Writing an Effective Resume

Dean Victor C. Manabat

School of Business Information

Saint Michael’s College of Laguna
City of Binan
 Road Map
 Role of the Resume
 Types of Resumes
 Resume Formats
 Resume Sections
 Additional Documentation
 Miscellaneous Tips
 Miscellaneous Tilts
 Sample Resumes
 On-line Resources
 What is a Resume?

 A marketing tool
 Your first tool for building a career
 The first impression a prospective employer has of you
 A selling tool that allows you to highlight to an employer how you
can contribute to the company
 Request for an interview
 Purpose of the resume is to get you an interview
 Must capture the reader’s interest and attention
 Must convince the employer that you have the ability to fill their
position
 Your “big picture”
 A snapshot of what you believe are your most important
experiences and qualifications
 Types of Resumes
 A Paper/PDF Resume
 A printed resume for use at job fairs, conferences, …
 Should be clean, concise, professional, and pleasing to the eye
 Use bullets, bolding, and indentation
 Take this resume with you on job interviews, career breakfasts, …
 An Electronic Resume
 A plain text resume for on-line submission
 Typically must conform to employer specifications
 Use left-justified and space indented formatting
 If desired, use “+”, “*”, and “0” to represent bullets
 An HTML Resume
 Typically includes links to homepage, images, …
 Avoid this type of resume
 Most people don’t want an employer walking around in their homepage
 Resume Formats - Chronological
 Highlight your
work experience in
reverse
chronological
order
 Be sure to not
leave gaps
 The most widely
used format for
working
professionals
 Resume Formats - Functional
 Highlight specific
skills for which
the market has
high demand
 Seldom used by
new graduates
 Frequently used
to change jobs or
careers
 Resume Formats - Combinational
 Highlight specific
work experience
 Highlight marketable
skills
 Use reverse
chronological order
 The best resume style
for most college
students

I would prefer bullets

 The Silver Bullet
 What Is Your “Story”?
 What slant can you take on your resume?
 Do you want to emphasize internship experience?
 Do you want to emphasize work experience?
 Do you want to emphasize course work?
 Do you want to emphasize project experience?
 Do you want to emphasize research experience?
 Do you want to emphasize personal traits?
 What is unique or interesting about your college experience?
 My Recommendation
 If you have an interesting internship – emphasize it – if not get one!
 Most SBA graduates have interesting project/work experience
 Build on your liberal arts education!!!
 Demonstrate leadership, communication, depth
 Standard Resume Sections
Move toward bottom
 Header
 Objective
 Education
 Honors/Activities
 Work Experience
 Relevant Courses
 Skills
 Projects

I prefer other order

 The Header Section
 The first line should be your name
 Larger than the largest font used in body
 Avoid using decorative fonts
 Don’t use black or gray shaded backgrounds
 Exclude titles Mr., Mrs., Ms., …
 Include contact address
 Permanent address
 Current address
 Include your email address
 Use email from “yahoo, gmail”
 Don’t use “[email protected]”
 Include your phone number
 Change the message machine to be appropriate
 The Objective Section

 Considered optional but I strongly suggest including it

 Make statement clear, concise, and to the point

 Bad: “I want to get a job”
 Weak: “To get a job in the automotive industry.”
 Good: “To get a job working in sales and marketing in a company
in the automotive industry .”
 Avoid being overly specific to single company
 “To attain a position at 3M Pharmaceuticals working on …”
 I prefer objectives from the company’s perspective
 “To acquire a human resource development position where
knowledge and experience working with a soft drinks
manufacturing firm will be of prime importance. “
 The Honors/Activities Section
This section should scream “I am a leader”
 Should only contain honors and awards earned during
your time in college
 You can include academic or extracurricular items
 I prefer only academic or service-related items
 Include a brief description if not self-evident from title
 “Award given to top performer on the capstone exam”
 Don’t include hobbies or activities not related to the job or
your story
 Good to include leadership positions in related organizations
 Good to list membership in related organizations
 Don’t include volunteer work unless there is a direct and
positive link with the job or your story
 The Work Experience Section
 Dedicated to most recent and relevant employment
 Format
 Employer and location on the first line
 Don’t need name of supervisor, complete address, or contact information
 Position and time-span on the second line
 Use only year, not month and year (avoids time gaps)
 Each position should have at least two bullets
 Explain role and contributions
 Don’t emphasize duties but rather emphasize outcomes
 “Increased efficiency of … by 20%”
 “Improved user navigation experience on …” Employers want
 Descriptions should be consistent in wording problem solvers
 Watch the tense
 Current job uses present tense
 Former jobs use past tense
 The Relevant Courses Section

 The keyword is relevant courses

 Don’t include Fundamentals of Management.
 Don’t include Fundamentals of Accounting or Basic Math
 Focus on courses the are either unique or would normally be
considered elective
 Total Quality Management
 Management Information System
 Corporate Planning/Business Policy
 Governmental Accounting
 Project Management
 Management Accounting

 Employers will assume you have had the rest

 The Skills Section
 This is where you emphasize your technical skills
 Fluency in foreign languages
 Put in order of familiarity

 Knowledge of computer applications

 Put in order of familiarity
 Can use “Exposure to:” as the only modifier if you wish

 Other special skills

 Should have a direct relationship to the position you are applying for.
 The Projects Section
 Used correctly, this section can set you apart from other new graduates
 Most new grads don’t get the opportunity to use this section

 Show any lengthy, impressive, or relevant projects to which you have

made real contribution

 Each project should have at least two bullets (focus on outcomes)

“Market Basket Analysis System
 Designed and implemented a Java application for predicting future purchases
based on a probabilistic analysis of past purchase records
 Deployed system as a web service using XML and SOAP and an Oracle
database on the backend
 Used synchronized threads to increase overall throughput of the system to
handle up to 50 client requests per second”
Supporting Documentation – Cover Letter (1)

 Why do I need to write a cover letter?

