How to improve your resume in three easy steps

Strong Career Profile

Also known as Career Summary and/or Career Objective. No matter what you call it, you need to get this part right or the hiring manager won’t even bother looking at the rest.

So, what is the main focus of this? Well, in short, it is a few lines of your key highlights, career goals, skills and experience. It is your power punch sales pitch.

In this tiny section you need to meet the selection criteria. Basically, aligning yourself as the companies ideal candidate in terms of experience and future direction. No pressure of course.

Whilst this does seem like a challenge, it really can be easily written up if you know what the hiring manager is looking for. How do you find this key information out? The job ad! The job ad will highlight the selection criteria, experience required and ideal candidate profile. Using that information write up your career story that sells.

Correct Placement

The good old fashion debate – what is more important – education or experience? This answer will vary depending on who you ask.

When it comes to asking Human Resource and Recruitment experts, they would say both are just as important as the other. However, it does all come down to the industry and job specific requirements where the end hiring manager may prefer one more than the other.

So how do you know what you should highlight the most and place what where?

If you pay close attention to the job ad, it will tell you. If the job ad does not include educational requirements (or indicates that there is a preference for some sort of degree), but places more emphasis on experience and skill set, then mark your educational history after your employment history on the last page of your resume. In turn, place your skills and/or highlight experience on the first page before you go into your employment history.

However, if the job ad explicitly requests specific educational background, then swap around the order of your skills and move that to the top page.

Why is this important to know? Because the hiring manager will quickly filter someone based off either their education or specific skill set/experience. So by marking it clearly on the first page will allow the hiring manager to know where you stand on their list of desired candidates and continue to read your resume to learn more about your employment history and so on.