# 001 The 6 Effective Steps for a Well-Organized Resume

Is writing a strong resume a daunting task for you?

Articulating your entire career journey in the most impressive and precise manner—Is that what takes most of your crucial time?

If so, let’s learn the nitty-gritty of writing a well-organized, an easy-to-follow, and an error-free resume.

Being a talent acquisition specialist, I look over several resumes in a day besides interviewing and doing other hiring activities. Many research studies have revealed that a resume should not be over two pages.

So, if you have more experience and accomplishments to brag about, just squeeze in the key points and leave the rest for discussion during the interview.

Per my experience, resumes are not read line by line. In fact, they are skimmed over very quickly by recruiters and hiring managers. It is shown in most studies that many hiring stakeholders do not spend over six seconds in reviewing and deciding to either select or reject the profile for an interview, so prioritizing information is essential.

However, some hires spend a longer duration going over your profile before taking a final call. It is during the interview when the hiring managers verify the details mentioned in the resume. So, be sure you show your true side in your resume or else you may be caught later during a background check/reference check or could be outright reject during the interview.

As a job seeker, the first thing you should know is what recruiters and hiring panels look at in your resume. I’ll walk you through crafting a profile that not only makes your profile impressive to get an invitation for the interview, but also it prepares you halfway through to excel in that interview.

Please note: The examples used throughout this article are used from varied technical and non-technical fields and are unreal.

Here is my take on...

The 6 most effective serial order steps for crafting a strong resume.

Step 1– Personal Info: Its purpose is to let the hiring folks know who you are and by what all ways they can reach you. Mention your personal information to the top center of the resume.

• The first line should have your first and last name in bold.

• The second line carries your address/location, email address, phone no. and customized LinkedIn address(hyperlink)—Separate each of these fields by visiting MS Word->Insert Menu->Symbol tab-> insert either “Black Circle” or “Vertical Line.

Having all the four fields in the same line will clear up a lot more space and save you in limiting your resume to 2 pages.

These days, most companies look at your LinkedIn profile to vouch your authenticity, so ensure your info over the LinkedIn and in the resume is alike.

• The third line should be your professional title/or major skills you possess that should ideally match with your employment experience, academic qualification, and/or position you are applying for.

• Brag your valid/non-expired certifications/licenses by placing their logos on top of your name.

Quick Note: Always prefer an email address with a combination of your first and last name or with your name and profession such as johnsmith@gmail.com/ JohnJavalead@gmail.com as opposed to writeme_at@gmail.com.

Have a meaningful and professional email address for recruiters to keep them seeing your name all the time. If they're going to contact you and send you an email, you want them to be able to go into their system and just type “John” and have your email immediately pops up, which is where it gets handy for them.

Next, never use Headers/footers/tables for your personal info anywhere in your resume as most research have proved that application tracking systems (ATS) are not able to read the content out of graphics, so just avoid them.

Step 2 A– Professional Summary: Its main purpose is to let recruiters have overall information about you. This is your second sub-section which should align with the job you are applying to. Make sure you tailor your expertise per the job description.

To start with, include your consolidated years of work experience, your expertise such as “Java Lead “and the industry (Banking/Telecom/Software technology) and the types of companies you have served for (fortune-500, start-up, medium-size).

Later, encompass an overview of your achievements, which can be measured in numbers and percentages such as, achieved 110% sales target in the 2nd quarter of 2019 which resulted in fulfilling the overall sales targets of my department with lesser employees than initially assigned for the XYZ project.

However, if you don’t have anything quantifiable to mention, then don’t shy away showcasing your non-measurable accomplishments like, designed sales strategy for ABC product line, which doubled the no. of sales in my department.

Simply put, don’t just use adjectives such as detail-oriented, strong interpersonal skills for showcasing your strengths; rather, advocate your positive skills with real achievements for a profound impact on the hires, and how you accomplished them can be elaborated during the interview if asked.

For instance:

• Seasoned professional with 10 years of experience in the Information Technology space as a developer and product specialist.

• Hands-on experience in all the phases of software development life cycle from requirements analysis through testing and production support.

• Developed projects for clients such as ABC Insurance, XYZ Bank and so forth.

• Certified in Guidewire ClaimCenter 7.0.4 and Guidewire PolicyCenter 8.0 product implementation in AGILE methodology.

• Raised client satisfaction from 80% to 100% by delivering defect-free products within the time frame and the defined budget.

Quick Note: Do not include an “Objective Statement”, especially for experienced candidates, as recruiters are more interested to know what you can bring to the table rather than what you’re looking for.

Also, Objective Statements are too generic to add any value to the position you are applying for and because of that they have “No place” in resumes these days. However, interns or fresh grads if they are specific about their career needs, can include targeted Objective statement.

