Manufacturing Resumes Archives - Page 2 of 2

Accomplishments that Hurt a Resume

I write a lot about how important accomplishments are to a resume. They provide the sales pitch to get a hiring manager interested and excited about your background. They also demonstrate your capability in a way that nothing else can.

The resume I read today showed me the rare example of when accomplishments actually hurt the overall impression. The problem wasn’t the individual accomplishments – each was good and impressive. The problem was they didn’t fit together. In fact, they seemed to contradict each other. Below are the two accomplishments from an operations manager within a distribution company:

Building up staff to eventually build in 2nd shift for production to accommodate increased volume.
Reduced warehouse staff 25% and increased production by 15% in shipping and receiving.

The candidate has been with this employer for around a year. In this short time, both increasing and decreasing staffing levels seems out of place. If the candidate had a five year track record with the company, it would be fine. The business cycle has changed and companies are adjusting.

Do I think the candidate is lying about his accomplishments? No. There is probably a good explanation for what he did. Despite this, I’m focused on whether he is telling the truth, how these two accomplishments could be reconciled and whether the accomplishments are credible. I’m not thinking about how the accomplishments demonstrate an ability to help an organization.

If the job seeker is coming for the exact role and type of company than the job being filed, this won’t be too much of a problem. A hiring manager is like to still give him a call. More often, a job seeker will be from a different job type or industry. If this is the case, the job seeker already has a strike against them. Adding even a little doubt or confusion about the accomplishments can be the deciding factor in rejecting the candidate.

There are a couple of solutions for this job seeker. The easiest is to delete the bullet related to adding 2nd shift. In a down economy, more companies are concerned about cutting costs, and few are worried about expanding. Dropping this will not hurt the resume.

Another option would be to explain the accomplishments better, so they make sense together. For example, the staff reduction might be in one department and adding 2nd shift could be in a completely different department. If this is the case, providing a little more detail would fix the inconsistency.

One of the greatest challenges when writing your resume is knowing how a reader, who knows nothing about you, will interpret what you write. You have the benefit of knowing your complete work history. This makes it difficult to see when key details are omitted. The solution is to have someone, who knows little to nothing about your review your resume, assess the content.

Supply Chain Resume Review

The resume and cover letter I read this morning contained a number of mistakes I routinely see. The candidate is a supply chain professional from one of the biggest and best known manufacturing companies.

The cover letter was long, a full page, but it had very little substance. The bulk of the cover letter was content straight from the resume. In fact, there is nothing in the cover letter that isn’t also in the resume. In addition to the substance of the cover, there was a lot of hype. For example, the sentence below is taken from the middle of the cover letter:

I am an interpersonally-skilled team leader with a rapid advancement history and a unique blend of analytical and communication skills.

This sentence will do little to impress a hiring manager. The rapid advancement history is a plus, but the rest of the sentence is just hype. Even worse, the value of the characteristics isn’t clear. I doubt a hiring manager has ever said they need a person that is an “interpersonally-skill team leader” and has “unique blend of analytical and communication skills.” The hiring manager is focused on finding someone that can achieve specific results. Nothing in the cover letter references specific results and accomplishments.

This omission is emphasized in the resume. The resume starts with a Professional Summary. The first line is “Results-driven Logistics & Planning Manager with global supply chain management…” How can a person be results-driven, but fail to list a single accomplishment? It doesn’t make a good impression.

Another problem with resume and cover letter relates to the career progression of the job seeker. This individual spent more than ten years with his last employer. Then, more than six months ago, he stopped working there. There is no explanation why. There are many candidates who have been laid off due to a downsizing or facility closure. Despite this, a hiring manager is unlikely to assume the candidate way laid off. It is more likely the hiring manager will assume the candidate was fired.

If the job seeker was fired, this isn’t a deal breaker. He was with the same company for more than ten years and received a couple of promotions in the process. Most companies will look past a termination, if the candidate can explain why the problems leading to the termination won’t occur in the future.

Recommendations:

A Short and Concise Cover Letter: The cover letter needs to be cut down to under 100 words. At more than 300 words, it isn’t going to get read.
Include Accomplishments in the Cover Letter: The cover letter needs to have some substance. Adding a couple of accomplishments demonstrating past successes can make a very good impression.
Add Accomplishments to the Resume: In a 10+ year career, with a couple of promotions, the job seeker must have done something right. Include a few accomplishments on the resume.
Explain the Gap in Employment: The job seeker has been out of work for six months with no explanation why they left their last position. Including a statement in the cover letter why the job seeker is unemployed can answer what is likely to be the top question by a hiring manager.

