What Goes In The Summary Section Of A Resume

Everything You Need To Know About The Resume Summary Statement

Ready for a challenge? Summarize your entire professional history in a few concise and impactful sentences.

Make sure to touch on everything that makes you a qualified candidateâyour past experiences, your skills, your education, and all of those other qualities that should earn you a spot at the top of the resume pile.

This is your task every time you apply for a new job.

Itâs called your summary statement , and itâs a resume section that trips nearly every job seeker up.

Why Are Proper Resume Headers So Important

Applicant tracking systems and hiring managers depend heavily on your resume layout to find the information that is relevant to them, so an easy-to-read layout will greatly improve your chances of securing an interview.

In short, the more intuitively you organize your resume, the easier it is to decipher your information and land you that interview.

There are certain important things to keep in mind when drafting your resume; namely, deciding where to put information and how to label it.

When hiring managers have just a few seconds to glance over your resume, itâs important that you organize it efficiently so that they can easily find the most important information.

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The way you organize the information on your resume is almost as important as the resume itself.

Again, there are a few reasons for the supreme importance of resume organization:

Office / Administrative Jobs Resume Summary Examples

Office Manager Resume Summary

Office manager with 5+ years of experience in controlling inventory, ordering and tracking new supplies, developing procedures and training material for staff. Strong communication skills, organized, with a track record of success.

Click here for the full office manager resume example.

Executive Assistant Resume Summary

Accomplished executive assistant with experience in providing support to a high-level CEO and other executives for 4 years. Helped with everything from customer support, to data entry and preparing well-researched documents. Skilled at time-management, proficient in MS Office and Adobe Photoshop.

Click here for the full executive assistant resume example.

Receptionist Resume Summary

Customer-oriented and self-motivated receptionist with 5+ years of experience in customer support. Proficient in medical record-keeping software and MS Office. Thorough and attention to detail in daily professional matters.

Click here for the full receptionist resume example.

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Graphic Design Resume Summary Examples

Graphic Designer Resume Summary;

Senior graphic designer with 6+ years of experience in website design and branding, across a wide range of industries. Extensive experience in multimedia, marketing, and print design. Highly skilled in communications, digital storytelling, and Adobe Creative Suite.

Click here for the full graphic designer resume example.

Creative Director Resume Summary

Experienced creative director, with 10+ years of experience in the advertising industry. Over the past 3 years, managed 2 separate creative teams, creating video ads for company clients. Worked with some high-profile clients, including IBM and Phillips.

Product Designer Resume Summary;

Creative designer with 7 years experience in product design, packaging, and graphic design. Expertise in new product design, brand identity, and market research. Created and launched a new line of award-winning tableware that generated over $1 million in sales the first year.

UI/UX Designer Resume Summary;

Proactive UX designer with 5 years of experience in delivering enjoyable web and mobile products for the FinTech industry. Designed UI, UX and marketing materials for 6 apps and 3 games at Company X, 2 of which were featured in Apples App Store. Skilled with Sketch, and Adobe Creative Suite.

Medical Resume Summary Examples

Nurse Resume Summary;

Registered nurse specialized in psychiatric nursing. Developed strong psychiatric-evaluation and treatment planning skills after 5 years of working at Hospital X. Experienced in administrative work, management, and training new employees.

Click here for the full nurse resume example.;

Medical Assistant Resume Summary

Certified Medical Assistant with 10 years of experience in working in a fast-paced environment, handling confidential paperwork, administering medication and providing quality patient care. Team-oriented with proven ability to create positive rapport with patients, family, and staff. Completed and submitted clinical documentation in accordance with hospital regulations, and experience in supporting diagnostic and technical treatment procedures.

Click here for the full medical assistant resume example.

Dental Assistant Resume Summary;

Licensed dental practitioner with 4+ years in helping dentists prepare, perform, and document procedures. Strong hand-eye coordination, with skills in 4-handed dentistry and working with patients.

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How To Write A Professional Summary For A Resume With No Work Experience

A lot of people with no work experience default to writing a resume objective because they think they have nothing to summarize.

However, this usually ends up backfiring on them as a resume objective brings little to the table. Thats because a resume objectives main focus is you as opposed to a professional summary which focuses on solving the needs of the company.

