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resume advice Step 3: Present Your Unique Capabilities The format preferred by many resume reviewers includes these five sections: - Career Objective - Specific Accomplishments - Education and Special Skills - Honors - References These sections form the heart of the resume and will keep your presentation concise and to the point. Let's look at each section: Career Objective. This is your statement, in two to three sentences, regarding the type of position and area of responsibility you are looking for at present. Focus on what you want to do and what you want to contribute in this next career move. Avoid talking about where you want to end up or how you want to run the company some day. Stay focused on the next career objective. This is an area that you should refresh with each career move so that you are always looking ahead and thinking about the next move. Specific Accomplishments. This is the listing of your various jobs, promotions, and accomplishments. Present this section in sequential order, starting with your current position and working backwards. Do not leave any holes in your timeline. These will stand out to the experienced resume reader. If there are specific times when you were not working, say so, and note what you were doing. The format for each entry in this section look like this: Job Title, Company Name, Inclusive Dates in which you held that role. Key Accomplishments: (List those things that resulted from your holding of this position and/or the key things that were accomplished. Try to relate to business results, such as increasing sales, decreasing cost, improving quality, enhancing the customer experience, reducing cycle time, etc.) Avoid "empire-building" types of comments like numbers supervised or the size of your budget. This can create an image that you are more interested in the size of your empire than what value you created. These accomplishments form the basis of your value proposition to a prospective employer and they should show increasing impact as you move toward your current position. Education and Specific Skills. List your education, starting with your undergraduate education. (If you only graduated from high school, start with this listing.) List the years of attendance, major area of study, and degree(s) received. Continue on with graduate school, and finally any relevant continuing professional education courses. Be sure to be specific about the degree received. If you received it and the school can verify it, claim it. If you did not, indicate, for example, how much course work was actually completed and that you were working toward an MBA or other degree. Do not make up degrees that do not exist, such as "ABD" (all but dissertation for doctoral candidates). This only looks bad and shows how you are shading the truth. Degrees are the easiest part of your resume to verify. Given the recent rash of embarrassing revelations, it seems that this is becoming standard practice at most companies. Honors or Special Recognition. This is the section in which you can list key honors, certificates, recognition and professional awards. They should be listed in chronological order, starting with the most recent. This list should include notable events, such as recognition as earning an employee-of-the-year award, becoming the top sales person, serving as a team leader, involvement in key civic activities, professional society honors and certificates, etc. Your list should show that you are accomplished, someone who continues to add value, and who is a well-rounded individual. Showing that you are active in civic or community activities that demonstrate leadership is very important to list in this section as well. Even including that fact that you, for example, coach the local little league, is important. References. References are always a tricky matter. When you are going for your first position or those next moves early in your career, listing a couple of solid references is a good move. This shows the reader that you have some good references that will support your claims and from whom they can get information. Make sure these references are work-related and that the people can speak about the characteristics that will make you valuable to a prospective employer. Your Uncle Ted, while a great guy, cannot add to you image as employable. Even people who have worked with you on a part-time basis are better than someone whose opinions will immediately be seen as biased. |
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Creating a Successful Resume Step 1: Define Your Personal Marketing Strategy Step 2: Develop a Clear Idea of the Buyer's Needs Step 3: Present Your Unique Capabilities Step 4: Structure Your Resume Step 5: You're in the Door: Now What? [back to top] |
