Alliance Resources

Your resume is a marketing tool to help you showcase your personal brand. A well-written resume is more than just bullet points and analytics. It tells a story – illustrating your technical expertise, leadership skills, and career trajectory to help you capture the interest of a hiring manager so you can land a first interview.

It is not enough to simply list a few accomplishments and a KPI or two. You need the right structure, good formatting, and authentic, concrete examples to catch the reviewer’s attention, and do it quickly. A study done in 2018 recorded the average initial screening time that reviewers take to look at a candidate’s resume is just 7.4 seconds. That’s not very long to attract a hiring manager’s notice and make them take a second look.

Today, some managers are attempting to expedite or automate this already rapid-fire review with an even quicker initial screening as a variety of factors, including the advent of job board tools like LinkedIn’s Easy Apply, has caused the number of applications per role to rise an astonishing 45% over just the last year.

So, what is a jobseeker to do? In a competitive job market, this had led some applicants to use their own AI tools to rewrite their resumes wholesale or stuff them with keywords from job descriptions in the hopes of outsmarting employers’ AI and increasing their odds. However, using the same tools as everyone else creates a resume that looks just like everyone else’s, which won’t help you to stand out. Instead, create a resume that truly makes an impact. Write it yourself, including just the right information to help hiring managers and recruiters quickly see the value you’d bring to the role.

Here are some tips to create a resume that will attract attention:    

• Contact information. Maximize your chances of an employer reaching out by always including your full name, email address, and personal phone number at the top of the page. You do not need to list your complete address. However, many applicants include a city and state to show they are local, particularly if being on site is a requirement.
• Brief description. Immediately below your name, include a few keywords describing your role or title and a few quick highlights to direct the reviewer’s attention: “Senior HR Executive | Benefits Management | Leadership Coaching.”
• Professional summary. Next, add a short paragraph summarizing your key achievements and experience. “Dynamic human resources leader and strategist  with more than 20 years’ experience in….Known for…  Proven experience in…”  
• Core competencies and skills. In this section, share your key competencies and skills in short bullets of no more than a few words each. It’s ok to list the bullets in columns to save space. Focus on the items most relevant to the specific role for which you are applying. For instance, a finance role might include specific software or financial modeling tools where you have proficiency. You might also include relevant expertise you possess, like the ability to lead teams, conduct financial analysis, develop budgets, or create forecasts.
• Professional experience. For every role you have held, list your title, company name, location, and your dates of employment. Underneath, share ruthlessly-edited bullets highlighting your real accomplishments and KPIs that align well with the job description for the role for which you are applying. Emphasize your most recent experience, and keep older positions and achievements brief without omitting them. Experienced jobseekers may choose to put their earliest roles into a separate section called “early career” to save space listing just company names and titles.
• Education. If you are a professional with more than a year of experience in the field, list your education after experience. For each degree, include the school’s name, the degree earned, major, and year of graduation. If you graduated cum laude or with other honors, highlight that. If you haven’t completed a program, it’s important to clearly state that your studies are still in progress. Most employers run background checks that include education verification, and failing to disclose up front that you haven’t completed a program can cause issues down the line.
• Certifications. If you have certifications or licenses like a CPA, CMA, or CFA, that are valued for your role, be sure to list them in a separate section to showcase these credentials to employers.
• Other categories.If relevant, memberships in professional associations or industry groups, awards, professional development classes, and volunteer experience can also help to demonstrate your professionalism and character to employers. Create section headers appropriate to your experience and list disparate items in their own categories.
• LinkedIn. If you have an active link to your LinkedIn profile, it is good to include it on your resume. Just make sure your content is consistent in both places. (To maximize your chances, check that your LinkedIn “About” section, “Headline,” “Work Experience,” photo, and education are also up to date.)
• Avoid headshots and fluff. While photos are great on LinkedIn, they don’t belong on your resume. Also avoid clichés, or “References available upon request.”

Here are some tips to help you format your resume for maximum impact:   

• Limit your words to highlight what matters. Hiring managers have a fixed amount of time to review each resume– make it easy for them to quickly see the value you bring by paring text down to the most relevant information. For best results, keep your resume to 1-3 pages with normal margins and a font size no smaller than 10.5. More white space makes for easier reading.
• Keep your font simple. Choose a classic font like Calibri, Arial, or Times New Roman. Use black text for bullets, then highlight titles and other essential information in bold or a neutral blue. Avoid bright colors and keep your formatting consistent throughout the document to give it a professional look that recruiters will appreciate.
• Use bullets. Bullet points are an effective way of organizing lists of skills, achievements, and other information. Just be sure to check that your alignment, capitalization, and formatting are consistent across all items in a given list.
• Use columns with caution. As previously mentioned, it is appropriate to use columns to format a short list of key competencies or skills. However, it is generally better not to use vertical columns that span an entire page as that can cause issues for resume screening tools.
• Put important information up top. Eye-tracking studies have shown that most recruiters and hiring managers read resumes in an “F” pattern – first scanning the top horizontal line from left to right to see your name, contact information, and professional summary. Then, they move down to a second scan to look at your job title, and company names. Then, finally they finish with a look at bullet points, dates, and section headers. Optimize your resume for this by putting important information up top in a brief summary and in the first bullet of each section.
• Word choice matters. Use a diverse mix of adjectives and verbs to describe your work history and professional background, customizing your experience and avoiding repetitive first-word verbs in bullet points.
• Be careful with jargon. Use shorthand and abbreviations, such as QoQ (quarter over quarter), only if you are 100% sure the resume reviewer will understand exactly what you mean.
• Follow the X by Y by Z Formula. Articulate your experience in bullets in a specific way to have the greatest effect: “Accomplished [X] as measured by [Y], by doing [Z].” Put simply, this advice from Laszlo Bock (former Senior Vice President of People Operations at Google) means highlighting accomplishments – showing the impact you made and the measurable results you drove. For example, if you were applying for a job as an accounting manager and wanted to write a resume bullet describing a way that you improved department performance, here are three ways you could present it on your resume – the “OK way,” the “better way,” and the “best way”:

• • OK: Reduced the monthly financial close time.
  • Better: Reduced monthly financial close time by three business days.
  • Best: Reduced the monthly financial close time by three business days by creating close checklists and distributing reconciliation work more efficiently.

• Share your personality… professionally. Allow some of your personality to shine through as you draft your resume to ensure future employers see your unique value. Including interests or volunteer experience can be a wonderful way to do this. Just ensure they align with the professional brand you are looking to show.
• Customize content. Every time you apply for a position, tailor your resume for that specific role. While including keywords is important, so recruiters and AI resume screeners can quickly see the alignment between your skills and the job requirements, avoid having an AI tool rewrite your experience to try to align it with the job description. In addition to sounding generic, this type of electronic keyword stuffing can create phantom accomplishments that leave you looking untrustworthy if you are asked about them during the interview. Instead, draft the bullets yourself to make sure that the content reflects your actual experiences without inflating them. Highlight areas of expertise that uniquely align with the potential employer and job description.
• Check twice… then check again. Use correct spelling and grammar to show reviewers that you value attention to detail and demonstrate care in your deliverables. Avoid errors by first using a spelling and grammar checker. Then, have at least two different people review your resume before finalizing it.

Updating or creating a resume can feel daunting, but following these tips can help fast-track your path to an interview.

And remember, if you’re looking for a new opportunity, Alliance Resource Group can help!  Alliance’s experienced recruiters have access to roles at phenomenal organizations, and we assist candidates by speaking directly to your experience and expertise. Reach out to an Alliance recruiter today.