Also, writing a summary objective can make you appear more inexperienced then you truly are.;

Instead, as someone with no work experience you can write a professional summary by including:;

• Your education level;
• Adjectives that emphasize your work ethic ;
• Relevant skills gained at school, volunteering or internships;;
• Professional hobbies .;

In addition, if you have volunteered or interned, know that regardless of whether they were paid or not they are still considered work experience. As the skills and knowledge gained as a volunteer or intern can be quite valuable to an employer.;

With that said, heres an example of a professional summary for someone with no work experience:

People United Foundation Fundraiser Volunteer;

Education Resume Summary Examples

• Self-motivated university graduate with a Bachelor of Arts in Secondary Education and critical experience in learning technology.
• Compassionate and organized Caregiver with 3+ years of experience in providing expert care to both English and Spanish-speaking children aged 0-5. Experienced in working with special needs children and maintaining their emotional comfort and safety.
• Imaginative, patient Special Education Teacher with 3+ years of experience focusing on meeting IEP goal requirements for students with special educational, behavioral and mental health needs.
• Dedicated Tutor with 3+ years of experience improving student grades by focusing on total comprehension with targeted lessons in a variety of subject areas. Quickly identifies individual student learning styles to tailor exercises to their needs.
• Motivated Teaching Assistant with 3+ years of experience promoting collaboration with the lead teacher to support student educational needs.
• Conscientious Counselor with 3+ years of experience staying attentive to the needs of children, students, and parents, while ensuring a welcoming, trusting environment. Enjoys creating customized plans and programs to spur educational and emotional growth.

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Show Your Willingness To Learn

Since you are new to the workforce, employers want to see that you are willing to learn. Make it clear that you want to develop your skills and gain new experiences. Even if you have little experience, showing that you are eager and motivated signals to employers that you will be easy to train on the job.

Professional Summary Resume Section

Whether you are a fresh graduate or an experienced professional, your summary will come after your header. It displays a brief and compelling account of your skill, accomplishments, and if necessary, a glimpse of your ambitions.

The summary section is one of the important resume sections since the recruiters initially address this. Therefore, it can help you stand out. Since this is in the format of a paragraph, it gives you space to best showcase your candidature.

It is extremely imperative to tailor your summary section to the specific job posting. Underscore your most compatible skills and core capabilities that correspond to the job requisites which you are applying for. Mention especially if:

You have managed a company’s budget in the past.You have compliance or liaised with internal/external stakeholders. You led a team.

Include relevant keywords in your summary from the job description. Consider the following ideal summary:

2+ years of experience BD professional with experience in dealing with firms in the UK & Europe. Skilled professional with hands-on experience in forging strategic alliances & increasing profitability. Proficient at closing B2B deals worth millions of dollars. Adept at forging partnerships to create strategic benefits. Looking forward to applying the acquired gamut of skills to a challenging role.

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Key Skills/technical Skills Resume Sections

Your Key Skills & Technical Skills section should ideally include computer skills, language skills, software skills along with soft skill sets. For example, if you are applying for the role of a Financial Associate you may want to include:

Financial Analysis Cash Flow Management Budgeting Working Capital Management Financial Reports Financial Data Monitoring

It is important to personalize the skills section according to the job description as much as possible. You can write both hard and soft skills while giving priority to the former. Use only those soft skills which you can find in the JD – there should be no other reason for adding soft skills in your standard resume.

Neatly dividing your entire list of key skills into relevant subsections is important. An example will better demonstrate what we mean. You’ll see a myriad of key skills grouped in the following example. To the recruiter, it hardly makes much sense.

The same set of skills grouped under a relevant heading makes them easier to quickly scan for relevance.

Without changing the volume of your standard resume skills, you optimize your standard resume sections for both the ATS and the recruiting manager.

Your technique for dividing your key skills into subsections may depend on the industry you are in and the norms which are conventionally followed. IT Professionals can usually classify their extensive range of key skills into various groupings like

Tools

Read Through The Job Description

When first getting started as a professional, one solid piece of advice to remember is that you should tailor your resume to the job youre applying to. Keep a master copy of your general resume and then make slight changes based on the role you want. When planning your summary, carefully read through the job description. Think about what would make you a good fit for this role.

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Your Resume Will Likely Have To Make It Through The Filters Of An Applicant Tracking System

If your information is not labeled correctly, the computer will simply be unable to read it.

Applicant tracking systems scan through your information using page markers like headers. If you have your resume headers correctly formatted and labeled, the ATS will have no problem parsing your information correctly and passing the relevant information on to the employer.

If your resume is not labeled correctly, the applicant tracking system will have a hard time finding where your relevant information is. It will present the employer with misinformation or irrelevant information–or just reject your resume altogether.

In short, don’t confuse the machine! A well-organized resume will make it easy for the computer to determine your objectives and, in turn, make it more likely that you will pass the ATS resume test and land the interview.

Your resume will be scanned by a hiring manager, and only for a few seconds.

Most hiring managers are tasked with going through dozens, sometimes hundreds, of resumes in a short period of time. Because of this high demand, most hiring managers spend an average of about six seconds scanning each resume. Of course, six seconds is not even close to enough time to actually read the whole resume. So, how can we guide the eyes of the employer to the information that we absolutely want them to see? Clear and concise resume heading of course!

