Resume Building Tips

The development of a powerful, eye-catching Resume is one of the most critical steps in MY Future Consulting Firms 5-Step Process for securing your Dream Job. Recognizing the significance of this critical step, MY Future Consulting has outlined 10 key points job seekers should be cognizant of as they prepare their resume.

  1. Professionally Attractive – Recruiters, Hiring managers review hundreds of resumes each day. Step one of the weeding out process – Attractiveness of Resume. If it has a professional, conservative, yet creative look…it generally passes the test. If the resume lacks professional flare, credentials are often times overlooked.
  2. Use of Action Words – As you summarize your experiences, skills and accomplishments, it’s imperative that you’re very descriptive and look for opportunities to insert action verbs in your summaries. “I reduced costs by…” “I lead several process improvement teams…” “I increased sales by 60%…”
  3. Identify someone to review your resume – You’ll be amazed at the hidden opportunities that exist on your resume when reviewed by a 3rd party. Questions generally lead to creativity and clarity.
  4. Skills + Experience = Company Benefits – Very important that you highlight your skills and accomplishments, however it’s more important that you translate how your previous successes can benefit your potential employer.
  5. Gather critical information prior to writing resume – Make note of your experiences, education and accomplishments
  6. Use of Bullets – Brief Summary followed by accomplishments presented in bullet form. Brevity is important. Recruiters, Employers have very little time and patience. Four (4) page resumes are really not impressive to the employer.
  7. Utilize Bullets – Managers prefer brief, bulleted summaries versus lengthy paragraphs. This enables decision makers to scan the resume quickly. Huge time saver.
  8. Contact Information – Very, very important. Over half of resumes submitted only have home telephone numbers listed. And how often are you at home? My point exactly. Job seekers are strongly encouraged to provide e-mail addresses, mobile phone number and mailing address.
  9. Section that highlights significant accomplishments – This is your opportunity to communicate successes, both professional and personal. Identify a 2-3 Professional accomplishments and 2-3 personal accomplishments (Philanthropic, Volunteerism, Sports etc.) The latter speaks to your character which is very important to potential employer.
  10. Do not provide employment or education dates – Communicating significant dates can expose your age and position you as victim of age discrimination. The fact that you graduated or succeeded in your business is more important than the date of accomplishment.