Newly published in 2010: Get the best book for Manufacturing Resumes

Resume Writing for Manufacturing Careers - Front Cover

Identifying Impressive Accomplishments

I read two resumes today with accomplishments that appeared to have nothing in common. One is from a senior manufacturing executive and the other is from an individual in the Navy. The scope and type of the accomplishments are vastly different, and yet, they both are impressive.

The Manufacturing Executive

The accomplishment on the resume provided specific results and a description of how they were achieved:

Reduced annual labor costs by $1.75 million through standardization of work methods, instituted employee productivity reporting system, improved product-flow, realigned supervisory responsibilities, and implemented a comprehensive employee training program

This is an impressive accomplishment. Nearly $2 million in labor savings through a number of changes. Any manufacturing manager would want an accomplishment like this on their resume. Most people don't have accomplishments this significant, though.

The Transitioning Sailor

The accomplishment from the individual transitioning from the Navy also provided specific results and a description of how they were achieved:

Saved over $7,000 by expertly using outside government sources to provide services previously taken from activities budget.

After reading about a $1.75 million in savings, $7,000 appears insignificant. You may be thinking that it is pointless to write about saving a few thousand dollars. For this individual, the accomplishment is impressive and may be more impressive than the accomplishment from the manufacturing executive.

The reason the accomplishment is impressive has nothing to do with the dollar amount. Going by dollars, there's no comparison between these two accomplishments. Dollars saved isn't the only factor. We also have to look at the role of the individual and the potential for savings. If the CEO of GE, IBM or Exxon listed an accomplishment of saving $1.75 million, it would not be impressive. These companies have sales in excess of $100 billion dollars. A million is insignificant to the scope of company.

For the transitioning sailor, there is very little opportunity to generate cost savings. This individual was enlisted and at a lower level. Very few of his peers can identify any specific cost savings they have delivered. This is what makes the accomplishment significant.

In your career, you may not have had the opportunity to save millions of dollars. This does not mean you do not have significant accomplishments. Review your background for situations where you were able to make a contribution beyond your basic expectations. These accomplishments could involve saving money, but they could also relate to other aspects of your job. Have you improved a process? Did you help a company become more efficient? Did you do something that elevated customer service levels? There are a wide variety of ways people contribute to their employers. Look for ways you have contributed and highlight these on your resume.

Newly published in 2010: Get the best book for Manufacturing Resumes

Prioritizing Info on Your Resume

Choosing what information to include in a resume is important, but an even more important consideration is the order. The most significant elements of your background need to go at the top of the resume. Unfortunately, many job seekers fail to prioritize information effectively. A resume I read today illustrates this common mistake.

The resume was from a manufacturing professional with a good education and good experience. The job seeker didn’t know how to package his background effectively. The first problem was with the order of the sections. Below are the section headings in order:

Objective
Education
Additional Training
Select Career Achievements
Professional Experience
Summary of Qualifications
Technical Skills

The job seeker has more than 15 years of experience managing manufacturing operations. This experience should not be buried in the middle of the second page. Compounding the mistake, the candidate prioritized Additional Training towards the top of the resume. The additional training section contained routine courses like Hazmat, Sexual Harassment and First Aid. Classes like this are routine in most mid-size to large companies. They do not differentiate the candidate.

The Select Career Achievements section listed several impressive accomplishments. This section should have been at the top of the resume. The accomplishments will get a hiring manager interested so they keep reading.

The Education section raises a question, though. The job seeker has a Six Sigma Black Belt, an impressive credential. The remainder of their education is ordinarily – a bachelor’s degree and a few additional courses. This education is important but isn’t going to make the candidate standout. The candidate needs to move the Six Sigma certification to the top of the resume and the rest of the education to the bottom.

The Summary of Qualifications section was just a listing of responsibilities the job seeker had. This section needs to be merged into the Professional Experience section. The is no need to break the responsibilities out from the job descriptions.

After making these changes, the new resume has a top section containing the objective, the Six Sigma certification and a few accomplishments. This section becomes the Professional Summary or Professional Profile. With this new section, the resume takes its new structure:

Professional Summary
Professional Experience
Technical Skills
Education
Additional Training

This structure leads off with the most important elements. It then moves into the basic information about the job seekers work history. From there, the resume wraps up with other information, the skills, education and training of the job seeker. The overall impression is much more impressive.

