Some Truths About What Makes Your CV or Resume Appealing

Having literally read and evaluated thousands of CVs and resumes in my career, and having just met with a former work colleague to help with hers, I wanted to take a few moments in this article to go over what makes for a good and bad resume (assume CV when I write resume).

Let me throw out some useful notes to get things rolling into a more productive article:

• Your desired salary has little to nothing to do with how well your resume is written and formatted (your experience and interview does)
• Your ability to get an interview has more to do with experience (that is often buried in the fluff of an over-produced resume)
• Your resume speaks directly for you, meaning I will know within moments in the interview screen on whether you wrote your own resume or paid someone to do it (not matching = no go)
• More bullets on a resume does not mean you did a lot of good work (it actually counts against your hiring desirability)
• Using statements like, 'Successfully delivered' or 'Personally lead (or managed)' that are meant to impress actually do the opposite

So to pull the wrapper off all of this resume and LinkedIn profile building used to get ahead or to be seen as a step above the rest of the competition, allow me to share what I like to see and why I like to see it...and you may be pleasantly surprised on how simple and affordable it really is to put together your experience to help with your next career role.

First I look for career trajectory. Where did you start, where are you in the now and how did you get there? What this means is to show your job titles, what you were involved in, what was your role and when did that shift or move into the next role (or desired role).

Although you may not have a lot of experience (maybe you do!), you did get experience and it is your experience that most interests me in terms of matching what you were doing somewhere else to what my organization is doing in the now. The key term is exposure - it does not have to be the role or the responsibility that matches! I am looking for similarities or something relatable in your work.

So how does that translate into a resume? Simple. Put down the industry, the company and the types of projects you were working on. Too many resumes are flooded with so much of what people personally accomplished they include nothing else that would help me understand the size of the project, the budget or the teams involved to get the bigger picture.

Second, I want to see where you are most comfortable. Again, if the resume is full of everything, from being in charge to rolling up the sleeves and getting into the minor details, it will be a struggle to understand what the candidate really wants and I do not want to spend interview time trying to figure it out. If other resumes are more clear and I have only a few interview slots to fill? I'll go with clarity every time.

My best advice is to decide what you prefer to be doing and sculpt your resume to highlight it. Basically if you want to be a manager, then show how you have been managing. If you want to get into the deep juicy bits of the details of whatever you enjoy doing, then highlight those strengths. Don't put them both down in the hopes that you get both or one. Likewise don't flood your resume with everything you ever did because you don't want to miss out on an opportunity.

As a hiring manager I prefer to see your strengths and work with you on how to match them to the opportunity. When I see resumes portraying a candidate as if he or she can run the whole company by day and then vacuum the floors at night? I get weary and look for someone else.

Third, those bullet points! Let me put it this way...if you cannot show what you've accomplished in 7 bullet points or less (less please!)? Then anything beyond 7 reads like the 'Wah Wah' teacher voice in the old Peanuts cartoons.

Let me put it to you this way, if your resume is a reflection on how you communicate and present yourself? If hired, will I (and everyone else) be reading 'War and Peace' for every email and status report? Will meetings go way too long and email threads spool endlessly because there's too much interaction to get clarity? A succinct set of bullet points that covers the important highlights is an excellent start to a productive interview where I can ask more questions if I need those details. Which goes to my last point...

...your resume is an invitation to an interview. Have a moment to think about that and take a look at your current resume.

Are you packing your resume with too much information, or just enough for a hiring manager to read it in 20 seconds to decide on a screening interview? Please take note of that 20 second rule. 30 seconds is pushing it. Beyond 40 seconds is a very high likelihood of not getting an interview. This does not just include length, but also the ease of reading and understanding.

20 seconds seems like this is too fast, but go ahead and read your resume and time it. Interestingly, 20 seconds is quite reasonable to make a decision to move forward. Someone may not get from top to bottom if you have a lot of experience, but if the experience stands out in ways for a human to scan it and see a potentially good match? Then the resume will get read more fully during the interview process. The key is keep it simple and easy to scan to understand if you qualify to continue forward with an interview screen.

One last note...do not get clever in formatting. When I have 12 resumes in front of me and suddenly I am looking at a resume where the experience is not where I was expecting it, forcing me find it? Not good.

Resumes are simple: Who are you? How do I contact you? What are you looking for? What qualifies you? And what experience and education/training can you share?

There is a saying in advertising that too many words risks confusing the potential customer. Apply this when writing your resume and see if you can convey as much about you in as little as it takes to get a hiring manager (your customer) to say, "Yes! I would like to speak with you!"

Good luck!

#AcceleratingYourCareer2020