marketing Management Professional with an extensive knowledge of multiple marketing software programmes, great communication skills, and excellent teamwork abilities. Currently looking for any Marketing related remote part-time job.
Professional Summary Example For Student
Self-driven and knowledgeable computer science student with demonstrated experience in developing user-friendly software applications, coding and testing features, and providing engineering support. Oracle Certified Professional with extensive knowledge of multiple programming languages and software development tools, excellent problem-solving skills, and ability to perform well in a team.
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How To Make A Resume
A resume is a document commonly used in the hiring process. It includes information about your background and qualifications and should communicate the most important, relevant information about you to employers in a clear, easy-to-read format. The goal is to quickly communicate why you are uniquely qualified for the position based on your skills and experiences.
To create a resume that will get noticed by employers, you can follow a few simple steps and best practices. The main goal to keep in mind is to make your resume relevant and readable. Lets take a closer look at the best ways to write each of these resume sections. For more inspiration when writing or updating your resume, look at resume samples from your industry and job title.
If you’re interested in professional and personalized resume feedback, learn more about Indeed’s free and paid resume review services at indeed.com/resumehelp.
1. Name and contact information2. Summary or objectivec. Description of role and achievement4. Education6. Optional
Identify Your Key Skills
When applying for jobs, it’s helpful to review the most important skills and highlight the ones that align with the listing. Business co-founders often have unique skills, such as:
-
Business acumen
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Problem-solving
Showcasing these unique skills and how they’ve helped you in your professional life can help you stand out among applicants for a position. If the position you’re applying for involves similar tasks that you handled in your co-founder role, you can also use this section of your resume to outline your abilities.
Related:Here’s Everything You Should Include on a Resume
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Prepare For The Interview
If you list detail-oriented skills on your resume or if the position you are applying for requires strong attention to detail, the employer will look for evidence of these skills during your interview. People who are detail-oriented make sure they prepare for an interview thoroughly by researching the company and the position they are applying for. During your interview, you should be able to answer questions with specific information about the company or details from the job posting to prove you are detail-oriented.
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Work Experience Example For A Resume
Here is an example of a well-written job experience section for a resume:
Work ExperienceAccounting Assistant
- Purchase supplies and equipment for 3 departments, accurately recording purchases and reducing reconciliation discrepancies by 35%
- Process expense reports, properly documenting and allocating expense items
- Submit travel reimbursement requests and ensure missing receipt affidavits are completed in full
*CRANE & JENKINS | Tampa, FL*
- Served as primary point-of-contact for vendor inquiries, promptly investigating issues and solving concerns
- Received, tracked, and accurately processed 50+ vendor invoice payments on weekly basis
- Reconciled and batched payments on a daily basis
*TRADELOT | Tampa, FL*
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How To Write A Concise Resume
Ex-Genpact | Ex-Deloitte | Ex-Ericsson | Specialises in Human Resources
Do you think your resume has what it takes to catch the attention of employers?
According to a CareerBuilder survey, one in six hiring managers spend 30 seconds or less reviewing resumes. After knowing this, do you still believe your resume has what it takes to score an interview?
When it comes to writing a resume, job seekers feel pressured to sound good. This means they want to use big or fancy words that will make their resume sound professional and well-written. However, this approach can sometimes have the opposite effect when it comes to writing a resume.
Many job seekers fall into the trap of filling their resumes with unnecessary buzzwords, a lot of fluff, and vague descriptions of their experience. They also end up writing too much on their resume and including irrelevant experience employers dont care about.
As employers sift through resumes, they dont have time for wordy and fluffy applications. They want to get down to the core of your qualifications so they can determine whether or not they should call you for an interview.
Writing a concise resume definitely isnt an easy task, nor is it fast to do. However, knowing the common mistakes and paying close attention to grammar, you can write a much more effective resume. To help you write a clear and concise resume that will get you noticed by employers, here are some helpful tips to follow:
Include relevant experience only.