In short, here is what Ladders found:

Example of common human resume scan process

How Long Should A Resume Summary Be

As you read the resume summaries above, you probably noticed there are some short single-paragraph resume summary examples and much longer career summaries that are two to three paragraphs plus bullet points.

So how long should YOUR professional summary be?

If you have relevant work experience, keep your summary to one or two paragraphs. The piece you really want the hiring manager reading is your most recent work experience .

The resume summary is just a bridge to get the hiring manager into your experience.

If I were writing my own career summary right now, Id likely use one single paragraph packed with skills, accomplishments, and exactly why Im ready to step into the job Ive applied for and be successful!

Even for a manager resume summary, I recommend a very short length.

However, if youre changing careers, or youre looking for jobs without any work experience, the summary section needs to stand on its own, and should be longer. Thats why some examples above are a bit longer.

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Q: What Is The Difference Between A Resume Objective And A Resume Summary

A: A resume objective statement is usually one or two lines long that talks about your goals. Here’s a really common example of a pretty generic resume objective:

Motivated, fast learner who recently graduated with a degree in ; looking for opportunities in the field that will allow me to leverage my skills.

When you first graduated from college or started looking for a job, chances are someone advised you to include an objective statement like this at the top of your resume. And chances are, you still use some version of this statement on your resume today.

However, this type of resume objective statement has quickly become an outdated custom that’s best forgotten for a few good reasons.

;A resume professional summary, on the other hand, focuses on highlighting your qualifications for the job you’re targeting.

A good resume professional summary will mention your level of experience, achievements/value, industry , and your current job goals. This section of your resume will set the tone and focus for the rest of the document, so give it some careful thought.

Project Management Executive Professional Summary Example:

15+ years of initiating and delivering sustained results and effective change for Fortune 500 firms across a wide range of industries including enterprise software, digital marketing, advertising technology, e-commerce and government. Major experience lies in strategizing and leading cross-functional teams to bring about fundamental change and improvement in strategy, process, and profitability both as a leader and expert consultant.

Why this resume summary is good:

Project Manager is one of those job titles thats REALLY broad. You can find project managers earning $50K, and others earning $250K. The client I wrote this for was at the Director level, and had worked for some of the biggest and best tech companies in her city. So this resume profile section shows her level and experience, and the wide array of areas she has responsibility for in her current work. You can borrow or use some of the phrasing here to show that youve been responsible for many important areas in your past work.

By: Biron Clark, Founder;of;CareerSidekick.com.

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Skip The I And Me Stuff

Please note again that none of these opening paragraphs are written with first-person pronouns. While you do write the paragraph in the present tense, you write it as if you are the understood subject of the resume. This allows the focus to remain on the employer.

Use of I, me, my places the focus on the applicant and the goal of the resume is to sell the employer on what you can do for THEM.

How Recruiters View Your Resume

Its not just about ATS. When a human recruiter gets ahold of your resume, you only have about 6 seconds to make an impression according to a study by The Ladders. Using eye-tracking technology, the study also found that recruiters home in on these sections first:

• Name
• Position start and end dates

No matter what sections you add to your resume, be sure that this core information is easily accessible and clearly labeled. Your resume should have a strong visual hierarchy that guides the reader through your resume.

Just as an overcomplicated and cluttered resume could get rejected or lost in an ATS, it will frustrate a recruiter and speak poorly of your organization and presentation skills. Thats a lose-lose.

Im looking at the logical flow of it, how you categorize the information, how does it read, a healthcare recruiter told Jobscan. The quality of presentation tells me something about you.

Be thoughtful about your resume sections and create a document that is fool- and bot-proof.

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Key Elements To Include In Your Resume Summary Statement

Before we get started with the different examples and samples of resume summary statements, hereâs a quick roundup of the key things you must include in your resume summary statement:

• Traits and skills: In short and crisp sentences, mention all the key skills that you possess that make you the perfect candidate for the job role.
• Work experience and roles handled: Especially if you have experience in the domain that youâre applying for, you need to mention your years of experience, as well as the different hats youâve worn during that time.
• Benefits you bring to the table: For this, youâll need to know a bit more about the company. So, do that research in advance. Then, compare the companyâs goals with yours and see how you can help mutual growth – that’ll be what youâre bringing to the table!
• Achievements and accomplishments: If youâre a fresher, mention your academic achievements or any complementary accomplishments in the relevant field. If youâre an experienced professional, talk about your professional milestones and achievements.
• Future goals in line with the domain: Take just one sentence to describe your goals and aspirations and how youâd want to benefit the domain.

Resume Summary Examples: Correct and Incorrect

Incorrect:

Why:

Itâs vague, generic, has no substantial information or numbers, lacks any insightful details about the candidate or what they can offer. It doesnât work!

Corrected: