DEVELOPING YOUR RESUME

A resume is an organized written presentation of work experience, skills and abilities targeted at a specific job and/or industry objective.?It’s a marketing document and a sales brochure. You are marketing yourself to potential employers, so make it look good. What a resume is not is an autobiography or a laundry list of jobs you have held in the past.

With this in mind and coupled with the short attention span of all of us, your resume must impress the reader quickly. You have about 5 seconds. Think about the person who is reviewing resumes for job openings. They are often responsible for 10 to 15 jobs and may get 25 to 100 resumes for each job opening. This equates to about 400 resumes they have to review. If your resume is sloppy or your information is buried below the top half of the first page, it will get lost.

It is important to understand that a resume is a screening out device and not a screening in device. Your resume will go into one of three files – the NO file, the MAYBE file or the YES file. Your objective is to get into the YES file. Therefore, your resume must be easy to read and grab the reader’s attention quickly and

Contact information – I can’t tell you how many times I have received a resume without contact information. Be sure to list your name, telephone number and e-mail address on the top of the page. Listing your address lets the reader know if you are local or live a long distance away from the worksite. With all of the remote jobs available now, this may be a moot point, but eventually your employer will have to know where you live. Your name should be in bold with a larger font size to bring a little more attention to you.

Summary of Qualifications - Make a list of your primary qualifications right below your contact information. This section should be a few lines. If you want to be more specific, list your expertise as well.

My summary of qualifications is Strong, diversified experience in all aspects of human resource management in all types of industries. Successful record of accomplishment in linking compensation practices, performance management techniques and training into the framework of organizational goals. Possess excellent managerial, communications, interpersonal, consulting and project management skills.

?Areas of expertise include employee relations, recruitment, training and development, performance management, equal employment opportunity, Affirmative Action Plans, organizational development, compensation, benefits administration, policy and procedures.

This is actually pretty long, but after 44 years o experience, it gets harder to summarize. In here you can list the type of programs you worked with or other skills you possess.

?Significant Accomplishments – A few bullet points about the good things you have done in your career will give the reader an idea of how you are better than the others who are applying for the job. These should be quantifiable and state results. Think in terms of quality, quantity, timeliness and costs. Examples could include:

• Redesigned the workflow resulting in 15% reduction in time to manufacture widgets and a 25% reduction in overtime costs.?
• ?Researched software packages to run in-house payroll.?Negotiated purchase price, trained payroll clerk on use of software saving the company $50,000 in the first year of operation.
• ?Redesigned work assignments in the application processing department eliminating the need to hire an additional person saving over $30,000.

?All of the above should be in the top half of the first page to pass the 5 second test so the recruiter will look at the rest of your resume.

?Job History – the next thing is to list your jobs starting with your current or most recent job with the name of the employer, a brief description of the type of business, the starting and ending date and job title.

Professional Experience - 2002 to present - McKenzieHR, a full-service human resources consulting firm - Title: President

Education: List the highest level of education you obtained.

Education: Rider University, Lawrenceville, NJ. - Bachelor of Science Degree - doube majored in Industrial Relations and Organizational Behavior. ?????????????????????????????

Saving Your Resume to Your Computer – one of my biggest peeves is receiving a resume with saved as “Resume” I usually get five or six of these every time I advertise. This means that I have to open the resume and save it with a different name. Even worse is when I get two attachments – one named “Cover Letter” and one named “Resume”.?This means I have to open two documents and save them each as a different file.?If you want to include a cover letter add it to your resume file as the first page. I see these people as selfish as they are not thinking of the reader and only about how the resume is saved on their computer.?

Save your resume with your name or initials up front and the word resume in the file name.?The idea is to make it very easy for the recruiter to hire you.

?Other points:

• The length of the resume should not exceed two pages.
• Make your own letterhead with all of your personal contact information.
• If you want to use a job objective instead of a summary of qualifications, only include the type or types of jobs you are seeking
• Highlight strengths, qualifications and accomplishments.
• Use up-to-date terminology.
• Concentrate on last ten years of experience.
• Use short sentences or bullet points – no long paragraphs.
• Use strong action words to enhance accuracy and variety.
• Use your own words – it is your resume.?Do not try to impress the reader with your vocabulary. It’s OK to use a thesaurus, just make sure your words make sense.
• Use lots of white space – it makes your resume easier to read

Most of all – TELL THE TRUTH.

Thanks for reading. Next week – Networking.?