Saad's Resume Guide

You have one goal with your Resume:

To secure interviews for your target opportunities

Your resume is a key, and each job opportunity is a lock. If you craft your resume according to this guide, you will have the right tool to unlock interviews for positions tailored to you.

The best resumes are clear, concise, and tailored to the job posting. First, clearly state why you are the right person for the opportunity. Next, concisely explain the skills you've developed and how you attained them. Finally, tailor your resume to the criteria in the job posting and demonstrate that you can achieve outstanding results.

The Modern Job Search

The modern job search process is different than it used to be. Good news! You now have access to thousands of job postings at your fingertips. Because of job boards like LinkedIn, it is easier than ever to apply to any job you want. Bad news, this means recruiters are going through 100+ applicants per job posting and the vast majority are nowhere near the right candidate.

Because of applicant overload, recruiters will fly through your resume faster than we scroll through posts on social media. Low-quality content limits how much we care, whether it’s a TikTok or a resume. Great news, you have the solution! With your new resume, it will be clear that you are a high-quality candidate that should be moved forward to the interview stage.

First things first;

No, a robot or applicant tracking system (ATS) is not auto-rejecting your resume. A real person is.

Yes, that person is rejecting resumes after reviewing them for an average of 7 seconds. Sometimes less.

Now, lets build your perfect resume:

1) Personal Statement

Recruiters have one question when reviewing your resume: are you a fit for the role? This goes beyond just looking at your past experiences; it includes where you want to go next and why. Recruiters need to assess this fit to find the ideal candidate who will be satisfied with the position, thrive in the role, and grow at the company.

Sounds like the right opportunity for a cover letter to shine, doesn't it? Except that the cover letter is dead. It was crushed under the weight of 100+ applications per job posting. While many job postings will ask for a cover letter, most recruiters only read them in special circumstances.

This is where a short, sweet, Personal Statement steps in to elevate your resume. The Personal Statement clearly states why you are the right person for the opportunity. It will go at the top of your resume, after your name. The Personal Statement has the following key components:

1)?Who I am – profession, industries, functions, and years of experience

2)?What do I want – the specific type of roles I am now targeting

3) What do I bring – The special skills and expertise I bring above other candidates

4)?What motivates me – The type of work that motivates me and the environments I thrive in

5)?Future goals – where I want to take my career in the future and how this role fits my career plan

The Personal Statement should be succinct, ideally within four sentences.

Here is a sample Personal Statement from the perspective of a Mechanical Engineer looking to shift from working on normal vehicles to autonomous vehicles:

As a Mechanical Engineer with 10+ years of experience in the automotive industry, I am now seeking roles in the development of autonomous vehicles. I bring advanced skills in vehicle dynamics and systems integration, in addition to a strong foundation in computer vision. I am motivated by working on innovative technologies in collaborative, fast-paced environments. My future goal is to become a Principal Engineer and lead projects to redefine urban transportation, making it safer and more efficient.

With a Personal Statement, you are clearly communicating what type of role is the right fit for you. With only your resume, the recruiter may not see the connection between your background and the job opportunity in question. With a Personal Statement you are confidently saying “Yes, this specific job is the right one for me”. The message recruiters receive most often is, “Eh, this is one of 100+ job postings I blindly sent my resume to”, so a strong Personal Statement lets you stand out.

Craft your own Personal Statement by using the same steps provided above. Revise it several times by critically assessing if it presents you in the best light possible while being honest about your qualifications. Use tools like ChatGPT and get friends and family to read it and provide feedback. How do you know you have a strong Personal Statement? It is as short as possible while being clear to anyone about the type of role you would thrive in.

2) Developing Your Story

You've successfully made a strong first impression with your Personal Statement to capture the attention of the recruiter. Now, you need to start building the story of how your experiences have led you to this opportunity.

To write an effective resume, it needs to match the job posting. Don’t make a custom resume for each job you're applying to, but you should have one resume that is designed for a specific type of role. To get started on building your resume points, find 5 job postings that represent your target role. These aren't just any jobs you're interested in; they should represent your ideal job and they should all be fairly similar. Once you have the job postings, make a table with 3 columns. The first column is Responsibility or Qualification, the second is Frequency, and the third is My Experience. It should look something like this:

The goal is to identify the responsibilities and qualifications most commonly sought after by employers for your target role. Then reflect on how you've developed the related skills through your previous jobs, courses, extracurriculars, volunteering, or other experiences.

?A Responsibility is a job duty that you will perform. A Qualification is usually a Yes or No question, like “Do you have 10 years of work experience”, or “Do you have this specific professional certification”. You need to prove why you can handle a Responsibility by providing detail, while you only need to confirm that you’ve earned a Qualification.

