Gloucestercitynews.net (February 1, 2020)–Let’s say you found a job posting where you believe your skills will fit like a glove. You applied to it by sending a resume and not only did you not get the job, but you also didn’t even get called in for an interview.
What do you think might have gone wrong?
image unsplash.com
It is safe to assume at this point that the fault lies within your resume.
Without a perfect resume, a recruiter will never even know what they missed. Being the first point of contact, your resume needs to be flawless. It is through this piece of document that you are going to dazzle the recruiter and score a place in the shortlist.
These are the 5 resume tips that will wow any recruiter in 2020:
1.
Structure your resume in neat sections
Structuring your resume not only makes it look appealing, but it also breaks down the information in brief relevant sections. This helps the recruiter take in one piece of information at a time and thus makes it easy to read and comprehend.
The presentation of information on a resume is more important than the information itself. Wrongly presented, it will have no impact on the recruiter and thus has no relevance. So, be incredibly careful about what you put in your resume and how you display it.
The first thing you need to do is decide what sections will go on your resume.
Compose the following sections in the order given below to cover every information a recruiter needs to know about you:
Header
Personal Information
Profile Title
Summary
Key Skills
Professional Experience
Education
You can also add additional sections like ‘Certifications’ or ‘Additional information’ if you have data that can be filed under these. Add these sections only if they are relevant to the role you are applying for and you are positive that adding this information will favor your chances at a shortlist.
2. Make your resume easy to read
Most resumes that get tossed are due to their length or bulkiness.
These
statistics
by CareerBuilder show that 66% of employers said a resume should be one page long for new college graduates and 77% agreed that it should be at least two pages long for seasoned workers.
So, do yourself a favor and optimize the length of your resume. Discard all the fluff and only keep the essential information that a recruiter needs to know on your resume.
This eye-tracking
study
suggests that recruiters spend an average of 7 seconds on a single resume, that is not enough time for them to go through everything in detail. This means recruiters are only focusing on a few key points before making their decision about a candidate.
A cluttered resume might turn their interest off immediately as they won’t have any idea where to start looking for the required information.
To ensure that your resume gets read at least once, use one-liner bullet points instead of paragraphs to describe your past roles & responsibilities in the ‘Professional Experience’ section.
Further, categorize points under relevant subheadings and highlight the important information to draw the attention of recruiters towards it.
3.Write effective professional experience statements
However high your qualifications may be, they won’t score you a job if you haven’t presented them effectively on your resume.
Following are a few actions that you can take to make your resume more effective:
Bring the STAR method into action as it brings a cause-effect relationship in your statements. STAR stands for:
S stands for the ‘situation’ that demanded your contributions.
T stands for the ‘task’ you performed.
A stands for the ‘actions’ you took to perform the assigned task.
R stands for the ‘result’ in the form of an achievement figure.
An example of using this method can be seen in this one-liner point: “Delivered
10+ articles
weekly which increased the web site’s
traffic by 20%
”
Include as many achievement figures as you can while keeping them relevant: These numbers will help you back up your claims and make you look like a competent and useful asset. Performance figures prove that your contributions were helpful for the company.
For instance in the example, “Delivered
10+ articles
weekly which increased the web site’s
traffic by 20%
” the number of articles and the web site’s traffic is achievement figures.
Use
action verbs
to begin each one-liner point as it gives a tone of assertiveness to your resume. Words like ‘Managed’, ‘Spearheaded’ can give your resume a wow factor.
4.Keep your resume relevant to the job you are applying for
An irrelevant resume is not going to help you get any interviews. For instance, it makes no sense to mention your first job as a busboy or the many internships you did if you have been in the workforce for over 10 years.
Volunteering experience, internships, and similar information are required by inexperienced professionals or students, not someone who has already made their mark in the professional world.
These tips will help you keep your resume relevant:
If you have changed industries and your old job doesn’t fit anywhere near the new profile you are targeting, leave it off your resume.
People with more than 3 years of experience do not need to mention internships or volunteering experiences.
Use keywords as it helps you get past the Applicant Tracking System (ATS). Recruiters set the ATS to explicitly look for keywords in resumes before shortlisting them. You can find these keywords in the job description of your target job. Select the keywords that apply to you and customize your resume accordingly.4
Never forget to mention your contact details
4.Keep your resume relevant to the job you are applying for
Even if your resume got shortlisted, a recruiter will never be able to contact you to further your prospects if they do not have any means of contacting you.
So before you submit your resume, make sure that you have correctly input all the necessary contact details in your resume which include:
Contact Number
Email Address
Current Location
Conclusion
Looking back, these are the 5 resume tips to wow recruiters in 2020:
Structure your resume by filing information under relevant sections.
Enhance the readability of your resume by cutting out any clutter and highlighting important information.
Make your resume effective by using the STAR format, using action verbs, and including performance figures.
Increase the relevancy of your resume by only including relevant information and using keywords.
Provide the correct contact details to enable a prospective employer to easily touch base with you.
Author’s Bio:
Aditya Sharma
On a quest to help professionals across the world land their dream jobs, Aditya lives and breathes
Hiration where he’s a Co-Founder and the unofficial CPO (Chief Problem-solving Officer) of the AI-powered
online resume builder
and platform to help job-seekers find their way in the treacherous job market.