Step 2 B – Certifications/Affiliations/Awards/Licenses (Do showcase if you have any, or else skip this step)

For Instance:

• OCA - Oracle Certified Programmer - Associate Java 7

• IBM Certified Database Associate (2000-2003)

Step 3–Professional Experience: The purpose of this sub-section is to let the hires know your work evolution within and across the organizations. Always start with your current or most recent work experience down to the first one. If there are some major employment gaps, justify them in the resume itself to avoid being skeptical, while minor gaps can be clarified during the interview.

Moreover, you can take off your irrelevant past years’ experience from your resume or can summarize non-related work in a line or two to avoid running past the 2-page limit.

Start with your company name(if the company is not well-known, write a line about its nature of operations) and its location (city, state), as well as the month/year you worked there in the same line, followed by a brief description about your project in the next line.

Further down, add the designation, if it is not clear enough, then write the nature of your work in parenthesis. Finally, bullet points your responsibilities and accomplishments for easy skimming.

Something like this:

• Current company name, city, state --- Month-Year to Till date

• Company description (if not well-known)

• Project / Assignment Brief

• Your Designation (Business Function)

• Responsibilities (all major job-related) coupled with your accomplishments (in 5-8 major bullet points)

• List all the technologies used

Quick Note: There is no concept of one-size-fits-all while writing a resume, so customize your resume per the job description (JD) which you are applying for.

Recruiters and the computers scan and match keywords in the JD with the resumes; therefore, ensure you showcase all the required skills and include all the major keywords of the JD in your responsibilities as well, provided you should have real on-the-job experience for them.

NEVER FAKE as you may be caught during the interview discussion and this can jeopardize your real experience as well.

Hiring Managers are always keen to know what impact you created out of your responsibilities, so never miss an opportunity to showcase your accomplishments in bullet points.

For Instance:

• Raised customer satisfaction 20% by reducing turnaround time to answer customer inquiries in last quarter ’19.

• Increased sales performance by 25% in Q2 and Q3 2018 by implementing well-defined sales/marketing programs that elevated the zonal growth.

Always mention your work experience before your education credentials no matter if you are a college graduate or a working professional. The hiring managers and the recruiters prefer to look at your work accomplishments.

However, if you have earned your full-time degree from grade A university; for example, MIT/IIT/Oxford/Harvard then always feel proud to reflect that on top of your experience.

Step 4–Education: The purpose of this sub-section is to let the recruiters know your academics. Bullet all the degrees in reverse order with course and university name and the year in which you attended, its location and GPA (grade point average). If your score is less than 3, don’t mention it.

For Instance:

• MS Information Technology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, 2006 – GPA 3.9

• Master’s in Computer Application, University of Mumbai, India, 2008 – GPA-4.0

Step 5–Extracurricular/Volunteer Work: The purpose of this sub-section is to let the hires know what additional value you can bring along with you. It could be anything from non-profit activities, board activities, mentor-ship programs to volunteer programs, anything that can be useful for hiring companies to know.

Such as:

• Completed the Toastmasters Interpersonal Communication Program,Pune , India

• Volunteered as a basketball coach for two years in YMCA, Chicago, IL.

Quick Note: Stay away from adding hobbies and mentioning references or writing “References on request”. References are asked separately by the recruiters towards the final stages of your selection.

Step 6–Proofreading and Formatting: Its purpose is to let the hires know that you are well-organized and careful about details. As most hires disregard resumes with unclear formatting and with too many typos, avoid them by following these steps:

• First, your personal info should be margined right enough at the top by changing the custom margin to .75’’ under layout menu. This will save you some space but don’t miss to leave adequate white spaces after each section for quick resume scanning.

• Second, use legible font

(Arial/Calibri/Cambria/Georgia/Helvetica/Tahoma) and font size (10-12-point fonts all over and 14-16-point fonts for sub-headings and personal information) for better readability.

Also, ensure a consistent font type and font size throughout the resume. It shouldn’t give a feeling to a hire that you have copied the content from elsewhere.

• Third, recheck your spellings (keep your “spell check” On) and grammar for accuracy. Also, place articles (a/an/the) and punctuation(comma/period) wherever necessary.

• Fourth, you may also insert a light color behind your personal info and sub-section headings to distinguish between sub-sections.

• Fifth, your resume should not sound wordy, omit being repetitive by clubbing similar responsibilities together for different projects.

• Finally, 99% of the time your resume is circulated via email, so save it with your First and last name_ Position Name/Job Code you are applying for; this gets handy for the recruiters when they save it on their system.

By using these six must-have steps, you can create your own unique resume for better outreach and more interview calls by recruiters.

Good Luck!