7 Tips for Improving Your Resume

One consequence of this long recession is the struggle individuals are faced with when dealing with the question, How should I present my experience when there are:

• gaps in employment periods
• unpaid jobs
• positions requiring a lot of experience alongside those requiring minimal skills
• jobs held that are unrelated to each other and perhaps seemingly unrelated to the current opening.

Although recruiters and hiring managers are most comfortable reviewing the traditional, chronological format, perhaps you’ll need to be creative in telling your story, and go beyond the traditional style. Please note: I’m using the word creative not in the sense of telling white lies, but in designing professional categories and information in a way that helps the reader understand what you’ve been doing, as well as how your skills are just what they are looking for.

Resumes are all about telling the story of your educational and work life experiences. In addition to what you already know about traditional resumes, consider these 7 tips:

1. Opening - There continues to be a lot of controversy about whether to use an objective statement or not. Here’s why I come down on the side of "Yes, it’s critical."

You want to be able to help the reader understand where you are trying to take them with your story. The objective statement, Headliner, opening - whatever you want to call it - sets the tone for the reader to understand why you are presenting your resume.

You can take a technical approach to noting the position you are qualified for, i.e., Human Resource Manager with Organization Development experience, or you can be more personal in your opening, i.e., Senior level Human Resources professional who values strategic alignment, collaboration and technology integration.

2. Clustering – Tom Washington and Gary Kanter wrote a book that explores the concept of resume clustering. The idea is to bring together and showcase the past experiences you have to offer in the most favorable light. This can be highly effective in those situations where you’ve have period of unemployment or temporary assignments with a variety of companies.

A cluster for example could bring together the Contract or Temporary Jobs you’ve been doing. Or if you’ve been volunteering in a line of work you did professionally, you could cluster in a way to explain your Sales Management and Temporary and Contract Sales Engagements.

3. Length of Experience – Although there is no need to indicate months on a resume, a lot of resumes still reference month and year of employment. As a result of the increase in business closures, layoffs, and temporary assignments, it is much wiser for candidates with these types of situations to focus on only indicating the year in which the work was done, trying to avoid highlighting any gaps between jobs.

4. Broaden the Experience Category – Don’t overlook taking credit for the "non-employment" or "volunteer" work you may be focusing on while you’re waiting for the market to bounce back. If you’re in a program at school, call that out in your experience area, providing an overview of the program and how it is enhancing the skills you have to offer.

If you’ve been freelancing, or running your own business, put that in the experiencecategory and provide a brief position description of the tasks and functions you’ve been managing and the results you’ve achieved.

Often candidates overlook mentioning the volunteer work they are doing, experience which often matches the skill sets needed for a paying job. Make sure these types of opportunities are also listed as most current, so the reader of your resume recognizes what you’ve been doing lately.

5. New Categories – Resume writing is challenging, I know. But try not to get hung up with the notion that you can only use the categories you see utilized in examples found in books and on the internet. If you have a unique situation, a major project you want to highlight or an achievement you think lends strength to positioning you for the job opening, create a new heading such as Key Project or Distinguished Achievement to call attention to it.

6. Update – Make sure that every resume you are sending out is up-to-date and reflects the activities, workshops, classes, part-time jobs, volunteer work, etc. you’ve been doing since the last time you submitted a resume.

It’s easy to fall behind and forget what you’ve accomplished. Make it a good habit to review your resume every few weeks and update it with the latest information. Keeping track this way will help you avoid having to explain gaps in the future.

7. Second Set of Eyes – We’ve all been there. We’ve written something and think it’s clear, concise and has no grammatical or spelling errors and then… we pick it up after we’ve sent it out and right there in the first line is a misspelled word. Horrors!

Avoid this problem by asking a friend to proofread your resume every time you make a change. Remember, your brain knows what it meant to say, so your eyes may play along – totally missing a sentence that doesn’t make sense or reflects poor grammar.

Resumes should always be looked at as a work-in-progress. They’re never finished. Keep yours up-to-date and highlight what you have to offer in the best light. And, in the meantime, keep challenging yourself to stay busy, productive and upbeat.

If you need additional resources, check out prior Career GPS articles, review my website, www.evolutionmgt.com, consider ordering a copy of my book Position Your Next Move for a Successful Job Search, and evaluate if our personalized career coaching would be of assistance to you.

Job Seeker Questions and Answers

I’ve always heard that being a member of a professional association aligned with the type of job you are seeking is an important job strategy. Well, I’ve joined two groups this year and nothing! No leads, no job! What am I doing wrong?
- Izabella

Check out Dear Job Seeker for my answer to Izabella's question.


　

This article was written by Deborah A. King, SPHR, CEO and Sr. Organizational Effectiveness Consultant with Evolution Management, Inc. Debbie and her team provide customized career transition coaching, including the development of resumes that get action. Contact EMI for more information about how we can assist with your career transition and outplacement needs: www.evolutionmgt.com, 770.587.9032.