Resume Writing Archives - Page 6 of 16 - Palladian Career Resources

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

Resume Writing for Manufacturing Careers - Front Cover

Graduation Dates on Your Resume

I read a couple resumes recently that had unusual graduation dates. The dates listed detracted from the impression the resume made.

Six Years of High School

A candidate with a bachelor’s degree and 40+ year career listed his high school on his resume. With a bachelor’s degree, there is no need to list high school. This isn’t a major problem though. The problem was range of dates. The high school listing had the dates 1961-1967, a six year time period. I don’t know if this was a typo, if the school system considered high school to be 7^th through 12^th grades, if the candidate had repeated a couple years or if there was another explanation.

Including the dates raises a question that is meaningless. The candidate’s performance in high school more than forty years ago has nothing to do with their capability today. Additionally, including the range of dates makes no sense. It is generally assumed if you include a single date, it is the graduation date. Finally, many older workers report instances of age discrimination. Highlighting your age with a high school graduation date can’t help your search, and may hurt it.

Super Fast Bachelor’s

A candidate listed their high school graduation and their college graduation dates. They included the months of each. This made it clear exactly how long the candidate had been in college – a year and a half. Reinforcing this, the candidate listed the number of credit hours completed to get the degree and a 4.0 GPA. Ordinarily, I would assume a graduation date only 18 months after getting out of high school would indicate a diploma mill, but the school is a big state school with a good reputation anyone would recognize. My conclusion is the date is either a typo or the candidate is lying. Neither is a good impression. There was no need to list the high school, or any of the graduation dates.

Employment dates are a critical element of a resume, but graduation dates are optional. Unless you are a recent graduate, drop your graduation dates. They will offer little value.

Resume of a Fired CEO

Rick Wagoner resigned on Monday after being asked by the President Obama to step down as CEO of GM. Wagoner joins millions of unemployed that lost their jobs. One trend I see with people that have been fired is they do a poor job of presenting their strengths and accomplishments. They allow the reason they were fired to define them. How Wagoner might present his resume demonstrates how to approach you resume if you were fired.

It's easy to demonize the CEO of a company on the verge of bankruptcy. It is much more difficult to fix problems that have been building for fifty years at a company as large and complex as GM. Is Rick Wagoner a good CEO? Did he do a good job or a bad one? I don't have these answers. What I do know is Wagoner has excellent experience and numerous accomplishments in his career.

The accomplishments should be the focus of the resume. They demonstrate the value that Wagoner has achieved in his career and show the potential value he would provide an employer. With a little research, I uncovered enough information to get his resume started and to give an idea of how to market someone being fired in a very public way.

Professional Summary

Senior executive with 32 years of progressively increasing responsibilities, leading to Chairman and CEO of the fourth largest company in the United States. Extensive international experience, including leadership roles in Brazil, Canada and Europe.

Successfully led union contract changes that shifted $50 billion of health care costs from GM to the UAW.

Shut down the Oldsmobile division, resulting in substantial cost savings.

Purchased Daewoo, gaining substantial inroads into compact and sub-compact car markets.

Turned around GM's North American Operations. Losses in the three years prior to becoming President of NAO totaled $11 billion. Each of the four years managing NAO were profitable with total profits of $6.6 billion.

Work Experience

General Motors 1977 to 2009

Chairman and CEO, GM 2003-2009

President and CEO, GM 2000-2003

President and COO, GM 1998-2000

President NAO, GM 1994-1998

Executive VP and CFO, GM 1992-1994

President, GM Brazil 1991-1992

VP of Finance, GM Europe 1989-1990

Various Positions in GM Brazil and GM Canada, 1981-1989

Analyst, Treasury Department, GM 1977-1981

Education

Master's degree in Business Administration, Harvard University

Bachelor's degree in Economics, Duke University

This is just an outline of what a resume of Rich Wagoner might look like. At every step in his career, he has had significant accomplishments. The changes he made at GM are substantial. Shutting down Oldsmobile and shifting health care costs of retirees to the UAW are major improvements. Reducing labor and retiree costs are key priorities for turning around GM. Wagoner has shown an ability to work with the union and achieve substantial modifications to the contract structure. All of this points to a track record of success.