This table is a brainstorming tool, not your final bullet points for your resume. Try the following format when filling out the "My Experience" section:

"I developed skill when I was in role where I did experience"

Then, add details on the situation, people involved, challenges faced, and results achieved. You may have more than one story to show how you developed the required skills; write them out to get all your ideas on paper.

Pay special attention to the responsibilities and qualifications that appear most frequently. Additionally, write down any that you know are important for your target role even if they don't appear directly in the job postings. You'll have successfully written your story when you have points that address all of the most common requirements between the job postings.

3) Resume Bullet Points

Time for the bulk of your resume; bullet points. You will write out excellent bullet points that convince the recruiter to give you an interview by leveraging the stories from the previous step.

When writing your bullet points, keep these two key guidelines in mind:

1) Focus on transferable skills – ensure they are relevant to the job you are applying for

2) Prioritize the recruiter’s perspective – ensure your content matters to them and meets their needs

Every single point on your resume should be written to increasingly convince the recruiter to give you an interview. If you have content on your resume that does not contribute to this goal, it is taking away from the rest of your resume. Each point should have a purpose; your goal is to make it as easy as possible for the recruiter to give you an interview.

As a general guideline, keep each of your experiences within 3-6 bullet points. Keep each bullet point to 2 lines, occasionally a maximum of 3. Similar to the Personal Statement, your points should be as short as possible while being clear to anyone why it proves your competence for the role.

To write effective bullet points, it is helpful to leverage a structured resume writing framework. Below are two frameworks you can use to form convincing statements.

STAR Statements

STAR is an acronym composed of 4 parts:

Skill – Define your specific skill that qualifies you for the role. The skill should be transferrable from your previous experience and relevant to the job you are applying for.

Task – Describe the challenge or scenario in which you developed the skill. This provides context for the recruiter to understand where you applied the skill, even if they were previously unfamiliar with the job.

Action – Describe what you did and how you did it. This proves you did something of value and shows how you developed through the experience. It should give the reader an appreciation for your work.

Result – Explain the impact your actions had and quantify the results using numbers, where appropriate. Your achievements will impress the recruiter and clarify how you can add value to the organization.

Here are some sample STAR statements:

• Applied social media content creation skills to boost online engagement by running targeted ad campaigns, increasing social media following by 40% and engagement by 50% within six months.
• Leveraged financial modelling acumen to enhance forecast accuracy, reducing forecast variability by 25% vs. the prior model and allowing for more accurate inventory management.
• Developed effective sales strategies to increase regional sales by leading team training to apply new sales tactics, boosting regional sales by 30% and improving team closing rate by 25%.

WHO Statements

WHO is an acronym composed of 3 parts:

What – What is the duty, challenge, or accomplishment you completed?

How – How did you achieve success? What tools, methods, knowledge, or skills did you leverage?

Outcome – What were the outcomes of your actions? How did your efforts benefit the organization?

Here are some sample WHO Statements

? Led the truck suspension redesign project using computer-aided engineering tools and simulations to improve handling by 30% and increase overall ride comfort by 20%.

? Coordinated team projects using Agile methodologies to complete the mobile app development contract 20% ahead of schedule with 30% fewer bugs identified during Quality Assurance.

? Enhanced predictive modelling for retail supply chain by applying ML algorithms and data visualizations to increase model accuracy by 25% and deliver actionable reports to leadership.

With the STAR and WHO frameworks in mind, start writing bullet points to address the responsibilities and qualifications identified previously. Use the stories from the previous step as the source for your statements. Critically review your writing, use tools like ChatGPT, and get feedback from friends and family. Your statements are ready when you have a concise statement that makes it clear your experience qualifies you for the job opportunity.

4) Resume Formatting

Here are my guidelines for formatting your resume:

You might be wondering, what about courses, projects, hobbies, and other sections? Just like the rest of your resume, only include what is relevant to the role. Remember the 7-second scan; use your judgement to decide what matters.

Resume Length

For the majority of professionals, resumes should be kept to one or two pages in length. Challenge yourself to make a one-page resume as an exercise; this will force you to cut the chaff and write concisely. Then, you can decide if you want a one- or two-page resume. I recommend a one-page resume unless you are missing critical information for the job you are applying to. If you haven’t won an interview with the first page, its unlikely that the second page will help.

Bolding

Bolding is a powerful tool in resume writing that helps maintain the readers attention. Limit your bolding to only 1-2 parts of each statement, highlighting the most valuable words.

Honesty

It can be very tempting to exaggerate your accomplishments and make up outcomes on your resume. Keep yourself honest. If you aren’t qualified for a job, it will come out in the interview process or shortly after you start; don’t waste anyone’s time by faking it.

Conclusion

In a world where there are 100+ applicants for one job posting, it is easy to feel lost in the job search process. By following this guide, you’ll have a resume that cuts throw the crowd and makes you stand out as the right person for the job.

Sample Resume

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