The best way to capture the recruiter's imagination and interest is by telling them what you have to offer, not what you are looking for.

Too often when job seekers think of resume headlines they think only of job-hunting web sites like Monster or Careerbuilder that provide job seekers a space to share a brief spot of information about them in the hope they will entice someone to look further and read their resume.

However, resume headlines are more than a blip in a long list of information required for job seekers to post their resumes on line. In fact, savvy candidates use a headline instead of an objective on their resume.

Why?

While objectives tell the employer what candidates want, a headline focuses on what job seekers have to offer. That’s a very important distinction to an organization. And just like on the front of a newspaper, the headline grabs the reader’s attention and makes them want to read more.

However, unlike objectives, a headline is a single self-defining sentence centered – frequently bold and italicized – under the contact information. With that in mind, here’s how to develop a great headline.

Background

Job seekers should begin by considering what the focus of their headline will be. That means they should consider the industry, field of interest, and/or job title that best fits with their career goals.

For instance, someone with a background in accounting might consider terms like accountant, senior accountant, accounting professional, CPA, public accounting, and so on.

Personal Characteristics

The next piece of the puzzle is for job seekers to look at their best personal traits. The easiest way to do this is to focus on the things that 1) the job seeker feels are her strongest attributes, 2) are highly valued by most employers, and 3) are important the job seeker’s career choice.

Personal characteristics can be everything from being well organized and personable to dependable and detail oriented. Be forewarned: this list can become very long.

Skill Sets

Like personal characteristics this will probably be a long list and may include a variety of things like having great computer or analytical skills to being a motivational speaker or training guru. Candidates need to be sure to select those abilities and skills that best describe them and will interest the employer.

Create a Headline

Creating a headline will take a little practice. Finding just the right combination of words that communicates all the key information in a succinct and interesting manner takes time. But keep working on it.

Here are a couple of examples:

Dynamic and versatile CPA with solid analytical skills and financial knowledge as well as a dedication to results offers over ten years of management, manufacturing and healthcare experience

Highly qualified telecommunications professional with an MBA and five years experience in sales engineering and channel marketing

Keep in mind that this same information, in abbreviated or slightly modified form, can still be used for the headlines requested by job posting web sites.

What candidates need to communicate is what they have to offer employers in the way of background, experience, skills and attributes by combining the right words into a headline that will capture the recruiter’s imagination and interest.