The problem with Wagoner's situation is the successes haven't added up to deliver overall corporate success. Does he just need more time? Did he start making these changes too late to save the company? Is there more he could have done? I can't answer these questions. I do know that the track record of Wagoner indicates he could add significant value to other companies. His very public profile poses a marketing challenge. Without this, he could be a very marketable candidate despite being fired. Being fired did not change the experience, knowledge, skills and potential of Wagoner.

If you were fired, your potential remains, also. Do not focus on the reasons you were fired. You can't ignore them, but you shouldn't let them define you.

In your job search, you need to present the value you delivered. This requires listing accomplishments. In my resume for Wagoner, I led off with a professional summary section and four accomplishments. They could be a lot stronger (I had to piece together the info from news articles), but they show significant contributions. The accomplishments also focus on the key challenges that GM faces: labor costs, unprofitable businesses, expanding into more fuel efficient vehicles and turning around divisions losing money. If no one knew Rick Wagoner, his resume would be a very close match to the ideal candidate for the GM CEO job.

If you lost your job, either through a layoff or being fired, don't discount the value you have provided. It is very easy to dwell on the negatives. Instead, focus on the positives – the accomplishments, successes and contributions in your career.

Resume Tip #9

Resume Tip: Provide specific results and contributions you delivered.

Resume Tip: Provide specific results and contributions you delivered.

Many job seekers list the goals of the projects they have worked on. Goals are good, but actual results delivered are more important. Review your resume and assess each accomplishment to ensure it shows clearly what you did and what the outcome was.

One challenge a lot of job seekers encounter is identifying significant accomplishments from their background. Our book, Resume Writing for Manufacturing Careers includes a detailed section on accomplishments. It shows how to identify and write about your accomplishments so they make a great impression. Although all the examples are tailored to Manufacturing Careers, the ideas and techniques in the book are applicable to almost any situation.

Functional Resume Example

I read a functional resume today that illustrated clearly why most people should avoid this resume structure. Functional resumes organize information according to the skills or experiences of the job seeker, not the individual jobs. This resume type can be effective for some individuals, but most people are better served by a chronological resume.

The resume was organized with the following sections:

Experience
Accomplishments
Education
Special Training
Technical Skills
Affiliations
Awards & Honors
Professional Work Experience

The resume had a number of problems. By far the biggest was the disconnect between the Experience and Accomplishment sections and the Professional Work Experience section. The Experience section described the candidate’s background in a single paragraph. The Accomplishments section contained a series of paragraphs, each describing a skill.

Both the Experience and Accomplishments sections described a senior executive with advertising and sales experience. The Professional Work Experience section showed a series of jobs, listing the title, company and dates only. The job titles listed in this section were for retail store manager positions. None of the jobs mentioned a VP role in any field, and did not show any advertising or business development roles.

Further clouding the picture was the Education section. The job seeker had bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Computer Science. None of the jobs, skills, accomplishments or experiences had anything to do with the IT field. I can understand a person getting a bachelor’s degree in one field and then working in another field. I have trouble understanding what would cause a person to get a master’s in a field but never work in a job remotely close to that field.

If you choose a functional structure for your resume, you need to create a clear picture of your career. Chronological resumes are much easier to write. The sequence of jobs and time in each position helps show the capabilities of the job seeker. In a functional resume, experiences and accomplishments are not tied to a specific position. This can cause confusion.

Recruiter Assessment

As a recruiter, I can’t see a situation when I would want to interview this candidate as long as they have this resume. The resume presents three primary areas of expertise: senior management of advertising and business development, retail store management and IT.

The job seeker did not list any positions where he held a senior management role and no positions in advertising or business development. If I had a VP position, I would find someone with experience in the field long before considering this candidate.