Newly published in 2010: Get the best book for Manufacturing Resumes

KPI’s and Your Resume

KPI’s are Key Performance Indicators. They are the metrics that drive the overall performance of an organization. KPI’s are critical to a company’s success and are an important element in your resume. If you don’t discuss KPI’s on your resume, you should.

A KPI is a measure of an activity that provides an indication of success or failure. Every industry has different metrics that drive performance. You should know the KPI’s that are important in your organization, and how you affect these KPI’s. If you don’t know your KPI’s, you’re going to have a tougher time in your search.

The reason KPI’s are so important is two-fold. First, many hiring managers want to know that a candidate is concerned about how their performance drives the overall success of a company. Discussing your KPI’s can help show that you understand what you need to do to succeed. Second, hiring managers like to see candidates that take responsibility for their performance and are committed to meeting expectations. To meet expectations, you need to know what they are and your performance relative to those expectations. Knowing our KPI’s is a good way to show this to a hiring manager.

KPI’s also help you show how you will drive performance of a team you manage. It is very difficult to drive performance without setting clear expectations and measuring the results. KPI’s are an important element of this.

Examples of KPI’s

Each industry has different challenges and different KPI’s. Below are examples from a manufacturing.

Scrap dollars per labor hour
Parts produced per labor hour
Rework hours per labor hour
Production hours to setup hours
Maintenance hours per shift
Equipment downtime
Order backlog
Percentage of orders shipped on-time
Line fill of orders shipped

This is just a sampling of a few KPI’s. A company may have dozens of metrics that are significant.

Writing About KPI’s

On your resume, you should write about specific KPI’s that are significant to the business. Start by discussing your actions and then provide the change in the KPI. For example, a production manager may have reduced setup times by standardizing tooling:

Reduced Setup Times: Standardized tooling in punch presses by utilizing a consistent mounting configuration. This change reduced setup times from an average to two hours to under 30 minutes. Setup hours per labor hour were reduced by 60% in the punch press workcenter.

This bullet provides a clear action completed by the job seeker. The results of the action are also clear. The job seeker reinforces the results by showing the effect on a KPI. This example provides one additional element that benefits the presentation. It is written with the title “Reduced Setup Times.” This title makes it very easy to scan the resume and see what is important, while reinforcing the results achieved by the job seeker.

If your resume does not detail any KPI’s, review your performance, identify the KPI’s that are important and show how you affected those KPI’s.

Newly published in 2010: Get the best book for Manufacturing Resumes

Resume of a Generalist

Many job seekers highlight the breadth of experiences and skills they possess. A diverse background offers multiple perspectives on problems and strategies, and can be valuable to an employer. Despite the benefits of wide range of skills, focusing your sales pitch on your diverse background can be a mistake.

Many job seekers highlight the breadth of experiences and skills they possess. A diverse background offers multiple perspectives on problems and strategies, and can be valuable to an employer.

Despite the benefits of wide range of skills, focusing your sales pitch on your diverse background can be a mistake.

The problem with this approach lies in how different experiences are presented. You should emphasize the elements of your background that directly related to the position, showing your strongest skills and abilities prominently.

When a person highlights a wide range of skills and experiences, it becomes very difficult to assess which elements are strongest. When a large number of skills are put on equal footing, a hiring manager will often conclude the job seeker is average at each skill. Average will not get someone excited to hire you.

You need to show how you are exceptional. The initial focus of your resume should be on the aspects of the job you are seeking. You need to demonstrate how you will be success in the core functions of the job. This targeted approach will make a strong impression and give you the opportunity interview. Early in the hiring process, companies typically have dozens if not hundreds of candidates to consider and need to screen a large percentage. Focusing on the core skills of a position and screening out candidates without exceptional experience with these skills is a common approach.

As you progress through the hiring process, the diversity of your experiences can then help you get hired. A breadth of experiences is a benefit to an employer. This background can be the deciding factor when a company is comparing to equally qualified candidates. The additional experiences you possess can be the selling point that gives you an edge to get hired.

Let’s look at an example – this candidate is Vice President of Supply Chain for a manufacturing firm. The company is looking for someone that can lead their supply chain function and is most concerned with reducing costs through better vendor management with Asian suppliers.

The candidate has five years of experience sourcing in Asia, ten years of supply chain management, 5 years as a manufacturing manager and 3 years as a quality engineer.

General Presentation: Successful supply chain executive with experience managing purchasing, logistics and scheduling. Excellent manufacturing management track record, with significant quality engineering experience.