 Use the cover letter to focus attention on elements of your
background that are particularly relevant to the company
 Letter acts as your verbal introduction to the employer
 Send it to a person, not a place
 Avoid “To Whom It May Concern,”
 Worst case “Dear Recruiter:”
 First sentence should tell why you are writing
 “I am writing in regard to your posting listed on …”
 “Dr. Wagner at UW – Eau Claire suggested that I …”
 “As you may recall, I spoke with you briefly at …”
 If unsolicited, indicate why you are interested in the company
Supporting Documentation – Cover Letter (2)

 Highlight your skills

 Use two to three paragraphs to given in-depth description of your
selling points
 Each paragraph should be stand alone (could be moved to
different location in text)
 Close with a promise of action
 If possible, indicating that you will be contacting them in the near
future to set up a mutually acceptable meeting time or to further
discuss your qualifications
 Nice if you can say “during my Winter Break, between December
28 and January 12, I will be in your Minneapolis. I will contact
your office when I arrive to arrange a possible meeting time”
Supporting Documentation – Cover Letter (3)
Supporting Documentation – References
 Prepare a separate reference sheet
 Use same paper as the resume itself
 Bring reference sheet (and resume) with you to any interviews, job
fairs, career breakfasts, …
 Do not mail reference sheet with resume and cover letter
 Reference sheet is a stand-alone document
 Should include your Header from the resume
 Try to arrange contact information in pleasing fashion
 Use professional references only
 Pick individuals that think highly of you
 Pick individuals that are familiar with your work
 Always ask your references before using their names
 Be prepared to give supporting materials – courses, projects, …
 Ask again if it has been a while
 Scannable Resumes

 Most large employers will scan your resume into a central

database
 Tips to assist the scanning process
 Don’t use italics, underlining, or graphics
 Use bold only for headers
 Use “scanner-friendly” fonts (Serif or Sans Serif fonts)
 Times New Roman, Courier, Helvetica, or Arial are good examples
 Font sizes of between 9 and 12
 Use black ink on white background
 Tips on Delivery of Your Resume
 Posting Online
 “rules” are still emerging
 Common mistake – formatting that doesn’t make the trip
 Convert to text only
 Use PDF if allowed
 Proofread carefully after conversion
 If they ask about salary, leave it empty
 If they force salary, be honest but don’t shoot for the moon
 Emailing your resume
 Attach resume as a PDF document (or Word document)
 75 – 80% of companies are running Windows
 Also include text version in the email message
 Attachments can get dropped or filtered
 Test before deploy
 Send to at least three friends, ask them to print it and send it back to you
 Miscellaneous Tips (1)

 Use action words in your descriptions

 Miscellaneous Tips (2)

 Act like a professional

 Avoid cutesy or inappropriate graphics, images, formats, …
 One page only
 You are a fresh graduate, don’t assume that the one-page rule
doesn’t apply to you!
 Stick to the truth
 Don’t sprinkle buzzwords in that you really don’t understand
 It speaks volumes about your character when you can’t explain
your own resume
 Focus on achievements and results
 Laundry lists of duties are not impressive
 Miscellaneous Tips (3)

 Use easy-to-read language

 Winston Churchill - “Use short, old words.”
 Get the words and punctuation correct
 Errors and “broken English” are the kiss of death
 Follow the instructions
 If the company asks for specific information, then give it to them
 Follow up
 If you said you would call, then call
 Maintain a consistent writing style
 Avoid “To apply …” then “Applying …”
 Avoid the use of “I” or “my”
 Miscellaneous Tilts (1)

 USE ALL CAPITAL LETTERS

 Much harder to read
 Avoidwhitespace
 Use white space (not borders) to break sections apart
 Include a picture of yourself
 You’re not THAT good looking!
 Use several fonts to catch their attention
 Creates a “ransom note” effect
 Print
Printyour
yourresume
resumeon
on“day
“dayglow”
glow”paper
paper
 Be professional
 Illogical Order Use
 Resume is a story – put most interesting parts at the beginning
 Miscellaneous Tilts (2)

 Focus on you and your needs

 Employers have better things to do than hear about you
 They want to know “what can you do for me”
 Use templates to construct your resume
 Give cookie-cutter look
 Lacks flexibility to your “silver bullet”
 Use superlatives to emphasis your work
 Great performance as …
 Stick to the facts and figures – not an evaluation of yourself
 Use long flowing sentences
 Short and to the point
 Sentence fragments are fine if they are understandable – BUT
NOT IN THE COVER LETTER!!!!!
 Don’t Make These Famous Mistakes
 “Education: Curses in liberal arts, curses in computer
science, curses in accounting”

 “Personal: Married, 1992 Chevrolet”

 “Proven ability to track down and correct erors.”

 “Disposed of $2.5 billion in assets”

 “Accomplishments: Oversight of entire department”

 Cover Letter: “Thank you for your consideration. I hope

to hear from you shorty!”
Good Examples (1)
Good Examples (2)
Bad Examples (1)
Bad Examples (2)
 On-Line Resources

 www.collegerecruiter.com
 www.developercareers.com
 www.writinglettersandresumes.com
 www.professional-resumes.com
Free
 www.1stresumes.com
 www.a1resumes.net

 www.10minuteresume.com
 www.crsresume.com Not
 www.resumeservice.com Free