Where To Put Your Work Experience On A Resume
The role and importance of your employment history section depends on the type of the resume you choose to write.
Depending on where youre in your career, you can choose to write either a chronological, functional or combination resume.
- Chronological resume is built around the employment history section. Great for professionals with several years of work experience. Presents information in reverse-chronological order, with the most recent events being placed first. The most commonly used resume style. Order of sections: Contact Information > Professional Summary > Work Experience > Education > Skills > Others.
- Functional resume puts forward your your skills, accomplishments, job traits and personal characteristics. Great for fresh graduates, students, and people who are changing careers in other words, for those who might already have the skills but lack experience. Contact Information > Professional Summary / Resume Objective > Skills / Projects > Work History / Education > Others.
- Combination resume contains elements of both the chronological and functional formats by including your relevant skills and accomplishments first and then detailing your employment history and education. Great for students, fresh graduates or career changers who dont really fit elsewhere.
In most cases, your work experience section should come right after your contact info and professional summary.
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And Lets Wrap It All Up
If youve followed all of our advice until now, congrats! Youre probably an expert on how to make a resume.
To wrap it all up, lets brush up on some of the most important lessons weve learned so far…
- Use the rightresume builder. You dont want to mess around with formatting for hours before even starting to work on your resume!
- Focus on achievements. Mention your achievements instead of responsibilities, so that you stand out from all the other applicants.
- Include the must-have sections. That is, resume summary, work experience, education, and skills.
- Tailor for the job. Everything listed on your resume should be relevant for the job youre applying for.
- Perfect your cover letter. Its as important as your resume, so make sure you pay as much attention to it!
At Novorésumé, were committed to helping you get the job you deserve, every step of the way! Follow our career blog to stay up to date with industry-leading advice. Or, check out some of our top guides:
Andrei Kurtuy
How Do I Demonstrate Attention To Detail On A Resume
This is a suprisingly tricky skill to describe on a resume. Merely writing attention to detail or detail oriented at the top of your resume doesnt add a lot of credibility. Honestly, it probably hurts you everyone does this and thus, it doesnt really mean anything anymore. Focus on showing rather than telling future bosses you have good attention to detail. You can do this a couple of ways:
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Resume Formats: Defining Structure
Now that were done with the visuals, lets move on to the magic of text. The most fundamental division of text in resumes is based on content format:
- Reverse Chronological
- Functional
- Combined .
The Reverse Chronological format is not only the most common one, but also the most widely accepted among various employers and industries. The biggest benefit of a reverse chronological resume is its straightforward, easy to understand and linear structure.
It displays your professional experience and past work experience from most recent to oldest. This is great when you have a continuous history of work, and you can showcase some important recent positions. But what should you do if youre a fresh graduate or have a sizable gap in your employment history? This is where the Functional and Combination formats come in.
A Reverse Chronological order also takes advantage of short attention spans and busy schedules of recruiters by demonstrating your most recent and impressive positions first. Take advantage of those 6-7 seconds of eye time!
The Functional resume format leans on soft and hard skills as its main focus-point. If you lack experience as an entry level job seeker due to recently graduating college, or are in the process of moving to a new industry, the Functional format is one you should consider. You can also make the resume more robust by mentioning past projects, social initiatives, experience in other fields and so on.
Arrange Your Contact Information
Now that you know the format youre going to use, its time to start your resume. First things first, employers need to know who you are and how to contact you.
List the following contact details in your resume header at the top of the page:
- Name
- Telephone number
- Email address
- Link to online portfolio
- LinkedIn profile
Traditionally, you would also include your mailing address on your resume. However, this is no longer mandatory because most job applications are sent via email.