If I was filling a retail store manager position, the candidate would get a solid look, but still not fair well. None of the accomplishments on the resume have anything to do with retail. I would question why a good store manager has to list accomplishments from other fields and can’t include one from retail. There are a lot of good retail managers that can show clearly their performance and accomplishments. They will have a big edge over this candidate.

IT jobs are an even a bigger stretch. The field changes quickly and a few years out of the industry can put someone technically behind. With only a couple degrees and no work experience, the person would only be qualified for an entry level role. In those roles, more recent graduates would have an edge.

You may be wondering if this job seeker has a chance to get hired. With this resume, it’s very unlikely. With a targeted resume focused on one field and a better presentation of the job seeker’s skills, experience and accomplishments in that field, he would greatly improve his chances. The key is to create a solid sales pitch for the desired role.

Choosing a Font for Your Resume

Everyone wants their resume to look good. The font your choose can have a big affect on the presentation of your resume. Some fonts look great on a computer screen. Others look better in print. There are also fonts that look unprofessional no matter how they are viewed.

Everyone wants their resume to look good. The font you choose can have a big effect on the presentation of your resume. Some fonts look great on a computer screen. Others look better in print. There are also fonts that look unprofessional no matter how they are viewed.

There are two types of fonts – Serif and Sans Serif. Serif fonts have details at the end of the lines that make up letters. Sans Serif fonts do not have these details. Below are two of the most common fonts:

Serif Sans Serif

The font on the left is Times New Roman and the font on the right is Arial. Serif fonts are common in print and read very well in this format. They are more difficult to read on a computer screen. Sans Serif fonts are much easier to read on a computer screen. When choosing a font, you will need to decide if you want your resume looking best on screen or in print. For most job seekers, a sans serif font will be the best choice since their resume will be looked at much more on screen.

Selecting the type of font is just the starting point. You then need to choose the specific font. There are two primary factors you should consider. First, you want a font that looks good. Second, you want a font that is widely available. There are fonts that are rare and only show up in a few programs. If the reader of your resume does not have the font you choose, the program will try to find a close match. Unfortunately, the close match might not be that close.

One of the fonts that is being used more frequently that is not yet widely available is Calibri. This is the default font in Microsoft Word 2007. It’s a really good looking font. The problem is that older systems don’t have it. I was working on a computer that didn’t have Word 2007 today and opened a file that had been created in it. The system chose a font that looked like a cartoon font (I would show you what it looks like, but it isn’t a common font and you might not have it). The resume looked terrible.

Common Fonts

Sticking with one of these fonts will not guarantee that every reader of your resume will see it exactly the way you want, but it will improve the odds. These fonts are available on more than 90% of the computers on the internet. By contrast, Calibri is on less than half the computers (code style provides statistics on the availability of fonts).

If you absolutely have to use a font that no one else on the planet has, there are options. You can embed the font in the file. Word allows you to do this in the Tools menu under options. Embedding the font will allow a reader of your document to install the font on your system. Not all fonts can be embedded though. Some have licensing limitations that prevent this.

You may be bored with Arial or Verdana, but they look reasonably good. Another font may look better, but may also get replaced with something much worse.

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

Spelling Errors on a Resume

Writing an effective resume requires a greater attention to detail than almost any other writing you will do. Most hiring managers assume the resume you submit is an example of the highest quality work you can produce. A mistake that would be overlooked in a typical daily email becomes a major detractor on your resume. This makes proofreading your resume a critical step.

Eliminating spelling and grammar mistakes sounds easy, but can be very difficult. Most people find proofreading their own work extremely challenging. They know what they meant to write. A missing word, use of the wrong word or a misspelling can be overlooked with even repeated proofreads.

Spell Check

There are steps you can take to avoid making mistakes. The first is using spell check. When I get a resume and open it in Word, any misspelled word is underlined in red. The mistakes are essentially highlighted and jump off the screen. Errors like this will make the worst impression. It is so easy to identify and fix an error that is underlined in red on your screen that few hiring managers will be forgiving.