Focused Approached: Successful supply chain executive, specializing in purchasing and vendor management of off-shore suppliers, with extensive experience sourcing in Asia. Experienced with logistics, scheduling, manufacturing management and quality engineering, allowing effective anticipation of problems from vendors that will affect downstream customers.

The difference between these two presentations is small. Most resumes I read are similar to the general presentation. All of the skills and experiences are put on equal footing and none standout as a result. This presentation requires the hiring manager to connect the dots and recognize the value of the different experiences.

The second presentation positions the candidate much clearer. It is targeted to show the supply chain experience, and more specifically, the experience sourcing in Asia. The addition experiences are still presented, but are placed in a secondary, supporting context to the supply chain and sourcing experience.

Newly published in 2010: Get the best book for Manufacturing Resumes

No Clipart

One of my recruiters showed me a cover letter that they received that I have to share. The cover letter is from a successful manufacturing executive and illustrates how your professionalism and style can greatly impact the impression you make.

The Cover Letter had a large font – a 14 point. This made the letter look more like a flyer than a professional letter. Most resumes have a 10 or 12 point font for the body of the text. A 14 point font is usually good for section heading, to add emphasis. Additionally, the cover letter had larger than normal margins. A 1” margin on all four sides is a good choice. Increasing the margins beyond this doesn’t make sense.

The font size and margins weren’t the problem. They didn’t help the cover letter, but they weren’t terrible. What really made the resume look cheesy was the clipart. The job seeker had put a cartoon at the top of their cover letter. The image looked like one the stock images that comes with Microsoft Word.

Adding images to a cover letter is never a good idea. Cartoons are an even worse idea. It sets an unprofessional tone that doesn’t match the purpose of a cover letter.

Remember, your cover letter and resume need to get attention, but resorting to gimmicks will hurt your chances. Getting remembered as the worst resume or most ridiculous cover letter won’t get you hired.

Newly published in 2010: Get the best book for Manufacturing Resumes

Accomplishment Examples

I pulled four accomplishments from resumes I’ve received recently.

Example 1: Director of Real Estate Acquisitions

Research and negotiate real estate acquisitions totaling approximately $#M per year.

This accomplishment clear, concise and specific. The role of the job seeker is also clear. What’s missing is something that quantifies whether this is figure is good. Did the job seeker meet expectations? Including the number of deals completed would help. It would also be good

Example 2: Facilities/Engineering Manager

Champion use of Six Sigma/Lean tools to develop and implement strategic initiatives relative to managing facility construction and maintenance, capacity utilization.

Six Sigma and Lean are two skills that receive a lot of attention and are in demand. Implemented properly, they can have a huge impact on a company. A lot of job seekers try to work them into their resume, whether they are skilled are not.

In this accomplishment, the job seeker is saying they are a champion for using six sigma and lean tools. They do not say anything about whether they were successful in driving change or if the results of the change were significant.

Remember that many hiring mangers are going to be skeptical of anything you claim. Is this job seeker a six sigma expert? The education section of the resume lists training in six sigma, but no details of what the training was, and no listing of certifications. Did the job seeker sit through a 60 minute class on the basics of six sigma or spend weeks in classes? There were no specific projects listed that were completed, so the a hiring manager will probably assume the job seeker does not have much skill is this area.

Example 3: Director Supply Chain

Exceeded all objectives for the fiscal year, including average AP days and freight as a percent of sales.

This accomplishment is clear and concise. The role is assumed from the title and the benefit to the company is also assumed. It isn’t very specific and it doesn’t say anything about how the job seeker achieved these results. Despite this, it actually a pretty good accomplishment. It shows the job seeker was successful in each area they were accountable for. A little more detail would improve it. The main thing this accomplishment will do is to prompt questions in an interview. In particular, what were the objectives and metrics that the job seeker was measured on and how did they achieve the results.

Example 4: Division President

Increased company revenues from $#.# million in 200# to $##.# million in 200# by opening new locations, rebuilding sales teams, and improving operations; grew from ## locations to ## locations.

This is a good example of an accomplishment. The accomplishment is clear and concise. The result is specific, along with the time frame to achieve it. The method to achieve the result is also clear. As an added clarification, the job seeker included the number of locations at the start and end. Although I left out the figures, they clearly showed a significant increase in the number of locations and a growth in revenues per location (locations doubled and revenues quadrupled). This is the type of accomplishment that make me want to learn more about how this individual accomplished this.