Here are two examples of how you can format your contact information section:
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What Does Attention To Detail Look Like In Me
The recruiter and HR manager are probably referring back to a job competency sheet. It will list off characteristics such as:
- Provides accurate, consistent numbers
- Provides information in a usable form and on a timely basis
- Maintains lists and schedules to ensure details are not overlooked
- Able to manage tasks in compliance with company policies and operating procedures
- Writes down important details so the details are not lost or forgotten
- Able to notice patterns in data and turn them into useful insights
- Work requires little or no checking
We can boil all this down to a couple of key ideas. First, you are capable of carefully reviewing your work to find mistakes. Furthermore, you can spot when something is out of place and figure out why it is important. Above all, you are trustworthy: you can be relied upon to follow orders and complete your work within the expected time.
Checking Your Work
Process Management
The second idea, organizing policies and processes, gets into how can you ensure you are delivering quality work on an ongoing basis. This set of organizational skills is particularly important if you are going to be regularly managing large and complicated projects. It also is an important requirement for managers, since you must think about how to check your teams work . Experience is helpful here, but any sort of management duties are good to showcase.
Insightfulness
I admire the attention to detail that went into those disgusting floors.
Trust
Use A Functional Or Skills Based Format
The first must for anyone creating a resume with periods of unemployment is to switch from a chronological resume format to a functional or skills based format. This will draw attention away from the fact that you werent employed for a period of time, and put focus on the fact that you have valuable skills and achievements to offer instead.
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Why Is Work Experience On A Resume Important
Many employers regard the description of work experience as the most important part of a resume. To get a quick idea of your employment history, your prospective employer will most likely read the work experience section first. As such, this section could be key in moving you forward in the hiring process.
The work experience section in your resume shows the hiring manager whether you have the necessary experience and skills to succeed in the role you are applying for. This section also includes information about your achievements, which can distinguish you from other applicants and make you more likely to get an interview.
List Your Professional History With Keywords
Write your professional history section in reverse-chronological order. Start with your most recent job and provide a short description including the company name, time period in which you were employed, your job title and a few key achievements during your time at the company. You might also include relevant learnings or growth opportunities you experienced while employed there.
When listing your professional history, you should keep a few best practices in mind:
- Use numbers to measure your impact, when possible. Including specific numerical achievements can help employers understand your direct potential value to their company.
Example: Developed new process for requesting supplies, reducing fulfillment time by 10%.
- Use keywords from the job description. Similar to your skills section, you should also include information from the job description in your job history bullets. For example, if the job description mentions the importance of meeting sales quotas, you could include information about how youve met or exceeded quotas in past roles.
Example: Achieved goal of reaching 250% annual sales quota, winning sales MVP two quarters in a row.
Follow the same process for other work experiences. If you do not have extensive professional history, you should also include internships and volunteer opportunities following the same format.
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The Right Way To Show Attention To Detail On Your Resume
Avoid listing ‘attention to detail’ or ‘detail-oriented’ on your resume that’s a big red flag to recruiters. Here’s what to do instead.
3 days ago 5 min read
Attention to detail is, arguably, one of the most important qualities for performing well in a wide number of positions. Listing detail-oriented on your resume, however, is a red flag to employers who have their eye out for subjective soft skills that can call your judgement into question. It also gets missed completely by automated resume screeners as these dont scan for soft skills at all.
The best way to convey your attention to detail is to indicate it through your accomplishments and bullet points. Let’s explain how to do that.
Create A Master List Of Skills
Go through each category and create a master list of the skills in your toolbox. Dont be afraid to list things that seem obvious, like computer skills or customer service.
Although they might seem like a given in your profession, many hiring managers still want to see these skills listed.
Never include skills that you are no longer familiar with. If you write a skill on your resume, hiring managers will be expecting that you can deliver on that activity.
If you are worried that a hiring manager will over or underestimate your level of proficiency, feel free to write beginner, intermediate, or proficient next to each skill listed.
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Include Your Educational Background
Many organisations usually expect a candidate to provide their academic qualifications in their resume to understand the education level of a candidate and what knowledge, training and skills they possess that qualify them for a position. In this section, outline your educational qualifications by including the name of the academic institution, the duration of your course and the program you completed. Consider including details such as any awards you received and extracurricular activities that showcase your personal attributes.
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