Your Resume needs special attention, to ensure it really does represent you. So let's take a look at how you can improve your chances of that critical business document.
The more time you spend on your Resume, tweaking those Sections to reflect your skills, experience and flavour of you as a person, the greater your chance of not only getting that critical interview, but actually proving you are who you say (or write) you are (and that translates to being hired!). Each Section must be given proper consideration, and each is important to providing the total picture of you.
The importance of your Objective has been discussed many times before in this column - The Essentials For Your Resume being the latest. Spend some time on this - yes, it is the first item the eye scans when looking at your Resume, and yes, it really IS important. Don't just put the title of the position you are applying for (as many people tend to do) - think about what you really want - and put that in. Of course, it is still advisable to have more than one Objective for the varying positions you might apply for.
Of course, many people still use the space above an Objective for their personal information - just keep it to two lines if at all possible. Your address and name is not as important as your skills, experience and education. A better solution? Use the Header for your Name and Contact Info - this means the information repeats on the second page - AND you can use this as a template for your Cover Letter.
What comes next will depend on what stage of your career life you are entering. Now you have to decide what IS more important - do you have more Work Experience or More Skills, or more Education? Just out of College or took time to Upgrade? Then put the Education first. Not much paid work experience but lots of skills? List those skills in terms of benefits to the employer. Don't sell yourself short because you've been with one company, are still young or think you're too old, or a stay-at-home parent for the past while. You're still alive, kicking, and contributing to society, so you ARE doing something right. Stay-at-home workers still have to multi-task during their workload, and must work within a defined and limited budget. Older workers provide a level of maturity as well as wisdom - they've probably already been through it and know how to survive and thrive through that business problem. Years bring experience in dealing with others that cannot be taught. Young workers provide a sense of energy and optimism, and are willing to try to think outside the box (heck, they don't even know what the box is!).
And always use action verbs! Did you write letters on behalf of the company? Then you created or produced business correspondence.
Take an honest look at your Resume now - with the above information in mind. Where can you improve yours?
More on Resumes - Section by Section in future articles.
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Copyright April 3, 2007. Paym Bergson and Suite 101. All rights reserved. Any unauthorized use of this material will constitute an infringement of copyright.
