Our 5-Minute Resume-Writing Guide

The following resume guide is supposed to take just five minutes to read, but that’s way, way longer than the average time a hiring manager spends looking at your resume.

With so little time spent looking at your resume, it’s important that you nail down the basics. Screwing up something like your contact information or professional achievements is a great way to send your document straight to the recycling bin.

We’ve only got about 4 minutes and 45 seconds left, so let’s get to that guide!

Contact information

This may seem like a no-brainer, but applicants occasionally don’t include basic contact information like their email address, or they don’t put it at the top of the page, or they use an old, out-of-date address that get flooded with spam.

Be sure to include your name, phone number, professional email, and LinkedIn URL at the top of your resume. Don’t bother including your address in 2017.

Make it as easy as possible for a hiring manager to contact you: Include just one phone number and email address.

Professional title

A title, such as “Line Leader”, listed just under your contact information lets your reader know who you are in the professional sense. A title also serves to connect a job listing to your application. For example, is a company is looking for a welder, having “Certified Mig Welder” as a title lets your reader know you are at least in the right place.

Keywords

Every job posting includes a number of keywords that should be very familiar to the qualified professionals they are targeting. You resume ought to reflect back these keywords and phrases as a way of showing you know the concepts and the lingo.

Also, many companies use resume-scanning software and if you don’t have a certain amount of keywords in your resume, the system will essentially disqualify you from moving on in the process.

Key numbers

It isn’t enough to just mention your responsibilities at your current or previous jobs. You also must lay out what you have achieved in the course of handling those responsibilities. For instance, if you were responsible for handling a company’s Facebook page, be sure to mention how many followers you were able to gain through your posts and interactions.

Also, if you developed new processes, helped open up new revenue streams or made improvements around the company, be sure to quantify how your changes translated into additional productivity, asset or money.

Certifications

Be sure that any certification you earned pop out when reading your resume. There are many fields when certain credentials vital to employment and you should make sure that you let your readers know you have any necessary certifications.

At Career Concepts, we help job seekers with everything from resume writing to interview follow-up. Contact us today for more info on how to take the next step on your career path.