You may not have Microsoft Word. If you don’t, other word processors have spell check. OpenOffice is a free office suite anyone can download. It is very similar to Microsoft Office and can save files in a Word format. If you don’t have a good work processor get OpenOffice or Microsoft Word.

If you are submitting your resume online, you may have to copy it into a form. Few forms come with spell check. There is a solution. Install the google toolbar and add the spell check button. This will spell check any form fields in your browser.

Limitations of Spell Check

Even if you use spell check, it is still easy to make a mistake. There are four common mistakes:

Typos Resulting in the Wrong Word: If you type the wrong key and spell a different word correctly, spell check will not catch the mistake. For example, typing “k” instead of “d” in “word” will result in “work.”
All Caps: Some programs do not spell check words in all caps, since a word in all caps is often an acronym. On a resume, many job seekers use all caps to emphasize important elements.
Common Mistakes: There are some words that are commonly misused. For example, “affect” and “effect” are very similar, but have different usage.
Omitted Words: When typing quickly, you may skip a word. For example, pronouns, articles and prepositions are short and can be missed when editing a sentence. When proofreading, it is easy to not look at these words and assume they are there. For a reader unfamiliar with the text, omitting one of these words is a mistake that is easy to see.

Solutions

Read Out Loud: A good way to proofread your resume is to print it and read it out load. Go slow and read each word individually. This is tough. You have to concentrate on each word.
Read Backwards: To make it easier to concentrate on each word, read your resume from the bottom up. Read the last sent first. Then move up to the second to last sentence. Keep reading each sentence individually, from the end to the beginning. Reading each sentence by itself, you are more likely to concentrate on each word and not get into a flow that will cause you to overlook mistakes.
Change Your Surroundings: If you always work on your resume in one location, go somewhere else to proofread. The change of scenery can make it easier to focus on text as it is written on the page.
Get a Proofreader: Get someone to proofread your resume. Ideally, you will know a good writer that is an expert with resumes review your resume. If you don’t know some like this, you can hire someone to do a resume review.

To ensure your resume is error free takes work and multiple reviews. Some job seekers don’t have the patience for this or don’t realize the importance.

The 2,600 Word Resume

A resume should be a concise summary of a job seeker’s background and potential. Resumes are not designed to provide every detail about the job seeker. The resume I read today was far from being concise.

I recommend a resume should be 400 to 900 words and no more than two pages. There are rare exceptions to this guideline, but most resumes are too long. The resume I looked at was seven pages, with a small font. I ran a word count and it totaled 2,606 – more than six times the length I recommend.

This wasn’t the first problem with the resume. The cover letter got things starter, beginning with:

Hello Gentlemen/Ladies,

I am a software engineer with a very strong backgroud in UNIX/LINUX, C, C++, parallel and distributed computing applications. I think my resume speaks for itself.

If misspelling “backgroud” wasn’t enough, a statement that the “resume speaks for itself” is a major detractor. It creates an impression of an extremely arrogant job seeker. The resume confirmed this. The vast majority of the resume dealt with various IT systems and programming languages. The level of detail was so overwhelming, it is very difficult to know what the candidate’s greatest strengths are.

The talent, education and experience of a person with a PhD in computer engineering and 16 years of design experience at top firms is impressive, but the candidate isn’t going to be assessed in isolation. A company that is considering a PhD with this much experience will be looking at other candidates with similar experience and educational backgrounds.

The resume was composed of lengthy paragraphs that only detailed the technologies used on the project. The technical skills are important, but listing the names of the technologies does nothing to show the skill level of the job seeker. It read like an IT version of boastful name-dropping. The project descriptions provided little information as to the scope of the project, the obstacles that were overcome and the results of the project. It only explained what technologies were used.

Without detailed information on the project scope, there is no way to assess the work of the job seeker. Listing a lot of in demand technologies does not make a person qualified to do a job. A much shorter resume, with far less detail could convey a lot more information.

Another problem is a direct result of the length. A seven page list of projects detailing every technology ever encountered resulted in a list of skills that covers most of the IT field. No one can be an expert in hundreds of different technologies, and companies don’t hire people because they have a very limited familiarity with a skill that is critical to the job. By presenting so many technologies, the job seeker dilutes the skills he really is a top expert in using.

This resume will show up in a huge number of IT searches if it is posted on a job board, but it is unlikely that the job seeker will get many calls. There just isn’t anything to generate a positive impression except for the education of the job seeker and a seven page list of buzzwords.

When writing your resume, look for ways to cut words out. You should assess every word and every sentence for whether they provide significant value or not. Shorter and simpler will be much more effective.

Living in the Past

I assessed a resume today of a job seeker focused on the past and not the present. The candidate came from a very good school and had an excellent track record. Below is an outline the information in the resume, with identifying information omitted:

Professional Profile

10+ years of leadership experience

Graduate of <a really good school> and 4 year NCAA Div. 1 varsity football athlete

Proven track record of delivering successful results

Broad experience conducting presentations to individuals at all levels of organizations

Extensive knowledge of <list of industries>

Practical experience with <list of skills>

Work Experience

2001-Present
Sales Representative
<Company Name>
<details of position omitted>

1997 to 2001
Progression of positions with increasing leadership responsibility
<Company Name>
<details of position omitted>

Education

University
City, State
Degree
1996

Activities

<list of hobbies and volunteer work>

The problem with this resume is in the Professional Profile. After twelve years in his career, playing football in college is the second most important element of the resume. I'm a big football fan and have incredible respect for the athleticism and work ethic required to balance the workload a Division 1 football team and the academics of a top tier school. This is impressive, but presenting it at the top of the resume may do more harm than good.

By listing the football career at the top, the job seeker raises the question of whether he has been successful in his career. If he was successful over the last twelve years, why isn't his success in his career at the top of the resume? Hiring managers look for a track record of success building throughout the career.

After reading the the Professional Profile section, the job seeker appears to have some good experience, graduated from a good school but emphasizes football over his career. This isn't enough to reject the candidate at this point, but does raise some doubts.

The work experience section is good. The experiences and skills of the candidate make a good impression, but there is nothing overwhelming. The candidate lists a few accomplishments and awards, but fails to qualify these. It is difficult to assess how impressive the accomplishments are. This leaves the interpretation of the resume to the feeling of the reader.

After the work experience, the candidate presents his education. As I mentioned above, the candidate graduated from a top tier school with an impressive degree.

The resume concludes with an Activities section. In this section, the job seeker lists some volunteer work and several positions coaching football. Ending with football reinforces the emphasis on football at the top of the resume and detracts from presentation of the candidate's career. No matter what the job seeker did in his career, by bracketing his resume with his participation in football at the top and bottom, the candidate leads the reader to focus their attention on football and not the professional qualifications.

To improve the resume, I would change three things. First, I would move the information on playing division 1 football to the education section. Playing Division 1 football demonstrates several good qualities. Including this on the resume is beneficial, but is much better placed at the bottom and not the top. Second, I would drop the listing of the activities. The volunteer work and football coaching do little to reinforce the capability of the job seeker. Third, I would provide more detail to a few of the accomplishments within the work experience section. An accomplishment is most impressive when the role of the job seeker, the scope of the situation, the actions taken and the results achieved are clearly presented. The examples given in the resume only show vague results, with nothing about how they were achieved.

Making these three changes will provide a much more compelling presentation. On your resume, make sure you are emphasizing the information that will be most impressive to a hiring manager. Many job seekers emphasize the details they are most proud of. Unfortunately, these details may not provide the best sales pitch for the candidate. Focus on the elements of your background that are most closely related to the requirements of the job you are seeking.